Skip to content
ADVISOR

Sheet 0.1

The Wayne State app stack, surveyed

ADVISOR

ADVISOR stands for Answers, Directions, Versions, Integrations, Standards, Onboarding and Resources.

What applies, and what's next.

The stack's own MCP server, like Laravel Boost for Wayne State. It orients your coding agent and hands it read-only tools into every stack project: the standards, the supported versions, the docs and the checks. Ask “which PHP can I build on?” and it answers from the policy file, with the date and the source, instead of from whatever the model remembers.

composer require --dev waynestate/advisor

PHP 8.3 or newer. ADVISOR is on Packagist with no tagged release yet, so for now ask for the main branch: composer require --dev waynestate/advisor:dev-main.

Ask the map Get directions

The ADVISOR mark: a speech bubble holding a gold compass needle.

The magic trick, minus the magic

Ask the map

Type the kind of question you would ask your coding agent. The map plots the route ADVISOR takes: from your app, through the advising office, past the tool that answers, to the stack project the answer comes from.

Or try:
Field map of the stack Every stack project is a place on the map, with ADVISOR's advising office in the middle and your app at the bottom left. The plotted route is written out in the control card beside the map. Office Hours Pond Prerequisite Ridge Elective Hill N 012 tool calls
An illustration of how your agent uses ADVISOR's tools. This page calls nothing; the real server runs on your machine, beside your app.

Read this before you set off

Legend

Six tools, two prompts and a shelf of resources. Every tool is read-only and every answer says where it came from.

Tools

list_projects
The stack's projects, WayneUI first, each marked built or proposed.
get_project_status
One project: its state, package, PHP constraint, its floor under today's policy, and its next step.
read_project_docs
A project's README or best practices, paged. For WayneUI, its markup contract too.
policy_lookup
Support state for PHP, Laravel, Node, MySQL, Vue, Inertia or Composer from CREED, as of today.
list_stack_rules
CREED handbook rules with their file and line, filtered by your app's shape and by chapter.
run_proctor_check
Runs your app's own vendor/bin/proctor check against the bundled policy and returns the findings.

Prompts

  • orient_me a first walk round the stack, ending in three next steps
  • plan_upgrade the way off an old version, via the policy and PROCTOR

Resources

  • advisor://policy CREED's policy file
  • advisor://creed/<chapter> one per handbook chapter

Map symbols

  • your app
  • a tool call
  • where the answer lives

Boost knows Laravel; ADVISOR knows Wayne State. They do not overlap, so run both. In a Laravel app the same server also runs as php artisan mcp:start advisor, right beside Boost.

Turn-by-turn

Directions

Three turns from a fresh clone to an agent that knows the stack. It is one PHP command, so it is the same on Windows, macOS and Linux: no shell script to pick.

  1. Add it to your app

    As a dev dependency. It refuses to run in production anyway.

    composer require --dev waynestate/advisor

  2. Print the client config, and read it

    Nothing is written yet. Pick your client: claude, cursor or vscode. For codex it prints TOML to paste into ~/.codex/config.toml.

    php vendor/bin/advisor install --client=claude
    {"mcpServers":{"advisor":{"command":"php","args":["vendor/bin/advisor","mcp"],"env":{"ADVISOR_ENABLED":"1"}}}}

  3. Write it, then approve it by name

    Open the project in your client and approve the advisor server when it asks. Keep the generated file out of git: it starts a program on whoever opens the project, and install warns you if it is not ignored.

    php vendor/bin/advisor install --client=claude --write
Where install --write puts it
  • claude.mcp.json
  • cursor.cursor/mcp.json
  • vscode.vscode/mcp.json
  • codexprinted only (TOML)

Every one starts the same fixed command, php vendor/bin/advisor mcp. Run your client from the folder that holds vendor/, or set ADVISOR_PROJECT_ROOT.

Other commands

# serve over stdio (your client starts this)
php vendor/bin/advisor mcp

# check the bundled content against its manifest
php vendor/bin/advisor content:verify

# every check, in the advisor repo itself
composer ci

Laravel apps

The adapter on laravel/mcp is auto-discovered. Publish the config if you want it in the app:

php artisan vendor:publish --tag=advisor-config

Hatched on the map, for a reason

Out of bounds

An advisor can tell you what's required. It cannot sit the exam for you, and this one cannot touch your files.

  • Off unless you turn it on. No ADVISOR_ENABLED, no server. production always refuses.
  • Read-only. No tool takes a command, a URL or a free path. None writes a file in 0.1.
  • No network, no model calls. It serves a bundled copy of the stack's docs, so it works offline.
  • Verified content. Every bundled file is checked against a SHA-256 manifest at start-up; a mismatch stops the server.
  • Answers are data. Every result is labelled as reference text and cleaned of invisible characters. PROCTOR in CI decides pass or fail, not ADVISOR.
  • One safe program. run_proctor_check starts only your app's own PROCTOR, with an argument array, an allowlisted environment, a timeout, and no shell.

Adjoining sheets

The neighbourhood

ADVISOR serves what every part of the stack publishes. Here is who lives where.

Here be roadmaps

Not yet surveyed

Honest edges of the map. None of these exist in 0.1, so none of them gets a command.

  • Coming soon

    Ask ADVISOR on the web

    A chat page. It needs a model, a data decision and an accessibility pass of its own.

  • Coming soon

    Tools that write

    Scaffold with Sourdough, apply a BOOSTER step. The read-only switch and tool groups are built so they can arrive safely.

  • Coming soon

    Modules from each project

    The loader exists and is tested; projects ship their own tools through a manifest when they are ready.

  • Coming soon

    HTTP transport

    stdio first. Remote needs a threat model before it needs a port.

  • Coming soon

    advisor doctor

    A check of the install and the client config, for now covered by content:verify and install.