Using the server

1. Install it#

One standalone checkout serves every project on the machine. install writes into the directory it runs in. So the last two lines run from the root of the project the agent works in, never from the checkout:

git clone https://github.com/TYPO3/dev-companion.git typo3-dev-companion
composer install --working-dir=typo3-dev-companion
cd /path/to/your/project
/absolute/path/to/typo3-dev-companion/bin/typo3-dev-companion install

Without --agent that writes the entry into .mcp.json and the skills into .agents/skills, the two places a client finds without configuration for it. Name a client that reads elsewhere, --agent=cursor, --agent=copilot, and the client table says which file each one gets. A project can require the package instead of a pointer at a checkout; that and every other case is Installing the server.

2. Finish in the client#

A file on disk registers nothing. The client has to read it, and most ask you to approve a project server before they start it. Claude Code reads .mcp.json when a session starts, so restart the session and approve at the prompt. The install prints what your client needs under the line that reports the entry. Finishing in the client has the same list with each client's own documentation behind it.

3. Ask it one question#

In the client you work in:

Which icon identifier is the right one for a delete button in the TYPO3 backend?

Then look at what the agent did: a call to typo3_icon_lookup means the server answers. An answer with no call behind it means the client never started it, and Checking that it answers is how to find out why.

4. Describe your task#

There is nothing more to drive. Describe the work in whatever language you speak to your agent in, and the server tells the agent at connect where to start. Working with it once it runs is what that changes on your side of the conversation. task-skills/ lists the workflows the install published beside the server, with their complete instructions.

Afterwards#

• typo3-dev-companion update refreshes the skills and the entry after this package moved. A server that finds stale copies puts them back on its own, see Keeping it current.
• Which tools the server offers, and the four environment variables the entry may carry: What the entry may carry.
• Taking it out again — Removing it.

It is a local subprocess, started by the client over stdio, and it reads. It writes nothing into the TYPO3 installation it points at. The one exception is the feedback channel, which writes into this server's own checkout, and only a standalone checkout offers it.