MCP CLI

MCP-CLI

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

Commands

| Command | Output |

| ---------------------------------- | ------------------------------- |

| mcp-cli | List all servers and tool names |

| mcp-cli <server> | Show tools with parameters |

| mcp-cli <server>/<tool> | Get tool JSON schema |

| mcp-cli <server>/<tool> '<json>' | Call tool with arguments |

| mcp-cli grep "<glob>" | Search tools by name |

Add -d to include descriptions (e.g., mcp-cli filesystem -d)

Workflow

• Discover: mcp-cli → see available servers and tools
• Explore: mcp-cli <server> → see tools with parameters
• Inspect: mcp-cli <server>/<tool> → get full JSON input schema
• Execute: mcp-cli <server>/<tool> '<json>' → run with arguments

Examples

# List all servers and tool names
mcp-cli

# See all tools with parameters
mcp-cli filesystem

# With descriptions (more verbose)
mcp-cli filesystem -d

# Get JSON schema for specific tool
mcp-cli filesystem/read_file

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

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

# JSON output for parsing
mcp-cli filesystem/read_file '{"path": "./README.md"}' --json

# Complex JSON with quotes (use heredoc or stdin)
mcp-cli server/tool <<EOF
{"content": "Text with 'quotes' inside"}
EOF

# Or pipe from a file/command
cat args.json | mcp-cli server/tool

# Find all TypeScript files and read the first one
mcp-cli filesystem/search_files '{"path": "src/", "pattern": "*.ts"}' --json | jq -r '.content[0].text' | head -1 | xargs -I {} sh -c 'mcp-cli filesystem/read_file "{\"path\": \"{}\"}"'

Options

| Flag | Purpose |

| ------------ | ------------------------- |

| -j, --json | JSON output for scripting |

| -r, --raw | Raw text content |

| -d | Include descriptions |

Exit Codes

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