MSBuild MCP Server

A lightweight MCP (Model Context Protocol) server for automating MSBuild projects and solutions builds. It dynamically locates MSBuild and provides customizable build configuration options.

Features

Dynamic MSBuild Discovery: Automatically detects the MSBuild executable, ensuring compatibility with various Visual Studio installations.
Customizable Build Settings: Easily configure build options such as configuration, platform, verbosity level, parallel build CPU count, NuGet restore, and additional command-line arguments through LLM-driven tool invocation.
Clear Error Reporting: Filters and presents concise, relevant error messages upon build failures.
MCP Client Compatibility: Supports seamless integration with popular MCP clients such as VSCode, Cursor, Windsurf, and more. Configuration snippets for these clients are provided in the documentation.
Cross-Language Support: Supports MSBuild-compatible projects, including .sln, .csproj, and .vcxproj files, enabling builds for languages like C#, C++, and more across Windows platforms.

Prerequisites

Ensure the following prerequisites are installed:

Python 3.11 or higher
Visual Studio or Visual Studio Build Tools (for MSBuild)
uv (recommended)

Registering the MCP Server

Ensure uv is installed.

In the MCP settings of your AI tools (e.g., Cursor, Windsurf, Claude Desktop, etc.), add the following configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "msbuild-mcp-server": {
      "command": "uvx",
      "args": [
        "msbuild-mcp-server@latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Place this snippet in your client configuration file: - VSCode: .vscode/mcp.json - Cursor: ~/.cursor/mcp.json or <project-root>/.cursor/mcp.json - Windsurf: ~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json

Restart your tool to ensure that the msbuild-mcp-server and its provided tools are properly registered.

Agent Prompt Examples

AI agents can trigger builds using natural language like:

Basic Project Build

"Build this solution at C:/Path/To/Project.sln using Release|x64."
Unreal Engine Build

"Build the solution located at C:/Projects/MyGame/MyGame.sln using Development Editor|Win64."