Squiggles

squiggles

Let your agent see the squiggles you'd see in an IDE.

squiggles is an MCP server that bridges coding agents to Language Server Protocol (LSP) servers. Configure one or more LSP servers and squiggles exposes their features — diagnostics, go-to-definition, find references, rename, formatting, and more — as MCP tools. Servers start lazily on first tool use, so there's no startup cost for languages you don't touch.

Beyond the standard protocol, squiggles unlocks the custom superpowers each language server ships that editors rarely surface and agents otherwise never see: expanding a Rust macro, discovering Ruby tests, switching between a C++ source file and its header, fixing every import after moving a TypeScript file, running govulncheck through gopls.

Quick Start

claude mcp add squiggles -- npx -y squiggles

Then, in your project root:

npx squiggles init

This writes a squiggles.yaml for the languages it finds (a tsconfig.json means TypeScript, a Cargo.toml means Rust, and so on). Name the servers to choose them yourself: npx squiggles init typescript ruby. Presets exist for typescript, rust, ruby, go, python, cpp and lua; each needs its language server on PATH, and init prints the install command for every one it writes.

The result for a TypeScript project:

servers:
  typescript:
    command: ["typescript-language-server", "--stdio"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.ts", "**/*.tsx", "**/*.js", "**/*.jsx"]

Configuration

squiggles looks for squiggles.yaml, squiggles.yml, .squiggles.yaml, or .squiggles.yml in the project root (the old mclsp.yaml names still work). Each server entry supports:

| Field | Required | Description | |---|---|---| | command | Yes | Command to start the LSP server (string array) | | filePatterns | Yes | Glob patterns for files this server handles | | initializationOptions | No | Options passed to the LSP server on initialization | | rootUri | No | Override the workspace root URI | | env | No | Environment variables for the LSP server process |

Multiple servers can be configured for different languages:

servers:
  typescript:
    command: ["typescript-language-server", "--stdio"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.ts", "**/*.tsx", "**/*.js", "**/*.jsx"]
  rust:
    command: ["rust-analyzer"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.rs"]
  ruby:
    command: ["ruby-lsp"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.rb"]
  go:
    command: ["gopls"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.go", "go.mod", "go.sum"]
  cpp:
    command: ["clangd"]
    filePatterns: ["**/*.c", "**/*.h", "**/*.cpp", "**/*.hpp"]

Tools

All standard LSP tools are registered and available when a matching server is configured.

Navigation: goto_definition, goto_type_definition, goto_implementation, goto_declaration, find_references

Inspection: hover, signature_help, document_symbols, workspace_symbols

Refactoring: code_actions, rename_prepare, rename, format

Hierarchy: call_hierarchy_incoming, call_hierarchy_outgoing, type_hierarchy

Always available: open_file, diagnostics

Position-based tools take file (relative path), line (1-indexed), and col (1-indexed). rename accepts apply: true to write the edit to disk instead of returning it; format always writes to disk. code_actions automatically passes the diagnostics overlapping the requested range, so quick fixes show up.

Server Extensions

The best language servers go far beyond the standard protocol, and this is where squiggles earns its keep: it subscribes to the custom methods and commands that IDE plugins use but agent harnesses ignore. Extension tools register automatically when a matching server is configured.

Ruby (ruby-lsp)

| Tool | What it does | |---|---| | ruby_discover_tests | Discover test cases (Minitest, RSpec) in a file | | ruby_go_to_relevant_file | Jump between implementation and test file | | ruby_show_syntax_tree | Show the Prism AST for a file | | ruby_dependencies | List project gem dependencies |

TypeScript (typescript-language-server)

| Tool | What it does | |---|---| | ts_go_to_source_definition | Go to the implementation, not the .d.ts declaration | | ts_organize_imports | Sort and prune imports, written to disk | | ts_rename_file | Fix every import after a file moves — move the file, then call this |

typescript-language-server needs a typescript install it can find (usually the workspace's own). TypeScript 7 ships no tsserver.js, so keep typescript@5 in the workspace for now.

Rust (rust-analyzer)

| Tool | What it does | |---|---| | rust_expand_macro | Show the code a macro invocation generates | | rust_parent_module | Navigate to the parent module | | rust_open_cargo_toml | Find the owning crate's Cargo.toml | | rust_external_docs | Get docs.rs / rustdoc URLs for a symbol | | rust_related_tests | Find tests covering a position | | rust_view_syntax_tree | Show the syntax tree for a file | | rust_runnables | List runnable targets (tests, binaries, doctests) | | rust_reload_workspace | Reload Cargo metadata after editing Cargo.toml | | rust_dependencies | List all crates in the dependency graph |

Go (gopls)

| Tool | What it does | |---|---| | go_list_known_packages | List packages importable from a file | | go_list_imports | List a file's imports and its package | | go_add_import | Add an import, written to disk | | go_mod_tidy | Run go mod tidy | | go_vulncheck | Run govulncheck against the module | | go_modules | List modules under a directory |

C/C++ (clangd)

| Tool | What it does | |---|---| | clangd_switch_source_header | Jump between source and header | | clangd_symbol_info | Get USR and symbol details | | clangd_ast | Show the Clang AST for a range |

When a server applies changes itself (organize imports, add import, rename file), squiggles receives the workspace edit and writes it to disk, keeping the server's view of the files in sync.

Contributing Extensions

To add extensions for a new language server, create a file in src/extensions/ (e.g. src/extensions/zig.ts):

import { executeCommand, type ServerExtension } from "./index.js";

const extensions: ServerExtension[] = [
  {
    name: "zls_something",
    description: "What this does",
    input: "position", // "none" | "file" | "position" | "custom"
    request: ({ uri, position }) => ({
      method: "zls/customMethod",
      params: { textDocument: { uri }, position },
    }),
  },
];

export default extensions;

request receives the opened file's URI, absolute path, and 0-indexed position, and returns the LSP request to send — use the executeCommand helper for servers that expose functionality as workspace/executeCommand commands. Register the module in src/extensions/index.ts under the server's binary name.

Migrating from mclsp

squiggles is the project formerly published as mclsp. Point your MCP config at npx -y squiggles and rename mclsp.yaml to squiggles.yaml — the old config names keep working, the tool names are unchanged.

License

MIT

Source & license

This open-source MCP server is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: carldaws
• Source: carldaws/squiggles
• License: MIT

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.