github-cli provides an executable called ghi, that can be used to access all of GitHub's documented Issues API (v2) functionality from your command-line

github-cli is written in Python

on most UNIX-like systems, you'll probably need to run the following `install` commands as root or by using sudo

pip

pip install github-cli

easy_install

easy_install github-cli

from source

pip install -e git://github.com/jsmits/github-cli.git#egg=github-cli

or

git clone git://github.com/jsmits/github-cli.git
cd github-cli
python setup.py install

as a result, the ghi executable will be installed into a system bin directory

make sure your GitHub username and API token are added to the global git config:

git config --global github.user <your GitHub username>
git config --global github.token <your GitHub API token>

or you can specify the environment variables GITHUB_USER and GITHUB_TOKEN

you can find the username and API token on your GitHub's account page

from within a working directory with a remote that is hosted on GitHub (remote named either origin or github for git repositories or default or github for mercurial/hg-git repositories), you can do this (note: with the -r option, commands can be invoked from anywhere):

(github-cli)[jsmits@imac:~]$ ghi --help
Usage: ghi command [args] [options]

Examples:
ghi list [-s open|closed|all]       show open, closed or all issues
                                    (default: open)
ghi [-s o|c|a] -v                   same as above, but with issue details
ghi                                 same as: ghi list
ghi -v                              same as: ghi list -v
ghi [-s o|c] -w                     show issues' GitHub page in web browser
                                    (default: open)
ghi show <nr>                       show issue <nr>
ghi show <nr> -v                    same as above, but with comments
ghi <nr>                            same as: ghi show <nr>
ghi <nr> -w                         show issue <nr>'s GitHub page in web
                                    browser
ghi open (o)                        create a new issue (with $EDITOR)
ghi open (o) -m <msg>               create a new issue with <msg> content
                                    (optionally, use \n for new lines; first
                                    line will be the issue title)
ghi close (c) <nr>                  close issue <nr>
ghi open (o) <nr>                   reopen issue <nr>
ghi edit (e) <nr>                   edit issue <nr> (with $EDITOR)
ghi label add (al) <label> <nr>     add <label> to issue <nr>
ghi label remove (rl) <label> <nr>  remove <label> from issue <nr>
ghi search (s) <term>               search for <term> (default: open)
ghi s <term> [-s o|c] -v            same as above, but with details
ghi s <term> -s closed              only search in closed issues
ghi comment (m) <nr>                create a comment for issue <nr>
                                    (with $EDITOR)
ghi -r <user>/<repo>                specify a repository (can be used for
                                    all commands)
ghi -r <repo>                       specify a repository (gets user from
                                    global git config)

Description: command-line interface to GitHub's Issues API (v2)

Options:
  -h, --help            show this help message and exit
  -v, --verbose         show issue details (only for show, list and search
                        commands) [default: False]
  -s STATE, --state=STATE
                        specify state (only for list and search (except `all`)
                        commands) choices are: open (o), closed (c), all (a)
                        [default: open]
  -m MESSAGE, --message=MESSAGE
                        message content for opening an issue without using the
                        editor
  -r REPO, --repo=REPO, --repository=REPO
                        specify a repository (format: `user/repo` or just
                        `repo` (latter will get the user from the global git
                        config))
  -w, --web, --webbrowser
                        show issue(s) GitHub page in web browser (only for
                        list and show commands) [default: False]
  -V, --version         show program's version number and exit