mcp-server-macos-defaults MCP server

MCP server for reading/writing macOS defaults (settings)

Components

Tools

• `list-domains`:
  • equivalent to running `defaults domains`
• `find`:
  • equivalent to running `defaults find `
• `defaults-read`:
  • equivalent to running `defaults read `
  • if `key` is not provided, the entire domain is read
• `defaults-write`:
  • equivalent to running `defaults write `

Quickstart

Install

Claude Desktop

On MacOS: `~/Library/Application\ Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json`

On Windows: `%APPDATA%/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json`

Development/Unpublished Servers Configuration

"mcpServers": {
    "mcp-server-macos-defaults": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "--directory",
        "/path/to/mcp-server-macos-defaults",
        "run",
        "mcp-server-macos-defaults"
      ]
    }
  }

Published Servers Configuration

"mcpServers": {
    "mcp-server-macos-defaults": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": [
        "mcp-server-macos-defaults"
      ]
    }
  }

Development

Building and Publishing

To prepare the package for distribution:

1. Sync dependencies and update lockfile:

uv sync

2. Build package distributions:

uv build

This will create source and wheel distributions in the `dist/` directory.

3. Publish to PyPI:

uv publish

Note: You'll need to set PyPI credentials via environment variables or command flags:

• Token: `--token` or `UV_PUBLISH_TOKEN`
• Or username/password: `--username`/`UV_PUBLISH_USERNAME` and `--password`/`UV_PUBLISH_PASSWORD`

Debugging

Since MCP servers run over stdio, debugging can be challenging. For the best debugging

experience, we strongly recommend using the MCP Inspector.

You can launch the MCP Inspector via `npm` with this command:

npx @modelcontextprotocol/inspector uv --directory /path/to/mcp-server-macos-defaults run mcp-server-macos-defaults

Upon launching, the Inspector will display a URL that you can access in your browser to begin debugging.