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name: firebase-basics description: >- Firebase CLI foundation for any project. Use when checking Firebase CLI version, authenticating with Firebase, setting active projects, initializing Firebase services, or running Firebase MCP commands. Triggers: firebase login, firebase use, firebase projects list, firebase init, firebase MCP, Firebase CLI setup, Firebase emulator start. allowed-tools: Bash, Read

Iron Law

NEVER use the naked firebase binary — always npx -y firebase-tools@latest <cmd>.

This guarantees the latest CLI version is used without polluting global node_modules. Every command in this skill prepends npx -y firebase-tools@latest.

Project Context

Check the project's CLAUDE.md to understand which Firebase services are in use and any project-specific constraints (e.g. which services are intentionally NOT used, whether Firestore is used as a canonical store or a status bus only, etc.).

Firebase project ID should be stored in an environment variable (e.g. FIREBASE_PROJECT_ID) — never hardcoded.

Prerequisites

1. Local Environment Setup:

   npx -y firebase-tools@latest --version
   

   Read references/local-env-setup.md for full setup.

2. Authentication:

   npx -y firebase-tools@latest login
   # Headless / remote shell:
   npx -y firebase-tools@latest login --no-localhost
   

3. Active Project:

   npx -y firebase-tools@latest use
   # Set project from env var (preferred):
   npx -y firebase-tools@latest use --add ${FIREBASE_PROJECT_ID}
   

Firebase Usage Principles

1. npx always: npx -y firebase-tools@latest <cmd> — never bare firebase
2. Consult Firebase MCP first: Use developerknowledge_search_documents before falling back to web search or memory
3. Use Firebase MCP tools for remote API calls: Crashlytics, Firestore queries, project management — always MCP, never manual REST calls
4. Emulator for local dev: Set FIREBASE_AUTH_EMULATOR_HOST and related emulator environment variables — without them, Admin SDK calls hit production Firebase with dev tokens

References

• Initialize services: references/firebase-service-init.md
• CLI commands: references/firebase-cli-guide.md
• Local env setup: references/local-env-setup.md

Related Skills

• flutter-mobile — Firebase Auth integration in Flutter apps
• firebase-hosting-basics — deploy static SPA to Firebase Hosting
• security-reviewer — Firestore Security Rules audit