srelens

See everything. Break nothing.

A fast, lightweight Kubernetes IDE built with Tauri v2 and a pure-Rust core — every backend capability is also exposed as an MCP tool, so AI agents can drive your clusters through the same code paths as the UI.

Website · Quick start · MCP server · Developer guide · Contributing

Why srelens?

srelens is a desktop workspace for operating Kubernetes clusters, inspired by
Lens/Freelens but rebuilt
from scratch on a modern stack. Three ideas drive the project:

MCP-native by design — every backend operation is declared once in a capability
registry and surfaced twice: as a Tauri command for the UI and as an MCP tool for
external agents (Claude, IDEs, automation). A CI completeness test guarantees the two
surfaces never drift.

Features

• Multi-cluster workspace — kubeconfig discovery (including additional files and pasted configs), context switching, cluster hotbar, per-context avatars and colors.
• Live resource browsing — 40+ resource kinds across workloads, networking, storage, RBAC, and custom resources (CRDs), with server-side watches streaming into the UI — no polling.
• Resource detail & YAML — manifest view, schema-aware YAML editing (CodeMirror) with validation and apply, resource events, workload relations.
• Operations — scale, rollout restart, delete/evict pods, cordon/drain nodes, port-forward management — every destructive action gated behind confirmation.
• Pod terminal & logs — interactive exec sessions (xterm.js) and live log streaming with follow.
• Helm — browse installed releases and inspect release details.
• Metrics — node and pod metrics (metrics-server) with usage overviews and sparklines.
• Command palette — ⌘K keyboard-first navigation across contexts, resources, and actions.
• Local-first — talks directly to your API servers with your kubeconfig credentials. No cloud service in between.

MCP server

The same binary that runs the GUI can run as an MCP server, exposing the full capability registry:

# stdio transport (for local agents / IDE clients)
srelens-desktop --mcp-stdio

# HTTP transport (loopback only, default 127.0.0.1:8765)
srelens-desktop --mcp-http [addr]

Destructive tools (delete, drain, apply, …) carry annotations and require an explicit
_confirm argument — an agent can't delete or drain anything without approval.

Example Claude Desktop / MCP client config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "srelens": {
      "command": "/path/to/srelens-desktop",
      "args": ["--mcp-stdio"]
    }
  }
}

Quick start

Prerequisites: Rust (stable), Node.js 22+,
pnpm 9+, and the
Tauri v2 system dependencies for your platform.

pnpm install
pnpm dev          # launches the desktop app with hot reload

Other useful commands:

pnpm test         # all JS/TS tests (Vitest, with coverage)
cargo test        # all Rust tests
pnpm build        # production frontend build
pnpm tauri build  # packaged desktop binaries

See the developer guide for architecture, testing standards,
and how to add a new capability.

Repository layout

apps/desktop/            Tauri app
  src/                   React 19 + TypeScript UI (shadcn/radix, MobX, xterm, CodeMirror)
  src-tauri/             Rust backend: commands, streams, capability registration
crates/
  capability/            Capability registry — single source of truth for backend ops
  kube/                  Kubernetes integration (kubeconfig, watches, actions, helm, metrics)
  mcp/                   MCP server (stdio + HTTP) generated from the registry
docs/                    Project documentation + brand assets

Project status

srelens is in early, active development (v0.1 pre-release). The read/browse/operate
core described above works end-to-end; extension support, broader resource coverage, and
packaging polish are on the roadmap. Expect breaking changes.

Signed builds for macOS (Apple Silicon + Intel), Linux (AppImage/deb/rpm), and Windows
are on the latest release; the app
updates itself from there. See the install guide for per-platform steps,
or the quick start to build from source.

Contributing

Issues and PRs are welcome — see CONTRIBUTING.md to get started.
Please also review our Code of Conduct.

License

srelens is open source under the MIT License.

_{Not affiliated with Mirantis (Lens) or the Freelens project.}