How to connect VS Code to DT Terminal with MCP
By DT Terminal · Published
VS Code installs DT Terminal from a link. In DT Terminal on the web, open Settings, MCP and press Add to VS Code. Your browser asks to open VS Code, which shows a page for the dt-terminal server with its URL; check it and press Install. When the server starts, VS Code asks to sign in to it. Allow that, and your browser opens DT Terminal's permission screen. Reading your profile, journal, backtests and connected accounts is ticked; writing is not until you tick it, and nothing can place a trade at your broker. Tick the box that says your data will leave DT Terminal and press Allow. Then use it from Copilot Chat in agent mode. In the DT Terminal desktop app the button copies https://dtterminal.app/api/mcp, and you run MCP: Add Server in VS Code instead. Settings, MCP lists every call, and Disconnect stops it at once.
Step by step
One link from the web app, one sign in, then Copilot Chat in agent mode.
01Copy the connector URL
Open DT Terminal, go to Settings and choose MCP. The connector URL sits at the top: https://dtterminal.app/api/mcp. On the web, Add to VS Code installs it for you. In the desktop app, the same button copies the URL.
MCP needs a paid DT Terminal plan: Verified lets the app read your account, and Pro also lets it write to your journal. You need an account before you connect, because the app you connect signs in to it.
- Settings, then MCP, then Copy next to the connector URL
- Or press the button for your app and skip the copying
02Install it in VS Code
Press Add to VS Code. Your browser asks to open VS Code, and VS Code opens an MCP Server: dt-terminal page showing its name, type http and the URL. Check the URL is https://dtterminal.app/api/mcp and press Install.
From the DT Terminal desktop app, or if the link does not open VS Code, add it by hand: run MCP: Add Server from the command palette, choose HTTP, paste the connector URL and name it dt-terminal.
- Add to VS Code, then Install on the dt-terminal page
- By hand: MCP: Add Server, HTTP, the connector URL
03Allow the sign in
When the server starts, VS Code asks to sign in to it. Allow that, and your browser opens DT Terminal's permission screen, naming the app and the account it will act as.
DT Terminal does not check who runs an app, since anyone can register one and pick its name, so allow it only if you just added it in VS Code.
- Allow the sign in VS Code asks for
- Allow it on DT Terminal's permission screen
04Choose what VS Code can do
Reading is ticked and writing is not. Press Customise to see all seven permissions: read your profile, read and change your journal, read and change your backtests, read and change your connected accounts.
Tick a write only if you want VS Code to log trades, write reflections or start a sync for you. No permission can place a trade at your broker. Then tick the box that says your data will leave DT Terminal, and press Allow.
- Reads are on, writes stay off until you tick them
- Nothing you allow can place a trade
- What VS Code reads is handled under its own terms from then on
05What to ask Copilot Chat
Ask about your trades the way you would ask Edge, the coach inside DT Terminal. Copilot Chat reads the same journal, so its answers come from your own record rather than from trading in general.
Open Copilot Chat in agent mode, where MCP tools are available. It can also work with the numbers: pull a month of trades into a notebook, or chart your R by setup.
- Run my weekly debrief
- Find my leaks from the last 90 days
- Review today against my plan
06See what it did, and disconnect
Settings, MCP lists VS Code with when you connected it, when it was last used and what it may do. Under it, What your AI read lists the latest calls, newest first, and whether each one worked.
Disconnect stops VS Code at once. Every token it held stops working, and it cannot read or change anything until you connect it again. What it already read stays with it.
- Every call it made, newest first
- Disconnect cuts it off straight away
FAQ
The Model Context Protocol is an open standard for connecting an AI app to a tool it can read and use. An app that speaks it can work with any product that publishes a connector, without a separate integration for each one.
On DT Terminal, Verified to connect and read, and Pro to let VS Code write to your journal. Copilot Chat in VS Code runs on your GitHub Copilot plan.
Only on Pro, and only if you tick a write permission for it. On Verified it can read but not write, and reading is the default on Pro too. With journal write it can log trades, write notes and reflections, and edit or delete what it created. Every call it makes is listed in Settings, MCP.
No. Broker connections are read only by design. The accounts write permission can start a sync and edit account details, and no permission opens order execution, whatever the app asks for.
The link needs VS Code installed on the same computer, and the DT Terminal desktop app copies the URL instead. Run MCP: Add Server, choose HTTP and paste https://dtterminal.app/api/mcp, then allow the sign in.
Press Disconnect next to it in Settings, MCP and its access stops at once. Then remove dt-terminal from VS Code's MCP servers so it stops asking.
Claude, ChatGPT, Claude Code, Cursor and VS Code each have a button in Settings, MCP and a page like this one. Any other app that supports remote MCP servers with sign in can connect with the same URL.