The blocker on this issue was whether BCC or the client does the expanding.
Answer, from Anthropic's docs: Claude Code expands ${VAR} and
${VAR:-default} itself, in command, args, env, url and headers, for both
project .mcp.json and user-scope ~/.claude.json. Claude Desktop has no
documented support.
So this is a per-client capability, not a global one, and BCC does NOT
expand on write: resolving a reference into the file would put the secret
back on disk -- the whole thing the user is avoiding -- and would defeat a
feature the client already implements correctly. BCC authors, validates and
warns; expand_env_refs exists to preview what the client will do.
Semantics mirror the documented ones exactly, including the unusual bit:
an unset variable with no default is left as literal ${VAR} text rather
than blanked, because that is what Claude Code passes through.
Gating uses the existing profile_targets_claude_desktop(), so a config that
is correct under Claude Code and broken under Desktop is reported against
whichever profile is actually loaded. The two warnings are worded
differently on purpose -- 'this client will never expand these' is a
different problem from 'this variable looks unset here'.
Two existing behaviours were backwards for this feature and are fixed:
- Secret masking hid placeholders. is_secret_key('API_KEY') is true, so
${API_KEY} rendered as dots -- making a reference indistinguishable from
a stored credential, which is the one distinction that makes the feature
worth adopting. should_mask_value() now skips references, in the table
delegate, _redact_server_data and redact_args alike.
- args_secret_warning fired on placeholders. Moving a token into ${VAR} is
the recommended fix for that warning; continuing to warn punished the
fix. It now skips references while still flagging a real secret that
follows one.
Real secrets are still masked everywhere they were before -- asserted, not
assumed.
Refs #76
Three conflicts, two of them semantic rather than textual:
- bcc.py QSS: this branch added the noticeBanner rules using the old
module-level constants ({MUTED}, {ACCENT}); main had since moved the
stylesheet onto palette slots ({p.muted}). Took main's form and
translated the notice rules into it -- picking either side wholesale
would have either dropped the banner styling or reintroduced globals
that test_stylesheet_builder_has_no_hardcoded_colours now forbids.
- bcc.py methods: both sides appended to MainWindow (update-notice
handlers vs theme handlers). Additive, kept both.
- tests/test_core.py: the usual EOF append. Kept both blocks.
_build_menu_bar auto-merged cleanly (View menu above, Help menu below);
verified both are present with their menu roles intact.
Verified: 272 test functions = 265 (main) + 7 (this branch), no
duplicates; 421 passed, ruff clean.
Union conflict at the end of tests/test_core.py -- both branches appended a
test block. Kept both, main's #72/#73 block first. Verified: 265 test
functions = 238 baseline + 15 (#77) + 12 (theming), no duplicates.
Reported from the field: running v1.2 against a repo with v1.3.0 published
gave no prompt, and there appeared to be no way to check manually. The
checker itself works; it was invisible, for two reasons.
#78 -- the notice was written to the shared status label, which 21 other
call sites rewrite. The check runs off-thread and lands a second or two
after launch, right as the user starts clicking, so the next selection or
refresh wiped it. Exactly the bug fixed for the MSIX warning in #35, which
got a persistent banner; that fix was never carried to the update notice.
Adds NoticeBanner: a persistent, dismissible notice carrying its own action
button. It's a shared widget rather than a second bespoke banner, so the
next thing needing the user's attention doesn't reach for the status bar
again. (The MSIX banner still uses its own QLabel -- migrating it is a
follow-up, deliberately not bundled with a bug fix.)
#79 -- the only 'Check for updates' affordance was a button inside the
About dialog, which is not where anyone looks. Worse, the About action was
created without a menu role, and Qt auto-assigns AboutRole to actions whose
text begins with 'About', relocating it into the macOS application menu --
so the notice's own hint, 'Help > About to view it', pointed at a menu that
on macOS doesn't contain the item.
Help now has its own 'Check for updates...' item with an explicit
ApplicationSpecificRole, and the About action states its AboutRole rather
than inheriting it invisibly. The menu-driven check is never throttled and
always reports back -- the user asked, so silence would read as broken.
The decision and the wording live in core.update_notice() because the test
suite has no PySide6 (CI installs pytest + cryptography only), so anything
in bcc.py is untestable. A test asserts the notice text names no menu path,
which is what went stale here in the first place.
Closes#78Closes#79
BCC has always been dark-only -- BG #1b1d23, hardcoded at import time, with
no light option and no awareness of the desktop's appearance. On a light
desktop it matches nothing else on screen and there was no way to change it.
Adds a Palette value type in bcc_core with DARK (byte-identical to the
colours v1.3.0 shipped) and a new LIGHT, plus resolve_theme(setting,
system_is_dark) so the decision is testable without a Qt app. View > Theme
offers Match system / Light / Dark, persisted in QSettings under ui/theme,
defaulting to following the system.
The light palette's semantic colours are deliberately not the dark ones
lightened: #4ade80 sits near 1.7:1 against white. They are darkened to clear
WCAG AA, and a contrast test enforces >= 4.5:1 for every text colour against
its surface in both palettes so nobody harmonises them back later.
Three near-black literals were baked into the stylesheet (#1a1205 on-accent
text, #202229 disabled table, #16181d diagnostics pane). Fine with one theme,
invisible breakage with two -- each now has a palette slot, and a test
asserts build_stylesheet contains no hex literals at all.
The ~20 inline setStyleSheet(f"color: {MUTED}") call sites are left alone:
apply_palette rebinds the module-level colour names, and an f-string resolves
its names when it runs, so each call site picks up the new colour on its next
render. Switching theme reapplies the global QSS and re-renders the
inline-styled widgets, so nothing is left dark-on-light.
Refs #75
Two silent-failure bugs found auditing the v1.3.0 features.
#72 -- extract_servers called dict() on every server value, so a config
that was valid JSON but held a non-object server ("foo": "oops", a
number, a list, null) raised on load. The strict parse succeeded, so the
repair path never saw it, and the call sat outside the load try/except:
an unhandled traceback with the window half-swapped to the new profile.
It also made the #54 schema lint unreachable for the most likely
hand-edit mistake -- the load died before the linter ran.
Malformed values are now preserved verbatim on ServerEntry.raw (behind a
NO_RAW sentinel, since a literal JSON null is itself a malformed entry
worth keeping) and written back untouched on Save, so nothing is silently
deleted. lint_servers names the offending entry instead.
#73 -- the stale-file "Merge & save" path reloaded the file from disk and
re-applied the user's servers, but apply_servers only writes mcpServers
and _disabledMcpServers. Named server sets live under _bccServerSets in
the same file, so a set saved that session was dropped from disk and then
from memory, with no warning, on the path the user picks because it
sounds like the safe one.
BCC-owned keys are now declared in BCC_OWNED_KEYS and carried across by
carry_owned_keys, which reports genuinely contested keys so the status
line can say so. Deliberately one-directional: a key absent locally is
left alone on disk, because 'user deleted their last set' and 'another
machine just added sets' are indistinguishable and deleting someone
else's data is the worse failure.
Closes#72Closes#73
Fixes findings 2, 3, 4, 6, 7 from the issue #68 adversarial review.
- Finding 2: config.env was type-checked only. Add CATALOG_DENIED_ENV_KEYS
(case-insensitive) for interpreter/loader-override keys (NODE_OPTIONS,
PYTHONPATH, LD_PRELOAD, ...), apply the ASCII check and the existing
secret-value check to env keys/values, and require env values to be
empty or a single <PLACEHOLDER> token.
- Finding 3: version pinning was only checked by catalog_review.py (which
never runs on the signing path per finding 1). Move enforcement into
_validate_catalog_config: npm/uvx specs must carry @version or ==version
(scoped names handled), docker images must have an explicit non-latest
tag. Only the first plausible package-spec token is checked, so flags,
<PLACEHOLDER>s, and docker subcommands/flags don't trip it. All 19 real
catalog entries still validate clean.
- Finding 4: the CI catalog-signature gate imported bcc_core from the PR
branch and trusted whatever CATALOG_PUBKEYS said there, so a PR changing
both catalog.json and CATALOG_PUBKEYS (with a matching signature) went
green. ci.yml now hardcodes the expected base64 pubkey and asserts
bcc_core.CATALOG_PUBKEYS matches it before verifying the signature.
NOTE: the maintainer is planning to rotate this key -- update
EXPECTED_CATALOG_PUBKEY_B64 in ci.yml as its own reviewed change when
that happens, never bundled with a catalog content change.
- Finding 6: resolve_catalog's anti-rollback/anti-freeze guards sat behind
`if best_version >= 0`, so the first verified candidate was accepted
unconditionally and the anti-freeze anchor drifted with each accepted
candidate instead of staying fixed. The cap is now measured against the
bundled catalog's version specifically (the trust anchor baked into the
binary), regardless of evaluation order; bundled wins version ties; and
a new pure `floor` parameter lets a future caller pass a persisted
accepted-version floor.
- Finding 7: catalog id is now constrained to ^[a-z0-9][a-z0-9._-]{0,63}$.
Tests: fixed _minimal_catalog to use a pinned package (was enshrining
finding 3), rewrote the env-passthrough test to prove the validation
boundary instead of asserting env passes through unchecked, and
reordered test_resolve_catalog_rejects_absurd_version_jump so it
actually exercises the first-candidate path. Added positive/negative
tests for every new rule. Manually verified each new check by commenting
it out and confirming the guarding test goes red, then restoring it.
Adds the Ed25519 public key generated by the Catalog Console (#62),
replacing the b"\x00"*32 placeholder, and imports base64 (the key line
referenced it without the import, so bcc_core failed to load at all).
Verified end to end against the signature the Console pushed in b08cf21:
signature verifies, catalog validates clean, resolve_catalog accepts the
bundled copy (19 servers), and a single-byte tamper is rejected.
Phase 1 of the MCP server catalog: pure, GUI-free core functions plus the
seed data/catalog.json (20 servers). No GUI wiring in this PR -- bcc.py is
untouched; a follow-up PR adds the picker dialog.
- load_catalog(): strict json.loads ONLY. The lenient repair pipeline
(repair_json_text / parse_pasted_json*) is never used on catalog bytes,
by design and by comment, so a signature always authenticates exactly
what gets parsed.
- validate_catalog(): rejects the whole file (not per-entry) on: bad
schema/version types, missing tier-appropriate fields (basic needs
config.command+args, link-only needs docs_url and no config), a
command allowlist (npx/uvx/docker/node/python/python3 only), -e/--eval/-c
denial for node/python, --privileged and root/$HOME volume-mount denial
for docker, non-empty env_required values (hard rejection -- secrets
never ship in the catalog), secret-looking args (reuses
_TOKEN_PREFIXES/_is_secret_value rather than reimplementing), non-https
URL fields, and non-ASCII code points in id/command/args (homoglyph
defence).
- verify_catalog_signature(): Ed25519 via the cryptography package,
domain-separated message (the literal prefix "bcc-catalog-v1|" + raw
bytes), accepts a match against any key in CATALOG_PUBKEYS
(rotation-ready), never raises.
- resolve_catalog(): picks the highest version among bundled/cached/remote
candidates that EACH independently pass verify + validate -- the bundled
catalog gets no implicit trust, closing the hole where an unsigned
payload merged to main would win on being local. Anti-rollback (never
regress below the best verified candidate already in hand) and
anti-freeze (reject a jump of more than 1000 versions) built in.
- catalog_entry_to_paste_json() / config_has_unfilled_placeholders(): small
pure helpers the future GUI dialog will use to feed a catalog pick into
the existing paste-import path and to gate Save on unfilled placeholder
tokens.
data/catalog.json: the provided 20-server seed, with a signed_at field
added at the top level (lives inside the signed payload once real signing
lands in #62). Wired into bcc.spec's PyInstaller datas so it bundles into
the frozen app.
Security requirements from the issue, and where they landed:
- Catalog bytes never touch the lenient JSON repair path -- enforced by
load_catalog()'s strict json.loads and a comment warning against wiring
it in later.
- env_required values are a hard rejection when non-empty, not a warning.
- Secret-looking args are rejected at validation time, reusing the
existing secret-detection helpers instead of duplicating them.
- Non-ASCII id/command/args rejected (typosquat/homoglyph defence).
- URL fields restricted to https://.
- Ed25519 signature verification is domain-separated and never raises.
- The bundled catalog is verified at runtime exactly like remote/cached --
no implicit trust for being local.
- Anti-rollback and anti-freeze bounds on resolve_catalog's version
comparison.
Tests: 42 new tests added to tests/test_core.py (full suite: 239 passed,
1 pre-existing unrelated skip). ruff check and ruff format --check both
clean.
Sets live in the config under _bccServerSets (bcc-owned, ignored by
Claude, travels with the file). Apply enables exactly the set's members
and parks the rest; vanished members are reported, not fatal. GUI row:
set combo + Apply + Save set… + delete.
Closes#52
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
First release actually shipping the v1.2.0 feature set (the v1.2.0
tag's release run was cancelled and produced no assets) plus the
audit fixes #32-#40 and the Windows process-tree kill (#13).
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Popen.kill() only terminated the direct child, so runner-style commands
(npx -> node -> server) leaked the real server process on every Windows
spawn test. taskkill /PID <pid> /T /F walks the descendant tree. Also
sets CREATE_NO_WINDOW on the spawned test process so the windowed exe
doesn't flash a console per test.
Closes#13
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
- Linux (and any non-desktop platform): refuse instead of 'pkill claude',
which substring-matched running Claude Code CLI sessions and relaunched
the CLI, not a desktop app. New restart_supported() gates the button.
- macOS: wait (<=5s) for the old instance to exit before 'open -a Claude'
so the relaunch can't re-activate the dying process. Runs off the UI
thread via a RestartWorker.
- Windows: verify the Start-menu shortcut exists BEFORE taskkill, so an
MSIX/Store install is never killed without a relaunch path.
Closes#33
Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Two prior attempts to fix this line via a literal or -escaped
non-breaking space both silently reverted back to a no-op regular-space
replace during transcription. Using chr(0xA0) instead removes any
non-ASCII or backslash-escape character from the source line entirely.
Platform-abstracted restart: macOS uses pkill -x Claude + open -a Claude,
Windows uses taskkill + relaunch via the Start-menu shortcut, Linux uses
pkill claude + a detached Popen relaunch. Not finding a running process is
not an error -- only a failed relaunch is reported as failure.
Also adds profile_targets_claude_desktop() to distinguish Claude Desktop
profiles (claude_desktop_config.json) from Claude Code profiles, used to
gate the restart button in the GUI.
- Add `__version__ = "1.1.0"` as the single source of truth (matches pyproject.toml).
- Add parse_version()/is_newer_version() for numeric (never lexical) version
comparison, handling v-prefix, pre-release suffixes, and malformed input.
- Add fetch_latest_release(): reads the public Gitea releases API
(anonymous, no token) and returns {version, url} or None on any failure.
Never downloads or touches a binary — metadata only.
The previous commit accidentally normalized the non-breaking space
(U+00A0) in _normalize_unicode's replace() call to a regular space
during a copy/paste, turning that replace() into a no-op. Use an
explicit escape instead of the literal character so it can't
be silently corrupted again.
Bare mtime equality can miss a concurrent external write that lands
within the filesystem's mtime resolution (same-second writes), or
where the writer restores the original mtime. Add config_fingerprint()
returning a (mtime, size) ConfigStat pair; the stale-file check in
bcc.py now compares both fields instead of mtime alone. config_mtime()
is kept as-is (still used/tested independently).
Adds `args_secret_warning(data)` to bcc_core — returns a warning string
when any arg positional value looks like a raw credential (token prefix,
value following a secret-named flag, or URL with embedded user:pass like
postgres://user:pass@host). `--flag=value` inline forms are intentionally
skipped (the flag name already labels the value).
Adds `secret_warn` QLabel in ServerEditor's stdio page; shown/hidden by
`_check_args()` on every field change, and cleared on deselect or
stdio→remote type switch. Non-blocking — save path is not touched.
Closes#1
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Records the file mtime at load time; before write_config() fires, re-checks
it. If it changed (e.g. `claude mcp add`, a second BCC window, or Claude
itself writing ~/.claude.json), StaleDialog prompts with the changed top-level
key names and a masked server-section diff. "Merge & save" applies the user's
in-memory server edits on top of the current on-disk file (preserving external
non-server changes); "Overwrite anyway" proceeds as before.
- bcc_core: config_mtime(), external_change_summary(), _server_sections()
helper extracted from backup_diff for reuse
- bcc.py: StaleDialog, MainWindow._loaded_mtime tracked through load/save
- tests: 7 new tests (config_mtime, external_change_summary variants, AC merge test)
Closes#4
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
The diff preview in RestoreDialog was serializing the full config dict,
exposing secret env values and token args in cleartext on a pasteable surface.
- Add _redact_server_data / _redact_servers_block helpers that apply
redact_args to args and mask env values for is_secret_key() keys
- Rewrite backup_diff to compare only {mcpServers, _disabledMcpServers}
sections (sanitized), not the whole file — also avoids double-serializing
multi-MB ~/.claude.json for a servers-only diff
- Add clarifying comment in _restore_from_backup about why full_config
is the right base after confirm-discard
- Add test: backup_diff with secret args/env → MASK in output, raw values absent
- Add test: restore_backup restores _disabledMcpServers correctly
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Add list_backups / backup_label / backup_diff / restore_backup to bcc_core,
RestoreDialog to bcc.py, and a "Restore…" button in the profile top bar.
Restore is selective: only mcpServers and _disabledMcpServers are replaced;
all other keys in the config (history, project state) are preserved verbatim.
Goes through write_config() so a pre-restore backup is always created first.
Closes#3
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Two bugs caught in supervisor review:
1. Stderr was silently dropped when the Details panel was closed during a
crash. _on_spawn_done appended to diag_text only when the panel was
already open, and refresh_dependency() clobbered that text on the next
field change anyway.
Fix: stash the result in self._last_spawn; _full_diag_text() appends
the stderr section whenever diag text is generated; _on_spawn_done
auto-opens the panel on non-ok outcomes (same pattern as the existing
auto_open for missing commands).
2. _drain stopped reading once _STDERR_CAP (4 KB) was reached. A process
that writes more than 4 KB then blocked on a full pipe buffer, never
exited, and was misclassified as "ok" instead of "crashed".
Fix: drain to EOF unconditionally; keep only the first _STDERR_CAP bytes.
Regression test: 64 KB stderr + exit(3) → outcome "crashed".
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Add spawn_test() to bcc_core — spawns a stdio server for up to 3 s,
captures stderr, and reports ok/exited/crashed/not_found. Key design
decisions driven by real MCP server behaviour:
- stdin=PIPE (never written): servers block on JSON-RPC input and stay
alive, so "still running after timeout" reliably signals a healthy
start. stdin=DEVNULL would send EOF, causing well-behaved servers to
exit 0 and be misclassified as "exited".
- Command resolved via shutil.which(augmented_path()) before Popen so
subprocess PATH resolution is unambiguous across platforms.
- start_new_session=True on POSIX + os.killpg on timeout: kills the
whole process group, not just the launcher (npx, uvx), which would
otherwise orphan the actual node/python grandchild process.
- stdout=DEVNULL: draining a PIPE we don't read would deadlock at ~64 KB.
- stderr drained in a daemon thread, capped at 4 KB.
GUI: SpawnTester(QThread) wraps spawn_test; "Test launch" button in
ServerEditor dep row (stdio only, visible when command resolves ok/warn).
Result colours match the existing dep-status palette (green/amber/red).
Stderr appended to the diagnostics panel if it is open.
7 new unit tests cover all outcomes and the stdin-open regression guard.
Ran python bcc.py locally: button appears for stdio servers whose command
resolves, is hidden for remote servers and missing-command servers.
Closes#2
Co-Authored-By: Claude Sonnet 4.6 <noreply@anthropic.com>
- Env/header values whose key looks secret (TOKEN, API_KEY, PASSWORD,
AUTH, ...) render as •••••••• via a display-only delegate; a
'Show secrets' toggle reveals them. Underlying data, editing, and
save are untouched.
- The Add dialog switches the value field to password echo when the
key name looks secret.
- Copy-diagnostics now redacts secrets from args (--token <v>,
--api-key=<v>, and well-known token prefixes like ghp_/sk-/xoxb-),
since those reports get pasted into public bug reports. Env and
header values were already omitted from diagnostics.
the_og
BCC Agent