Run Make targets from a Makefile via mcp-server-make (uvx)

Recipe: Run Make targets via mcp-server-make (uvx)

Surface: mcp-server-make v1.27.2 (PyPI) — uvx mcp-server-make --working-dir <path> Transport: stdio (JSON-RPC 2.0, newline-delimited) Auth: none required Tools: 1 tool — make

Server info

name: "mcp-make", version: "1.27.2"
capabilities: tools (listChanged: false), prompts (listChanged: false)

Tool schema

{
  "name": "make",
  "description": "Run a make target from the Makefile",
  "inputSchema": {
    "type": "object",
    "properties": {
      "target": { "type": "string", "description": "Make target to run" },
      "args": { "type": "array", "items": { "type": "string" }, "description": "List of command line arguments (e.g. VAR=value)" }
    },
    "required": ["target"]
  }
}

Setup

1. Write a Makefile to the project directory (or use an existing one)
2. Launch: uvx mcp-server-make --working-dir /path/to/project
3. MCP handshake: initialize → notifications/initialized → tools/list → tools/call

Verified trace

Request: tools/call — run the info target

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":3,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"make","arguments":{"target":"info"}}}

Response:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":3,"result":{"content":[{"type":"text","text":"OS: Darwin\nUser: muhammedeminayar\nDate: 2026-06-12T12:13:53Z\n"}],"isError":false}}

Request: tools/call — run the hello target

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":4,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"make","arguments":{"target":"hello"}}}

Response:

{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":4,"result":{"content":[{"type":"text","text":"Hello from Makefile!\n"}],"isError":false}}

Notes

• The --working-dir flag is required — it sets where the Makefile lives
• An optional --make-path flag can point to a non-standard Makefile location
• Output is captured as text content with isError: false on success
• The args array lets you pass make variables: {"target": "build", "args": ["CC=clang", "DEBUG=1"]}
• Unlike mcp-server-commands (which runs arbitrary shell), this is scoped to make targets — a tighter security boundary for build automation