MCP CLI

MCP-CLI

Access MCP servers through the command line. MCP enables interaction with external systems like GitHub, filesystems, databases, and APIs.

Commands

Both formats work: <server> <tool> or <server>/<tool>.

Workflow

1. Discover: mcp-cli to see available servers.
2. Explore: mcp-cli info <server> to see tools with parameters.
3. Inspect: mcp-cli info <server> <tool> to get full JSON schema.
4. Execute: mcp-cli call <server> <tool> '<json>' to run with arguments.

Examples

# List all servers
mcp-cli

# With descriptions
mcp-cli -d

# See server tools
mcp-cli info filesystem

# Get tool schema (both formats work)
mcp-cli info filesystem read_file
mcp-cli info filesystem/read_file

# Call tool
mcp-cli call filesystem read_file '{"path": "./README.md"}'

# Pipe from stdin (no '-' needed)
cat args.json | mcp-cli call filesystem read_file

# Search for tools
mcp-cli grep "*file*"

# Output is raw text (pipe-friendly)
mcp-cli call filesystem read_file '{"path": "./file"}' | head -10

Advanced Chaining

# Chain: search files -> read first match
mcp-cli call filesystem search_files '{"path": ".", "pattern": "*.md"}' \
  | head -1 \
  | xargs -I {} mcp-cli call filesystem read_file '{"path": "{}"}'

# Loop: process multiple files
mcp-cli call filesystem list_directory '{"path": "./src"}' \
  | while read f; do mcp-cli call filesystem read_file "{\"path\": \"$f\"}"; done

# Conditional: check before reading
mcp-cli call filesystem list_directory '{"path": "."}' \
  | grep -q "README" \
  && mcp-cli call filesystem read_file '{"path": "./README.md"}'

# Multi-server aggregation
{
  mcp-cli call github search_repositories '{"query": "mcp", "per_page": 3}'
  mcp-cli call filesystem list_directory '{"path": "."}'
}

# Save to file
mcp-cli call github get_file_contents '{"owner": "x", "repo": "y", "path": "z"}' > output.txt

Note: call outputs raw text content directly (often no jq needed for text extraction).

Options

Common Errors

Exit Codes

• 0: Success
• 1: Client error (bad args, missing config)
• 2: Server error (tool failed)
• 3: Network error