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MCP Sidecar for VS Code

io.github.lsequeiraa/mcp-sidecar

Cross-platform MCP server for managing long-lived background processes from any MCP client

client:VS Code transport:stdio runtime:npm

Install MCP Sidecar in VS Code

.vscode/mcp.json

{
  "inputs": [
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-max-processes",
      "description": "SIDECAR_MAX_PROCESSES",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-buffer-size",
      "description": "SIDECAR_BUFFER_SIZE",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-kill-timeout",
      "description": "SIDECAR_KILL_TIMEOUT",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-cleanup-after",
      "description": "SIDECAR_CLEANUP_AFTER",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-max-output-size",
      "description": "SIDECAR_MAX_OUTPUT_SIZE",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-allowed-executables",
      "description": "SIDECAR_ALLOWED_EXECUTABLES",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-blocked-patterns",
      "description": "SIDECAR_BLOCKED_PATTERNS",
      "password": true
    },
    {
      "type": "promptString",
      "id": "sidecar-audit-log",
      "description": "SIDECAR_AUDIT_LOG",
      "password": true
    }
  ],
  "servers": {
    "mcp-sidecar": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "mcp-sidecar"
      ],
      "env": {
        "SIDECAR_MAX_PROCESSES": "${input:sidecar-max-processes}",
        "SIDECAR_BUFFER_SIZE": "${input:sidecar-buffer-size}",
        "SIDECAR_KILL_TIMEOUT": "${input:sidecar-kill-timeout}",
        "SIDECAR_CLEANUP_AFTER": "${input:sidecar-cleanup-after}",
        "SIDECAR_MAX_OUTPUT_SIZE": "${input:sidecar-max-output-size}",
        "SIDECAR_ALLOWED_EXECUTABLES": "${input:sidecar-allowed-executables}",
        "SIDECAR_BLOCKED_PATTERNS": "${input:sidecar-blocked-patterns}",
        "SIDECAR_AUDIT_LOG": "${input:sidecar-audit-log}"
      }
    }
  }
}

VS Code prompts for each input the first time the server starts, so no secret is written to the file. VS Code docs

MCP Sidecar in other clients