Install Python package
OK, CAT seems cool. What do I do to start using it?
Prerequisites
.NET runtime (.NET 8)
This is a crucial prerequisite, but it is easy and quick to install. If you will not be able to install .NET runtime for any reason, you’ll not be able to use CAT from Python.
The easiest way to install .NET runtime is to use WinGet:
winget install Microsoft.DotNet.Runtime.8
Alternatively you can install from this web: https://dotnet.microsoft.com/en-us/download/dotnet/8.0. Find .NET RUNTIME 8.* section and download and install x64 version:
It is simple next, next, next.
Install CAT
CAT is distributed as a Python package. Name of the package is justcatit. It is available in PyPI index and you can install it like this:
py -m pip install justcatit
One-time setup
CAT command-line tools are available in the Team plan (interactive usage only, no schedulers or CI/CD) and in the Enterprise plan (no technical limits). Go to CAT Portal and activate a free trial for Team or Enterprise plan — no credit card needed.
If you activated the Team plan trial:
- Sign up at CAT Portal.
- Go to Developer → Personal access tokens and generate a token.
- Set it using
setx CAT_PORTAL_TOKEN "paste-your-token-here"and restart your terminal.
If you activated the Enterprise plan trial:
- Get the license key that arrived in your email.
- Set it from your Python code using
cat.set_instance("your-key").
The token is used for signing in only — except feature-usage telemetry, no data is sent to CAT Portal. A license key removes the need to sign in, and CAT can then work even without Internet access.
What Next?
OK, you now have CAT Python package installed. In the next step, create a sample project and explore it.