scout-mcp

scout, the Model Context Protocol server diagnostic, as MCP tools — so an agent can evaluate a server, or check an attestation about one, from inside the editor. Read-only, allowlisted, and it never sends a credential.

Contents

Getting started

• Install — go install, the container image, and an MCP host configuration
• Requirements — scout itself, and the Go floor to build from source
• Quick Start — ask the agent to evaluate a local server

The scout-mcp ecosystem

• The scout-mcp ecosystem — scout, scout-reporting, scout-action, scout-mcp, scout-lsp, scout-census at a glance

Reference

• Capabilities at a glance — the three tools and the protocol surface
• Ecosystem comparison — beside running scout yourself
• Benchmarks — what the server adds to a run
• Features — the allowlist, no credentials, read-only
• Configuration — two flags and their environment variables
• Examples — tool calls and results

Operational

• When not to use scout-mcp — limitations
• Development — make targets, CI
• Security — what an agent can and cannot make it do
• Documentation — all reference docs
• Stability guarantees — tool names, arguments and results
• License

Install

scout_check runs the scout program. scout must be installed and on PATH, or named with --scout, for that tool to work; the container image carries it. scout_verify_attestation needs nothing but scout-mcp.

As a Go program

go install github.com/sebastienrousseau/scout-mcp/cmd/scout-mcp@v0.0.8
go install github.com/sebastienrousseau/scout/cmd/scout@v0.0.8

Release binaries for Linux, macOS and Windows on amd64 and arm64 are on the releases page, with signed checksums and SLSA provenance.

As a container image

docker pull ghcr.io/sebastienrousseau/scout-mcp:0.0.8

The image is scout's own release image with scout-mcp added: distroless, non-root, linux/amd64 and linux/arm64, with scout at /usr/local/bin/scout and scout-mcp started with --scout pointing at it.

In an MCP host

scout-mcp speaks MCP over stdio, so a host starts it as a child process. For Claude Desktop (claude_desktop_config.json), Claude Code (.mcp.json) and other hosts that read an mcpServers block:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "scout": {
      "command": "scout-mcp",
      "args": ["--allow", ".internal.example.com"]
    }
  }
}

With the container image instead:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "scout": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": ["run", "-i", "--rm", "ghcr.io/sebastienrousseau/scout-mcp:0.0.8"]
    }
  }
}

Inside a container, loopback is the container itself. To evaluate a server on the host, run the container with --network host on Linux, or point at host.docker.internal and add -e SCOUT_MCP_ALLOW=host.docker.internal to the arguments.

The server is listed in the official MCP Registry as io.github.sebastienrousseau/scout-mcp; server.json is that listing.

Requirements

The Go floor is raised only when a release needs a language feature, on a patch release like everything else pre-1.0, and the changelog says so.

Quick Start

go install github.com/sebastienrousseau/scout-mcp/cmd/scout-mcp@v0.0.8
go install github.com/sebastienrousseau/scout/cmd/scout@v0.0.8
claude mcp add scout -- scout-mcp

Then, with an MCP server of your own listening on http://127.0.0.1:3000/mcp, ask the agent:

Evaluate my MCP server at http://127.0.0.1:3000/mcp with scout and fix what fails.

The agent calls scout_check, which runs scout check http://127.0.0.1:3000/mcp --auth none --output json and returns the score, the grade and every failing check with its detail and a link to the fix. Loopback needs no configuration; any other host must be named with --allow first.

The scout-mcp ecosystem

One engine, three surfaces, five satellites. This repository is the distribution surface: its deliverable is a registry listing, so scout is where agents look for tools.

The family manifest lives in scout at docs/ecosystem.md; make family checks this repository's row against it. Every lockstep repository carries scout's version; this one wraps scout's release, so its version is scout's latest, exactly.

Capabilities at a glance

Ecosystem comparison

The alternative is running scout in a terminal and pasting the report into the conversation, or poking the server by hand in an inspector. scout-mcp is the first with the decisions made for an agent: which hosts it may reach, that no credential travels, and a result sized for a context window.

Benchmarks

The server adds a process start and a JSON round trip to a run; the run itself is scout's, and bounded at five minutes. Measured with hyperfine on the binaries built from this tree.