MCP stdio transport

The stdio transport spawns the server as a local child process. The client writes JSON-RPC messages to the server's stdin and reads responses from stdout. This is the simplest deployment: no network, no authentication, the server inherits the client's environment.

The client launches the server executable with the configured command and arguments. Both sides exchange newline-delimited JSON-RPC messages. The server process lifecycle is managed by the client; when the client exits, the server is terminated.

Stdio is ideal for local development, single-user tools, and servers that must access local resources (files, databases, shell) with the user's permissions. It requires no network configuration.

Stdio servers cannot be reached by remote clients. They run on the same machine as the client, so they are not suitable for multi-user or networked deployments.