$ cat $ZE_INIT_INPUT
admin
secret123
127.0.0.1
2222
ze-demo
$ ze init < $ZE_INIT_INPUT
$ ze config list
ze.conf
$ ze data check

$ ssh ze-demo show bgp

$ ssh ze-demo
ze# set environment cli format default table
ze# show | compare
ze# commit
Session committed
ze# exit
ze> exit
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp'
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | text'
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | display router-id local-as peers-established'
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | display router-id | fill alpha'
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | peers'
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | raw' | head -14
$ ze cli -c 'show bgp | raw' | ze pipe text

The five lines answer `ze init`'s prompts in order: username, password, host, port, and name. It reads them from a file here so the recording is reproducible, and it prints nothing when its input is not a terminal, so the file is shown first rather than left as an unexplained redirection. `ze init` creates `database.zefs`. The first BGP summary uses the default text format. The SSH editor commits the format setting back to ZeFS, not to a second flat file, and the same operational command immediately uses the committed default. The last commands show the two ways to override that default, and they are different pipes. `show bgp | text` is Ze's own operator, inside the quoted command, and it wins over the committed setting. Then `| raw` on its own shows what every one of these renderings is made from: the payload as the daemon holds it, unrendered. The last command sends that same payload across a real shell pipe, and `ze pipe text` formats it on this side, which is how output captured earlier is formatted later. The command is `ze pipe` rather than `ze format` because the operator language also carries `match`, `count`, `first`, `last` and `resolve`, so `format` would name one clause of it. Every command answers with structured data, so `text`, `table`, `json`, `yaml` and `ndjson` all render the same payload. Three commands in the middle choose WHICH of that payload to read. `display` names the fields wanted, in the order wanted, and shows those alone. `fill` brings back the fields it did not name, and `alpha` orders them by field name. `peers` is an alias, which is a name for a pipe expression, so one word answers the per-peer rows without the totals beside them. Each command declares its own column order, so a table leads with the fields an operator reads first rather than with the alphabet.