Sverklo Code Intelligence

Sverklo Code Intelligence Skill

Sverklo is a local-first code intelligence MCP server. It gives you a dependency graph, semantic search, blast-radius analysis, and risk-scored PR review — all running on the user's machine. No API keys, no cloud, no data leaves the laptop.

Setup (one time per project)

npm install -g sverklo
cd /path/to/project
sverklo init

sverklo init auto-detects the user's AI editor (Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, etc.), writes the MCP config, appends sverklo instructions to CLAUDE.md, and verifies the setup. Safe to re-run.

If something looks wrong after setup:

sverklo doctor

Once installed, sverklo tools appear as MCP tools prefixed with sverklo_. The index builds automatically on first use.

When to use Sverklo vs Grep vs Read

Use Sverklo when:

• You don't know exactly what to search for ("where is auth handled?")
• You need to understand importance or ranking ("what are the key files?")
• You need blast-radius analysis ("what breaks if I rename this?")
• You need to prove code is dead ("is this function actually called?")
• You're reviewing a diff and need risk scoring

Use Grep when:

• You need exact string matching ("does FEATURE_FLAG_X exist?")
• You know the literal identifier and just want its location

Use Read when:

• You need to see file contents (sverklo is not a file reader)

Skip sverklo for codebases under ~50 source files — the overhead doesn't pay off. Just read everything directly.

Tools Reference

1. sverklo_search — Semantic code search

Hybrid BM25 + vector + PageRank search. Use instead of Grep when you don't know the exact string.

sverklo_search query:"authentication middleware" top_k:5

Returns ranked code chunks with file paths, line numbers, and relevance scores. Results are ordered by structural importance (PageRank), not just text similarity.

When to reach for it: "Where is X handled?", "Find the code that does Y", any exploratory search where you'd otherwise grep for 10 different terms.