ClarifyDoc Install

For AI agents · Claude Desktop

ClarifyDoc in Claude Desktop. One command, then ask.

Give Claude Desktop (the Claude app for macOS and Windows) a map of your codebase: which screen calls an endpoint, which tables it touches, what an edit breaks. It asks ClarifyDoc’s MCP server and gets short answers with path:line references instead of reading whole files. Local, read-only, no account.

npm install -g clarifydoc && clarifydoc install . --client claude-desktop
// claude_desktop_config.json — what clarifydoc install . --client claude-desktop writes
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "clarifydoc": {
      "command": "clarifydoc",
      "args": [
        "mcp",
        "/path/to/your/project"
      ]
    }
  }
}

SET IT UP

From install to the first answer

  1. Install ClarifyDoc and connect Claude Desktop

    The CLI is on npm and needs Node.js. From the project root, the second command merges the entry into Claude Desktop’s config and keeps everything else in it. Add --print to see what it would write first.

    npm install -g clarifydoc && clarifydoc install . --client claude-desktop

    With the VS Code extension instead: VS Code’s ClarifyDoc: Set Up MCP for an AI Agent… → Claude Desktop writes this entry too, pointed at the extension’s own launcher.

  2. Where the entry goes

    macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
    Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

    This file serves every project, so the entry names one by path. Run the command again from another project and it adds a second entry, clarifydoc-<folder>, beside the first. Written by the installer, the entry starts the CLI by its absolute path, since an app started from the dock may not have your shell’s PATH.

    {
  "mcpServers": {
    "clarifydoc": {
      "command": "clarifydoc",
      "args": [
        "mcp",
        "/path/to/your/project"
      ]
    }
  }
}

  3. Reload Claude Desktop

    Quit Claude Desktop completely and open it again; closing the window is not enough.

  4. Ask the first question

    Type this as it is. If the project has no analysis yet, the first call makes one; a large repository can take a few minutes, and every analysis after it reads only the files that changed. To have it ready first, run clarifydoc analyze . from the project root.

    Call clarifydoc_status, then use clarifydoc_routes to pick one API route. Tell me which screen calls it and which tables it reads and writes, with path:line for each.

    Then one about your own change:

    Before I change <a file you know>, what depends on it and which tests should I run?

  5. Check that it worked

    clarifydoc_status answers with the project root, when it was analyzed and how many routes, screens and tables were found. If it says no analysis was found, the server is looking at another folder: start Claude Desktop from the project root, or check the path in the entry.

    The tools menu in a new chat lists clarifydoc and its tools.

  6. Keep it current

    Ask the agent to call clarifydoc_analyze, or run clarifydoc analyze . --incremental: either re-reads only the files that changed. clarifydoc install --git-hooks does it in the background after each commit, merge and branch checkout. To update ClarifyDoc itself, npm install -g clarifydoc@latest (the extension updates itself, and its launcher keeps its path), then reload Claude Desktop.

  7. Remove it

    Delete the clarifydoc entry (or clarifydoc-<folder>) from claude_desktop_config.json. Delete .clarifydoc/ in the project, and npm uninstall -g clarifydoc. If you asked for them, --guidance wrote between <!-- clarifydoc:start --> and <!-- clarifydoc:end --> in AGENTS.md, and --git-hooks between # clarifydoc:start and # clarifydoc:end in the repository’s git hooks. Nothing else is written.

OPTIONAL

More than the server

Each is a flag on the same clarifydoc install command, off unless you ask for it, and --print shows it before anything is written.

A section in AGENTS.md

--guidance adds a short, marked section to AGENTS.md that tells agents when to ask the map instead of searching text, and what this project’s analysis says to know first. It edits a file your team shares, so --print it first.

WHAT IT ANSWERS

23 tools, all read-only but two

Routes and who calls them, the tables a screen reads and writes, the call path between two functions, what a diff reaches, one function’s source instead of its file. Only clarifydoc_analyze and clarifydoc_diff write, and only to .clarifydoc/. Nothing leaves your machine — every network request any part can make.

Every tool Open a live report

OTHER HOSTS

The same server, elsewhere

Claude CodeVS CodeCursorWindsurfCodexGemini CLICopilot CLIZedOpenCodeClineInstructions for an agent (setup.md)