api-testing

A testing guide for MCP tool and resource handlers, using Vitest, a JavaScript and TypeScript testing framework. It includes mock contexts and checks for results, errors, formatting, and integration boundaries.

In plain words
What is it for?
Writing isolated handler tests, simulating sessions and HTTP requests, checking McpError responses, testing storage, and configuring Vitest test isolation.
Why use it?
It helps test handler behavior without depending on the full server framework or real upstream services.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Part of the shift-mcp-server plugin — 32 skills, 1 MCP server shipped together

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/cyanheads/shift-mcp-server/api-testing
Any agent
npx skills add cyanheads/shift-mcp-server --skill api-testing
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/cyanheads/shift-mcp-server

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Or install shift-mcp-server, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 32 skills, 1 MCP server.

Per session 46 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 5,902 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin 100% copy Near-identical to another mod in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00046 $0.05902
Opus 5 $0.00023 $0.02951
Sonnet 5 $0.00009 $0.01180
Haiku 4.5 $0.00005 $0.00590

Measured 2d ago against content hash 1958f0095306, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

api-testing scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

Origin

This is a copy

100% identical to api-testing — 0 lines differ, which has more behind it and is treated as the original. This page carries a canonical link to it rather than competing with it.

skills/api-testing/SKILL.md · 528 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 528 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Overview

Tests target handler behavior directly — call handler(input, ctx), assert on the return value or thrown error. The framework's handler factory (try/catch, formatting, telemetry) is not involved. Use createMockContext from @cyanheads/mcp-ts-core/testing to construct the ctx argument.

Additional exports from /testing: createMockSession() binds a mock handler context to an HTTP session; createFetchMock() provides a strict upstream HTTP fake; runToolContract() executes a definition through schema, handler, formatting, enrichment/content, and production-shaped error-envelope checks. createMockLogger() returns a standalone MockContextLogger, and createInMemoryStorage(options?) provides a real StorageService backed by InMemoryProvider.

Philosophy: Test behavior, not implementation. Refactors should not break tests. Match the repo's existing test layout: fresh scaffolds use tests/, while colocated src/**/*.test.ts files are also supported. Integration tests at I/O boundaries over unit tests of internals.


mcpTest — fixture-based Vitest test

mcpTest is a test.extend-based Vitest test that provides ctx, session, fetchMock, and storage as per-test fixtures — fresh instances for every test, eliminating boilerplate and enforcing isolation automatically. fetchMock is installed as globalThis.fetch only when requested by a test and restored afterward.

import { mcpTest } from '@cyanheads/mcp-ts-core/testing/vitest';

mcpTest('echoes the message', async ({ ctx }) => {
  const result = await echoTool.handler(echoTool.input.parse({ message: 'hi' }), ctx);
  expect(result.message).toBe('hi');
});

mcpTest('uses storage fixture', async ({ ctx, storage }) => {
  const svc = new MyService(config, storage);
  const result = await svc.doWork(ctx);
  expect(result).toBeDefined();
});

mcpTest('stubs an upstream HTTP boundary', async ({ fetchMock }) => {
  fetchMock.route({
    match: 'https://api.example.test/items/42',
    respond: Response.json({ id: '42' }),
  });
  await expect(loadItem('42')).resolves.toMatchObject({ id: '42' });
});

Read the full file on GitHub · 528 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 528 lines · 46 tokens per session scan A 1958f0095306

Subscribe to this mod's changes

api-testing is a skill published in the GitHub repository cyanheads/shift-mcp-server (1 stars, last pushed 11d ago), licensed Apache-2.0. It adds 46 tokens to every session and 5,902 once invoked, about $0.0002 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. It is 100% identical to api-testing, differing in 0 lines, and is treated as a copy.

Related

Other skills, from other repositories