Try the demo

Use the demo when you want to prove that your MCP host can start Electron Stagewright and drive a real Electron app before pointing it at your own project. It is a small local task board with a modal form, mutable list, and second window; it makes no network requests and carries no credentials.

Install the pinned demo beside core, Playwright, and Electron. The --demo flag remains opt-in: a normal core installation neither loads nor depends on this package.

Start it from the published packages

Prepare a fresh npx cache in a terminal before adding this command to an MCP host. Electron downloads its binary the first time something loads it and prints progress to stdout, so fetch it with install-electron first, outside the stdio protocol, then confirm with doctor. Keep --prefix ~/ in every command so npx installs the whole list even inside a project that already has Playwright or Electron:

npx -y --prefix ~/ \
  --package @electron-stagewright/core@0.8.1 \
  --package @electron-stagewright/demo@0.1.0 \
  --package playwright@1.63.0 \
  --package electron@42.11.10 \
  install-electron
npx -y --prefix ~/ \
  --package @electron-stagewright/core@0.8.1 \
  --package @electron-stagewright/demo@0.1.0 \
  --package playwright@1.63.0 \
  --package electron@42.11.10 \
  electron-stagewright doctor --json

doctor should report "ok": true. Then use the same package list with electron-stagewright --demo in the host configuration. The package set is deliberately pinned: update all four versions together after validating a new release. To run from a built checkout instead, use:

node /absolute/path/to/electron-stagewright/packages/core/dist/cli.js --demo

Configure a host

Use npx as the command and include the demo package before the CLI and --demo flag.

Claude Code

claude mcp add electron-stagewright-demo -- \
  npx -y --prefix ~/ --package @electron-stagewright/core@0.8.1 \
  --package @electron-stagewright/demo@0.1.0 --package playwright@1.63.0 \
  --package electron@42.11.10 electron-stagewright --demo

Claude Desktop

Add this entry to claude_desktop_config.json, then fully restart Claude Desktop:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "electron-stagewright-demo": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": [
        "-y",
        "--prefix",
        "~/",
        "--package",
        "@electron-stagewright/core@0.8.1",
        "--package",
        "@electron-stagewright/demo@0.1.0",
        "--package",
        "playwright@1.63.0",
        "--package",
        "electron@42.11.10",
        "electron-stagewright",
        "--demo"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Cursor

Add the same entry to .cursor/mcp.json (project-scoped) or ~/.cursor/mcp.json, then reload Cursor:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "electron-stagewright-demo": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/electron-stagewright/packages/core/dist/cli.js", "--demo"]
    }
  }
}

Any other MCP host

Configure the same command and args in the host's stdio-server format. With a built checkout, replace the command and arguments with the absolute node …/dist/cli.js --demo form above.

Drive the flow

After the host lists the server's tools, ask the agent to do the following exactly:

1. Call electron_launch {}. The flag supplies the demo entry; no local app path is needed.
2. Call electron_snapshot, find the Add a task ref, and click it by ref.
3. Type a task into #task-title, click #save-task, then assert #task-summary.
4. Click #open-inspector, call electron_windows_list, select Stagewright demo inspector with electron_switch_window, and assert #inspector-status.
5. Call electron_stop when finished.

That sequence exercises launch, snapshot/ref interaction, typing, assertion, and multi-window surfaces against a visible Electron process. The repository's package smoke also runs this flow from the packed tarballs before a release.

Troubleshooting

The demo verifies a host configuration only. Use Launch, attach, or inject when you are ready to drive your own app.