Quickstart

Sign up, mint a key, wire krabs into your agent of choice, run your first call. About five minutes.

Install

v0.4 ships from source. Homebrew + npm distribution arrive in v0.5 — until then, clone and build:

git clone https://github.com/augusto-devingcc/krabs.git
cd krabs
pnpm install
pnpm setup

pnpm setup mints an API key against a local SQLite DB and saves it to ~/.config/krabs/config.json. Your CLI is now authenticated for the localhost API. For the hosted version (app.krabs.dev), run ./cli/dist/index.js auth login --api-url https://api.krabs.dev after building the CLI — that triggers the device flow.

See the install guide for symlinking the CLI to your PATH, uninstall, and the v0.5 distribution roadmap.

Mint a key

On signup the dashboard auto-provisions a key labeled Web Dashboard bound to your browser session. For anything else — an agent, a script, a deployed worker — create a scoped key at /dashboard/keys.

Tokens look like this:

krabs_sk_4n7q2vh3jpz9w8x1y0c5b6d4f8g2k1m3

The full token is shown once at creation. We store only a hash. If you lose it, rotate.

Wire Claude Desktop

Open ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json and add the krabs server under mcpServers.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "krabs": {
      "transport": "https",
      "url": "https://mcp.krabs.dev",
      "auth": {
        "type": "bearer",
        "token": "krabs_sk_…"
      }
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop. The krabs tools appear in the tool drawer; the agent can now reach every operation listed in the contract.

Your first call

Three transports, one operation. Each of the following creates the same contact.

MCP — ask the agent in natural language; the host invokes the tool:

tool: contact.upsert
args: {
  "identity": { "kind": "email", "value": "ada@lovelace.dev" },
  "first_name": "Ada",
  "last_name": "Lovelace"
}

CLI:

krabs contact upsert \
  --email ada@lovelace.dev \
  --first-name Ada \
  --last-name Lovelace

HTTP:

curl https://api.krabs.dev/v1/contact.upsert \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $KRABS_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "identity": { "kind": "email", "value": "ada@lovelace.dev" },
    "first_name": "Ada",
    "last_name": "Lovelace"
  }'

All three return the same JSON: a contact object with a stable id.

Next steps

• Auth & tokens → scopes, rotation, and how revocation behaves under load.
• The contract → the five properties every operation honors.
• Runs & SSE → group calls into a session and stream them live.