MCP
The dashboard is where you define your design system. MCP is how your team uses it.
As AI tools become the primary code writers, MCP is the daily touchpoint: the bridge between your design decisions and every line of generated code. Without MCP, assistants generate generic UI that drifts from your system. With MCP, assistants discover approved components, validate proposals against your constraints, and follow the rules you've set.
What MCP is
MCP (Model Context Protocol) is an open protocol that AI coding tools speak. preset AI ships an MCP server. When Claude Code, Cursor, Windsurf, or any other MCP-capable tool connects, it gains access to your design system in a structured way the model can reason about.
What flows through MCP:
- Discovery: the model can ask "what tokens, presets, and components exist?"
- Constraints: the model can ask "what's forbidden in this file?"
- Validation: the model can submit a proposed change and get back a pass/fail with reasons
- Apply: when allowed by policy, the model can write changes back through a governed lifecycle
For the technical reference, protocol surfaces, tool categories, write lifecycle, adaptive modes, see developers.presetai.dev/mcp.
What it does for your team
Three audiences feel MCP differently:
- Designers: your tokens and patterns reach generated code without manual prompting. The AI knows what "primary button" means in your system.
- Operators and admins: you decide what the AI can do via active guardrails and maturity mode. MCP carries those decisions into every AI session.
- Product: generated code stays inside the system. Drift gets caught before it ships.
Adaptive behavior by maturity
MCP isn't one-size-fits-all. It adapts to your design system's maturity:
| Mode | Maturity | AI role | Behavior |
|---|---|---|---|
| Generative | Early: building the system | Co-creator | Proposes new presets when none match. Warns on drift but doesn't block. |
| Hybrid | Growing: some standards in place | Suggester + validator | Suggests presets. Validates proposals. Warns on drift. |
| Enforcement | Established: compliance critical | Guardian | Strict validation. Blocks non-compliant generation without an approved path. |
A startup gets help building. An enterprise gets enforcement. The same MCP server, different behavior: driven by your design system's measured maturity score and your active compliance mode.
For the full mode table, detection logic, and how to override, see adaptive modes on developers.presetai.dev/mcp/adaptive-modes.
When to read this vs. the reference
This page is the concept entry: what MCP is, what it does for your team, how its behavior adapts.
If you're configuring MCP in a tool, integrating against it, or writing code that calls MCP, read the reference on developers.presetai.dev/mcp instead: it covers protocol surfaces, tool categories, the propose → validate → apply lifecycle, and per-tool details.