@mukundakatta/shellquote-mcp

MCP server for safe shell argument escaping. Stops LLM-generated shell commands from breaking (or worse) on quotes, spaces, $VAR interpolation, and backslashes.

Tools

• quote_bash(arg) — single-quote escape for bash/sh/zsh. Suppresses all metacharacter expansion.
• quote_bash_argv(args) — escape a list and join with spaces.
• quote_cmd(arg) — Windows cmd.exe (caveat: cmd has unfixable delayed-expansion corners).
• quote_powershell(arg) — single-quoted PS string.

Why this exists

LLMs constantly get shell escaping wrong:

• bash -c "echo $HOME" interpolates the variable instead of passing it literal
• cmd /c "del file.txt" breaks if the filename has spaces
• Embedded single quotes in bash require the awkward '\'' dance the LLM forgets

This tool returns a string the shell will accept verbatim, with no metacharacter surprises.

Install — Claude Desktop

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "shellquote": { "command": "npx", "args": ["-y", "@mukundakatta/shellquote-mcp"] }
  }
}

Same shape for Cursor / Cline / Windsurf / Zed.

License

MIT OR Apache-2.0.