There are many more instances of toolkit within this repo, but the goal
of this PR is to get rid of user facing references as much as possible.
---------
Co-authored-by: Nate Barbettini <nate@arcade.dev>
TLDR;
The philosophy of CLI usage is "fire and forget" and "best effort". You
can opt out by setting `ARCADE_USAGE_TRACKING=0`.
We are capturing two events: `CLI execution succeeded` and `CLI
execution failed`. Reporting to PostHog is a short lived (maximum 10
seconds) subprocess that does not block the main CLI execution process.
`~/.arcade/usage.json` persists two values `anon_id` and
`linked_principal_id`. The logged in status of the CLI user determines
which ID is used. Upon `arcade login`, the `anon_id` is aliased with
`linked_principal_id`. Upon `arcade logout` the `linked_principal_id` is
removed and the `anon_id` is rotated.
## CLI Usage Tracking - How It Works
The usage tracking system implements an identity management and event
tracking pipeline. Here's how the pieces work together:
### **Identity State Management (`usage.json`)**
The system maintains a persistent identity file at
`~/.arcade/usage.json` with this structure:
```json
{
"anon_id": "uuid",
"linked_principal_id": "uuid" | null
}
```
**Key mechanics:**
- **`anon_id`**: Generated once on first CLI use and persists across
sessions. This UUID tracks all anonymous activity.
- **`linked_principal_id`**: Initially `null`. Once the user logs in and
we successfully alias their identity, this field stores their
`principal_id` to indicate this `anon_id` has been linked.
- **Atomic writes**: All updates use a temp file + atomic rename pattern
to prevent corruption from concurrent CLI processes
- **File locking**: Uses `fcntl` (Unix) to coordinate reads/writes
across multiple simultaneous CLI invocations
- **In-memory cache**: The `UsageIdentity` class caches the loaded data
to avoid repeated file I/O within a single CLI invocation
### **Identity Resolution Flow**
When tracking an event, the system determines the `distinct_id` (who to
attribute the event to) via this waterfall:
1. **Check `linked_principal_id`** in `usage.json`
- If present → use it (user was previously aliased)
- This is the fastest path and avoids API calls
2. **Fetch `principal_id` from Arcade Cloud API**
- Makes HTTP request to `/api/v1/auth/validate` with the user's API key
from `~/.arcade/credentials.yaml`
- If authenticated → returns `principal_id`
- Has 2s timeout for responsiveness
3. **Fall back to `anon_id`**
- If not authenticated or API call fails → use anonymous ID
- Marks event with `is_anon=True` flag
### **The Aliasing Lifecycle**
PostHog aliasing links anonymous activity to authenticated users. Here's
the state machine:
#### **Stage 1: Anonymous User**
```
usage.json: { "anon_id": "abc-123", "linked_principal_id": null }
All events → sent with distinct_id="abc-123" and is_anon=True
```
#### **Stage 2: Login Event**
1. User runs `arcade login`
2. Command completes successfully (auth token saved)
3. `CommandTracker` detects successful login
4. Fetches `principal_id` from API
5. Checks `should_alias()` → returns `True` because
`linked_principal_id` is `null`
6. **Calls `alias()` synchronously** (blocking):
```python
posthog.alias(previous_id="abc-123", distinct_id="zyx-321")
```
7. Updates `usage.json`:
```json
{ "anon_id": "abc-123", "linked_principal_id": "zyx-321" }
```
8. PostHog backend merges all events with `distinct_id="abc-123"` into
the user profile for `"zyx-321"`
#### **Stage 3: Authenticated User**
```
usage.json: { "anon_id": "abc-123", "linked_principal_id": "zyx-321" }
All events → sent with distinct_id="zyx-321" and is_anon=False
```
- Events are directly attributed to the authenticated user
- No more API calls needed (uses cached `linked_principal_id`)
#### **Stage 4: Logout Event**
1. User runs `arcade logout`
2. Logout event is sent with the authenticated `distinct_id`
3. `CommandTracker` detects successful logout
4. **Rotates identity** by calling `reset_to_anonymous()`:
```json
{ "anon_id": "xyz-789", "linked_principal_id": null }
```
5. New `anon_id` prevents cross-contamination if another user logs in
### **Critical Constraint: Alias Timing**
PostHog requires that `alias()` is called **BEFORE** any events are sent
with the new `distinct_id`. This is why:
- **`alias()` is synchronous (blocking)**: Guarantees it completes
before the login success event is sent
- **Subsequent events use `linked_principal_id`**: Once aliased, all
future events use the authenticated ID
- **Lazy aliasing**: If a user authenticates via another mechanism (not
through `arcade login`), the system detects this on the next command and
performs aliasing before sending that command's event
### **Event Capture Pipeline**
When `CommandTracker.track_command_execution()` is called:
1. **Resolve identity** → determines `distinct_id` and `is_anon` flag
2. **Build event properties**:
```python
{
"command_name": "toolkit.run",
"cli_version": "1.2.3",
"python_version": "3.11.0",
"os_type": "Darwin",
"os_release": "23.4.0",
"duration": 1250.42, # milliseconds
"error_message": "..." # if failed
}
```
3. **Call `UsageService.capture()`**:
- Serializes event data to JSON
- Spawns detached subprocess: `python -m arcade_cli.usage`
- Passes data via `ARCADE_USAGE_EVENT_DATA` env var
- **Returns immediately** (non-blocking)
4. **Detached subprocess (`__main__.py`)**:
- Runs independently, survives parent CLI exit
- Deserializes event data
- If `is_anon=True`, sets `$process_person_profile=False` (tells PostHog
not to create a full profile)
- Sends event to PostHog with 5s timeout
- Exits (hard exit after 10s max via timeout thread)
### **Concurrency Handling**
Multiple CLI processes can run simultaneously. The system handles this
via:
- **File locking** on `usage.json` (shared lock for reads, exclusive for
writes)
- **Atomic writes** via temp files ensure incomplete writes never
corrupt the file
- **Idempotent aliasing**: `should_alias()` prevents redundant alias
calls
### **Edge Cases Handled**
1. **Side-channel authentication**: User authenticates outside of
`arcade login` (e.g., manually editing credentials)
- Detected via "lazy aliasing" check on every command
- Performs alias if `linked_principal_id` doesn't match current
`principal_id`
2. **API failures during identity fetch**: Falls back to anonymous
tracking
- 2s timeout prevents hanging
- Silent failure doesn't disrupt CLI
3. **PostHog merge restrictions**: Can't alias returning users who
already have a profile
- System stores `linked_principal_id` to avoid retrying impossible
aliases
- New users (never logged in before) get full history stitched
4. **Multiple accounts on same machine**: Logout rotates `anon_id`
- User A's anonymous activity won't leak into User B's profile
### **Privacy & Performance**
- **Opt-out**: `ARCADE_USAGE_TRACKING=0` disables all tracking
- **Non-blocking**: Events never slow down CLI (detached subprocess)
- **Anonymous profiles**: `$process_person_profile=False` for `anon_id`
events minimizes data collection
- **Silent failures**: Network issues or PostHog errors never surface to
users
# Release Candidate 2
## This PR:
- [x] No more confusing 307 redirect logs when using `/mcp` instead of
`/mcp/` (requested by @shubcodes)
- [x] Fix bug in `arcade configure` for Python < 3.12 (reported by
@evantahler
- [x] Fix bug where tools with unsatisfied secret requirements could
still be executed (reported by @evantahler, @shubcodes)
- [x] Auth providers can now be imported via `from
arcade_mcp_server.auth import Reddit` (requested by @shubcodes)
- [x] Add complete E2E oauth flow for tool calls with informational
errors about how to log into arcade and where to go to authorize
(requested by @evantahler, @shubcodes)
- [x] Add OAuth tool in `arcade new`'s generated server (requested by
@shubcodes)
- [x] Standardize on defaulting to running servers on port 8000
- [x] Improve credentials.yaml reading logic
- [x] CLI user friendliness (requested by @Spartee)
- [x] Remove `arcade serve` CLI command
- [x] Fix race condition in `arcade logout`
- [x] Update docs for desired developer onboarding flow
## Next PRs:
- Get `arcade deploy` working for MCP servers. (Command is hidden for
now)
- Rename all occurrences of `toolkit` to `server`/`tools` and rename all
occurrences of `worker` to `server`
### Overview
Major restructuring from monolithic `arcade-ai` package to modular
library architecture with standardized uv-based dependency management.
### New Package Structure
- **`arcade-tdk`** - Lightweight toolkit development kit (core
decorators, auth)
- **`arcade-core`** - Core execution engine and catalog functionality
- **`arcade-serve`** - FastAPI/MCP server components
- **`arcade-ai`** - Meta package that includes CLI functionality.
Optionally include evals via the `evals` extra. Optionally include all
packages via the `all` extra.
### Key Benefits
- **Lighter Dependencies**: Toolkits now depend only on `arcade-tdk` (~2
deps) vs full `arcade-ai` (~30+ deps)
- **Faster Builds**: uv provides 10-100x faster dependency resolution
and installation
- **Better Modularity**: Clear separation of concerns, consumers import
only what they need
- **Standard Tooling**: Eliminates custom poetry scripts, uses standard
Python packaging
### Migration Impact
- All 20 toolkits converted from poetry → uv with `arcade-tdk`
dependencies plus `arcade-ai[evals]` and `arcade-serve` dev
dependencies. When developing locally, devs should install toolkits via
`make install-local`.
- Modern Python 3.10+ type hints throughout
- Standardized build system with hatchling backend
- Enhanced Makefile with robust toolkit management commands
- Removed `arcade dev` CLI command
- Reduce the number of files created by `arcade new` and add an option
to not generate a tests and evals folder.
This foundation enables faster development cycles and cleaner dependency
chains for the growing toolkit ecosystem.
### Todo After this PR is merged
- [ ] Post-merge workflow(s) (release & publish containers, etc)
- [ ] Release order plan. @EricGustin suggests releasing in the
following order:
1. `arcade-core` version 0.1.0
2. `arcade-serve` version 0.1.0 and `arcade-tdk` version 0.1.0
3. `arcade-ai` version 2.0.0
4. Patch release for all toolkits (all changes in toolkits are internal
refactors)
- [ ] [Update docs](https://github.com/ArcadeAI/docs/pull/318)
---------
Co-authored-by: Eric Gustin <eric@arcade.dev>
Co-authored-by: Eric Gustin <34000337+EricGustin@users.noreply.github.com>
MCP stdio Implementation:
The PR adds support for standard input/output (stdio) as a transport
mechanism for the Message Control Protocol. This is a replacement to the
SSE (Server-Sent Events) transport that was worked on in PR #359 but
will not be merged as it's not deprecated.
This will allow developers to use Arcade tools (written by the dev or
Arcade) in Claude, Cursor, windsurf, etc.
The engine Gateway already supports adding HTTPS streamable (replacement
for SSE) MCP servers as tool servers, and will soon support full gateway
capability in the client API as well.
To use any existing Toolkit just
## Examples
### Quickstart setup with existing toolkits
```bash
pip install arcade-ai
pip install <name of toolkit> # ex. arcade-google
arcade serve --mcp
```
### Run with Claude
Just add the following to the Claude config
```json
{
"mcpServers": {
"arcade": {
"command": "bash",
"args": ["-c", "export ARCADE_API_KEY=arc_xxxx && /path/to/python /path/to/arcade serve --mcp"]
}
}
}
```
### Customizing the Tool Server
Developers can customize their served tools and server furthermore by
importing the worker sdk
```python
import arcade_google # pip install arcade_google
import arcade_search # pip install arcade_search
from arcade.core.catalog import ToolCatalog
from arcade.worker.mcp.stdio import StdioServer
# 2. Create and populate the tool catalog
catalog = ToolCatalog()
catalog.add_module(arcade_google) # Registers all tools in the package
catalog.add_module(arcade_search)
# 3. Main entrypoint
async def main():
# Create the worker with the tool catalog
worker = StdioServer(catalog)
# Run the worker
await worker.run()
if __name__ == "__main__":
import asyncio
asyncio.run(main())
```
Then to run with claude, just run this python file instead of the prebuilt server used in ``arcade serve --mcp``
## PR Description
Changes `pip install 'arcade-ai[fastapi]'` to `pip install arcade-ai`.
In other words, FastAPI is now a required dependecy of arcade-ai.
Additionally, I snuck in some minor cleanup changes.
## PR Description
This PR adds 7 examples.
* `call_a_tool_directly_with_auth.py` - Simple example that uses Arcade
client to execute a tool that lists Gmail emails
* `call_a_tool_directly.py` - Simple example that uses Arcade client to
execute a tool that adds two numbers together
* `call_a_tool_with_llm.py` - Simple example that uses the LLM api to
star the arcade-ai repository
* `get_auth_token.py` - Simple example that gets a Google auth token and
then calls the Google API
* `call_multiple_tools_directly_with_auth.py` - A more involved example
that directly calls multiple spotify tools sequentially
* `call_multiple_tools_with_llm.py` - A more involved example that uses
an llm to call multiple spotify tools sequentially
* `simple_chatbot.py` - Simple chatbot that uses arcade tools and has
history
---------
Co-authored-by: Nate Barbettini <nathanaelb@gmail.com>
Fixes an edge case where the actor doesn't start because no toolkits are
installed in the local environment, but `arcade dev` keeps waiting for a
healthy actor.
## Problem
I found a bug with `Github.CountStargazers` where a stargazer count of
`0` was interpreted as a null result. In other words, 0 wasn't passed
back to the Engine correctly.
Separately, the tool function was also not authorized correctly.
## Fix
- Don't use a falsy comparison when evaluating `result` inside the
`ToolOutputFactory`
- Add unit tests for `ToolOutputFactory` to give us confidence in the
business logic
- Added `ToolContext` to pass in the authorization token correctly.
Before
```
User (nate@arcade-ai.com):
how many stars does the ArcadeAI/Docs repo have on github?
Assistant (gpt-4o):
I successfully checked the repository, but unfortunately, I cannot provide the number of stars for the ArcadeAI/Docs repository. Please try checking directly on GitHub for the most accurate information.
Called tool 'Github_CountStargazers'
Parameters:{"owner":"ArcadeAI","name":"Docs"}
'Github_CountStargazers' tool returned:Github.CountStargazers called successfully
```
After
```
User (nate@arcade-ai.com):
how many stars does the ArcadeAI/Docs repo have on github?
Assistant (gpt-4o):
The ArcadeAI/Docs repository on GitHub has 0 stars.
Called tool 'Github_CountStargazers'
Parameters:{"owner":"ArcadeAI","name":"Docs"}
'Github_CountStargazers' tool returned:0
On the last few PRs I have noticed two problems:
1. `ruff format` fails even though it seems OK on our local machines
(sometimes, not always)
2. Nate's and Sam's machines kept flip-flopping a specific piece of
formatting back and forth, indicating a subtle difference of config
hiding somewhere
3. This was reproducible by running `ruff format` in the terminal,
followed by `make check`. The former would edit files, and then `make
check` would edit them back!
This PR addresses both issues, and further standardizes our editor &
linter configs to be super stable.
Specifically:
1. The main fix for the above, the pre-commit hook was pinned to a super
old version of ruff.
This resulted in subtle differences in behavior between our machines,
and on CI.
2. Moved ruff settings from `pyproject.toml` to `.ruff.toml`
pyproject files in subdirectories (e.g. `toolkits/**`) were overriding
the main pyproject file and erasing the custom ruff config we set at the
root. This meant that our ruff config was applied to `arcade` but not to
any of the other packages.
By moving the config to `.ruff.toml` at the root, all projects will
inherit the same ruff linting & formatting config.
4. Un-ignored the `.vscode/` directory so that we can share
vscode/cursor workspace settings.
This is valuable for standardizing settings like the default formatter
(ruff) and default test framework (pytest).
However, it's important that going forward we _only_ commit things here
that should apply across all of our machines.
5. To avoid any conflict between prettier and ruff, prettier now
explicitly ignores *.py files
6. Finally, `ruff format` and `make check` agree. A number of files are
newly auto-formatted.
This PR includes several improvements to the Arcade client and adds
LangGraph examples:
1. Enhanced error handling in the Arcade client:
- Improved HTTP error handling in `BaseArcadeClient`
- Simplified request methods in `SyncArcadeClient` and
`AsyncArcadeClient`
2. Updated `ToolResource` class:
- Changed base path from `/v1/tool` to `/v1/tools`
- Added `tool_version` parameter to `authorize` method
3. Improved Toolkit discovery:
- Updated `find_all_arcade_toolkits` to search only in the current
Python interpreter's site-packages
5. Added LangGraph examples:
- New `langgraph_auth.py` example demonstrating Gmail authentication
- New `langgraph_with_tool_exec.py` example showing tool execution
within a LangGraph
6. Minor updates:
- Changed default `BASE_URL` to `https://api.arcade.com/`
- Updated import error message for eval dependencies
---------
Co-authored-by: Nate Barbettini <nate@arcade-ai.com>
In this PR:
- Handle and require fully-qualified tool names `Toolkit.ToolName` in
the actor
Also, unrelated changes/fixes:
- Cleaned up the logic around actor secrets and `$ARCADE_ACTOR_SECRET`
- Removes experimental Flask actor for now
Note: Must be merged along with
https://github.com/ArcadeAI/Engine/pull/87
# PR Description
## Summary
Changes include renaming the `arcade_gmail` toolkit to `arcade_google`,
adding unit tests for Google toolkit, add new tools to the Google
toolkit.
## Changes
### Makefile
- Added a new `make test-toolkits` target to iterate over all toolkits
and run pytest on each one.
### Added new tools for the google toolkit
1. `send_email`
This tool sends an email using the Gmail API.
2. `write_draft_email`
This tool creates a draft email using the Gmail API.
3. `update_draft_email`
This tool updates an existing draft email using the Gmail API.
4. `send_draft_email`
This tool sends a draft email using the Gmail API.
5. `delete_draft_email`
This tool deletes a draft email using the Gmail API.
6. `list_draft_emails`
This tool retrieves a list of draft emails using the Gmail API.
7. `list_emails_by_header`
This tool searches for emails by a specific header using the Gmail API.
- `sender`: The sender's email address to search for.
- `limit`: The maximum number of emails to retrieve.
8. `list_emails`
This tool retrieves a list of emails using the Gmail API.
9. `trash_email`
This tool moves an email to the trash using the Gmail API.
* Add new tool to the arithmetic toolkit for summation of a range.
* Add ability to attach debugger to cli. Use `.vscode/launch.json`'s
"Debug arcade dev" to do so.
* Fix issue in cli's main that used the incorrect url.
