Skip to content

mcp-server.md

Latest commit

 

History

History
186 lines (136 loc) · 3.01 KB

mcp-server.md

File metadata and controls

186 lines (136 loc) · 3.01 KB
id mcp-server
title MCP Server
sidebar_position 2

MCP Server

Use beads in MCP-only environments.

When to Use MCP

Use MCP server when CLI is unavailable:

  • Claude Desktop (no shell access)
  • Sourcegraph Amp without shell
  • Other MCP-only environments

Prefer CLI + hooks when shell is available - it's more context efficient.

Installation

Using uv (Recommended)

uv tool install beads-mcp

Using pip

pip install beads-mcp

Configuration

Claude Desktop (macOS)

Add to ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "beads": {
      "command": "beads-mcp"
    }
  }
}

Claude Desktop (Windows)

Add to %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "beads": {
      "command": "beads-mcp"
    }
  }
}

Sourcegraph Amp

Add to MCP settings:

{
  "beads": {
    "command": "beads-mcp",
    "args": []
  }
}

VS Code / GitHub Copilot

Create .vscode/mcp.json in your project:

{
  "servers": {
    "beads": {
      "command": "beads-mcp"
    }
  }
}

For all projects: Add to VS Code user-level MCP config:

Platform Path
macOS ~/Library/Application Support/Code/User/mcp.json
Linux ~/.config/Code/User/mcp.json
Windows %APPDATA%\Code\User\mcp.json 
{
  "servers": {
    "beads": {
      "command": "beads-mcp",
      "args": []
    }
  }
}

Note: Requires VS Code 1.96+ with MCP support enabled.

See GitHub Copilot Integration for complete setup guide.

Available Tools

The MCP server exposes these tools:

Tool Description
beads_create Create new issue
beads_list List issues
beads_show Show issue details
beads_update Update issue
beads_close Close issue
beads_ready Show ready work
beads_sync Sync to git
beads_dep_add Add dependency
beads_dep_tree Show dependency tree

Usage

Once configured, use naturally:

Create an issue for fixing the login bug with priority 1

The MCP server translates to appropriate bd commands.

Trade-offs

Aspect CLI + Hooks MCP Server
Context overhead ~1-2k tokens 10-50k tokens
Latency Direct calls MCP protocol
Setup Hooks config MCP config
Availability Shell required MCP environments

Troubleshooting

Server won't start

Check if beads-mcp is in PATH:

which beads-mcp

If not found:

# Reinstall
pip uninstall beads-mcp
pip install beads-mcp

Tools not appearing

  1. Restart Claude Desktop
  2. Check MCP config JSON syntax
  3. Verify server path

Permission errors

# Check directory permissions
ls -la .beads/

# Initialize if needed
bd init --quiet

See Also