forage

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🌿 Forage

Self-improving tool discovery for AI agents.

Install one MCP server. Your agent finds the rest.

  

npm · GitHub · Contributing

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Forage is an MCP server that lets AI agents discover, install, and learn to use new tools — automatically. When an agent hits a wall, it forages for the right tool, installs it, and teaches itself how to use it. No restarts. No manual config. The agent gets permanently smarter.

<!-- TODO: Add demo GIF here --> <!-- !Forage demo -->

Why?

AI coding agents are limited to whatever tools they're configured with at session start. Need to query a database? Deploy to Vercel? Search Slack? The agent apologizes and you manually install the right MCP server.

Forage closes that loop:

Agent encounters a task it can't do
  → forage_search("query postgres database")
  → forage_install("@modelcontextprotocol/server-postgres")
  → Tools available IMMEDIATELY (no restart)
  → forage_learn() saves instructions to CLAUDE.md
  → Next session: auto-starts, agent already knows how to use it

Quick Start

Claude Code

claude mcp add forage -- npx -y forage-mcp

Cursor

npx forage-mcp init --client cursor

That's it. Start a new session and Forage is ready.

Tools

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | forage_search | Search for MCP servers across the Official MCP Registry, Smithery, and npm | | forage_evaluate | Get details on a package — downloads, README, install command | | forage_install | Install and start an MCP server as a proxied subprocess (requires user approval) | | forage_learn | Write usage instructions to CLAUDE.md / AGENTS.md / .cursor/rules/ | | forage_status | List all installed and running tools | | forage_uninstall | Remove a tool and clean up rules |

How It Works

Forage is a gateway/proxy MCP server:

1. You install Forage once — it's the only MCP server you configure manually
2. Forage discovers tools — searches the Official MCP Registry, Smithery, and npm in parallel
3. Forage installs tools — starts them as child processes, wraps their capabilities
4. No restart needed — emits list_changed notifications so the agent picks up new tools instantly
5. Knowledge persists — forage_learn writes to agent rule files, manifest auto-starts tools next session

<details> <summary><strong>Architecture</strong></summary>

┌─────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Claude Code / Cursor / Codex               │
│                                             │
│  "I need to query a Postgres database"      │
└──────────────────┬──────────────────────────┘
                   │ MCP
                   ▼
┌─────────────────────────────────────────────┐
│  Forage MCP Server                          │
│                                             │
│  forage_search ─── Official Registry        │
│  forage_install    Smithery                 │
│  forage_learn      npm                      │
│  forage_status                              │
│                                             │
│  ┌─────────────┐  ┌─────────────┐          │
│  │ Postgres MCP│  │ GitHub MCP  │  ...      │
│  │ (subprocess)│  │ (subprocess)│          │
│  └─────────────┘  └─────────────┘          │
└─────────────────────────────────────────────┘

When you install a tool through Forage:

1. Forage runs npx -y <package> as a child process
2. Connects to it via StdioClientTransport (MCP client)
3. Discovers the child server's tools via listTools
4. Re-registers each tool on the Forage server with a namespaced name (foraged__<server>__<tool>)
5. Sends tools/list_changed notification — the agent sees new tools immediately
6. When the agent calls a proxied tool, Forage forwards the call to the child server

</details>

<details> <summary><strong>Persistence</strong></summary>

Forage stores its state in ~/.forage/:

| File | Purpose | |---|---| | manifest.json | Installed tools, command/args, auto-start configuration | | install-log.json | Audit trail of all installs and uninstalls | | cache/ | Cached registry search results |

On startup, Forage reads the manifest and auto-starts all previously installed servers. Your agent picks up right where it left off.

</details>

CLI

Forage also includes a CLI for humans:

forage search "postgres database"    # Search registries
forage list                          # List installed tools
forage init                          # Set up for Claude Code
forage init --client cursor          # Set up for Cursor

Security

[!IMPORTANT] Forage cannot install tools without explicit user approval. Every forage_install call requires confirm: true.

• Audit trail — every install/uninstall is logged with timestamps to ~/.forage/install-log.json
• No remote backend — everything runs locally. Registry searches are read-only GET requests to public APIs.
• No secrets stored — environment variables for child servers are passed at install time, not persisted.

Development

git clone https://github.com/isaac-levine/forage.git
cd forage
npm install
npm run build

Test locally with Claude Code:

claude mcp add forage-dev -- node /path/to/forage/dist/server.js

See CONTRIBUTING.md for more details.

Roadmap

Features

• [ ] forage update — check for newer versions of installed tools
• [ ] Support for pip/cargo/brew packages (not just npm)
• [ ] Smarter search ranking (weight by downloads, stars, description relevance)
• [ ] Auto-configure environment variables from .env files
• [ ] forage doctor — diagnose common setup issues

Distribution

• [x] Publish to npm
• [ ] Submit to the Official MCP Registry
• [ ] Submit to Smithery
• [ ] Submit to mcp.so and glama.ai
• [ ] Landing page at forage.dev

Community

• [ ] Demo GIF / video in README
• [ ] Write launch blog post
• [ ] Post to r/ClaudeAI, r/LocalLLaMA, Hacker News (Show HN)
• [ ] Share in MCP Discord / community channels
• [ ] Write use-case guides (e.g. "Add Postgres to Claude Code in 30 seconds")
• [ ] Add GitHub Discussions for Q&A and feature requests

License

MIT