MCP Connector for Advance Steel Documentation

MCP Connector for Advance Steel connects AI assistants to a live Autodesk Advance Steel session on your machine. Once connected, your AI can read the steel model as steel objects (beams, plates, bolts and assemblies with their sections, materials and marks), check and run numbering, create detail drawings, and read and add dimensions and labels on a detail drawing, alongside the AutoCAD drawing tools for geometry, layers, blocks, external references, annotation and layouts.

One installer sets up the Advance Steel plug-in and the connection your AI application uses. Open Advance Steel, enable MCP in the connector dialog, then restart your AI application.

224 tools are served by default: 189 inherited from the AutoCAD drawing surface and 35 that exist only because the host is Advance Steel. 39 of the 189 are free and read-only. Every steel tool needs a Pro licence. With Pro, the default set contains 39 free tools and 185 Pro tools. Two more Pro tools, for raw command execution, are available only when you opt in.

Supported Advance Steel Versions

• Advance Steel 2022
• Advance Steel 2023
• Advance Steel 2024
• Advance Steel 2025
• Advance Steel 2026
• Advance Steel 2027

If you work in plain AutoCAD rather than Advance Steel, use MCP Connector for AutoCAD instead. That one covers AutoCAD 2022 to 2027. This connector already contains the AutoCAD drawing tools, so inside Advance Steel you do not need both. Each connector has its own licence.

AI Applications

• Claude Desktop
• ChatGPT Desktop
• Cursor
• Claude Code
• VS Code (GitHub Copilot agent mode)
• Visual Studio 2022 17.14+ / 2026 (GitHub Copilot)
• GitHub Copilot CLI
• Grok Build (xAI CLI)

Installation

Enabling MCP Connector for Advance Steel

After installation, click the MCP Connector button in the Plug-ins tab to open the connector dialog, then toggle Enable MCP to start the connection. No licence key is needed for the free tools - the key only unlocks the Pro set.

The dialog shows the status of detected AI applications:

• Ready (Running) - The AI application is configured to reach Advance Steel and is currently open
• Ready - Configured, but the application is not running right now
• Detected - The application is installed but not yet configured; toggle Enable MCP to configure it
• Not Detected - The AI application is not installed on this machine

The indicator at the top of the dialog reads Disabled, Waiting, or Active. Toggling Enable MCP off again removes the connector from every detected client's configuration.

Configuration

MCP Connector for Advance Steel includes one-click auto-configuration for supported AI applications. Toggling Enable MCP in the connector dialog writes the configuration for every detected application at once. The installer also registers the server on install, so in most cases there is nothing to do by hand.

Claude Desktop

The config file is located at:

ChatGPT Desktop

ChatGPT appears in the dialog when it is installed on your machine. The config file is located at:

This file is shared with the Codex CLI, so configuring ChatGPT Desktop makes the Advance Steel tools available in Codex CLI as well. After configuring, fully quit ChatGPT and reopen it. With Advance Steel open and a drawing loaded, a quick test is to ask ChatGPT to "Check the connection to Advance Steel".

Use a local Work conversation on the computer running Advance Steel. In ChatGPT Desktop, open Settings > MCP servers and check that AUTOM8LABS_AdvanceSteel is enabled, then select Restart. Type /mcp in the conversation to check the connection. ChatGPT in a web browser does not read this local configuration. See the official MCP setup guide.

Cursor

The config file is located at:

GitHub Copilot

GitHub Copilot appears in the dialog when VS Code, Visual Studio, or the Copilot CLI is installed on your machine. The config files are located at:

Grok Build

Toggle Enable MCP and the connector writes its entry into xAI's Grok Build CLI configuration automatically. The config file is located at:

Grok Build also reads Claude Code's and Cursor's MCP config, so if you have already configured either of those the connector shows up in Grok Build with no extra step.

Claude Code & other MCP clients

MCP Connector for Advance Steel exposes a standard MCP stdio server, so it also works with Claude Code, VS Code, and any other MCP-compatible client. The server is a single executable installed with the plug-in bundle:

Register it in Claude Code from a terminal:

Manual configuration (any MCP client)

Add this to your client's MCP server configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "AUTOM8LABS_AdvanceSteel": {
      "command": "C:\\Program Files\\Autodesk\\ApplicationPlugins\\AUTOM8LABS.MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.bundle\\Contents\\Bridge\\MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.Bridge.exe"
    }
  }
}

VS Code

VS Code uses a slightly different shape. Add the server to your MCP configuration (for example .vscode/mcp.json in a workspace):

{
  "servers": {
    "AUTOM8LABS_AdvanceSteel": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "C:\\Program Files\\Autodesk\\ApplicationPlugins\\AUTOM8LABS.MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.bundle\\Contents\\Bridge\\MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.Bridge.exe"
    }
  }
}

Optional: raw command execution

Two tools can drive the host directly: execute_command runs a raw command string as if typed at the command line, and execute_lisp evaluates an AutoLISP expression. Because they can drive anything, both are disabled by default: they are neither listed nor callable until you opt in on that machine by setting MCP_CONNECTOR_ENABLE_COMMAND_EXEC=1 in the MCP client configuration. Even when enabled, code-loading and shell verbs (NETLOAD, APPLOAD, SCRIPT, SHELL, AutoLISP load) are blocked. Both tools are Pro, so a licence is needed as well as the opt-in.

After saving the configuration, fully quit and reopen your AI client - quit it from the system tray rather than just closing the window, or it keeps the old environment and the two tools still will not appear. To turn them off again, remove the setting and restart the client the same way.

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "AUTOM8LABS_AdvanceSteel": {
      "command": "C:\\Program Files\\Autodesk\\ApplicationPlugins\\AUTOM8LABS.MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.bundle\\Contents\\Bridge\\MCPConnectorAdvanceSteel.Bridge.exe",
      "env": {
        "MCP_CONNECTOR_ENABLE_COMMAND_EXEC": "1"
      }
    }
  }
}

Optional: read-only session

A read-only session withholds every tool that can change a drawing or the steel model. With a Pro licence that leaves 63 tools: the 39 free tools plus the steel queries and exports (objects, assemblies, numbering status, the catalogue, the drawing register, the dimensions and labels on a detail drawing and the material list). A withheld tool is not listed to the AI client at all, and is refused by name if it is called anyway, so the AI cannot reach a write.

It is worth using whenever the drawings belong to a client rather than to you. DWG is usually the format that arrives from someone else. An in-session change can still be undone in Advance Steel, but the folder tools save each drawing as they go, so those edits are on disk already - and an unwanted change does not always announce itself on screen.

Turn it on with the Read-Only Session checkbox in the connection dialog, or by running MCPCONNECTORADVS_READONLY at the Advance Steel command line. Either way, reconnect your AI client afterwards so it refreshes its tool list.

Locking it on for a team. An administrator can enforce read-only across a computer using ForceReadOnly. See Admin Permissions below.

Power BI Dashboard

A separate, free download containing a browser dashboard and Power BI report for tool-use records. The installer includes the audit logger. MCP Connector Pro is required to record audit logs.

Claude Desktop Settings

MCP Connector for Advance Steel exposes 224 tools, plus two optional command-execution tools that stay disabled until you opt in. In Claude Desktop, enable Load tools when needed so tools are loaded on demand rather than all at once.

Use Chat, not Cowork

Claude Desktop has a mode selector at the bottom of the message box: Chat and Cowork. MCP connectors run in Chat conversations. In Cowork, your Advance Steel requests will not reach the connector and Claude behaves as if Advance Steel is not connected - even though the connector is configured correctly. Before you start, check the selector is set to Chat.

Note this is the opposite way round to ChatGPT Desktop, where the Advance Steel tools are available in Work rather than regular Chat.

Operator Skill

An operator skill is a plain text playbook Claude reads before touching your drawing. It teaches Claude to use the connector efficiently: read in bulk instead of one entity at a time, verify answers with counts, batch edits in one call, and say so instead of guessing when something cannot be done. The result is fewer calls, fewer dead chats, and far less of your usage allowance burned on a single question.

The free AutoCAD operator skill covers the drawing tools this connector inherits, so it is worth installing. It does not cover the steel tools.

Install in Claude Desktop:

1. Download the skill: autocad-connector.zip
2. In Claude Desktop, go to Settings > Skills > Add > Upload a skill and select the zip.
3. That is it - Claude picks the skill up automatically in new chats. If you ever find it has not, mention it in your prompt, for example "Follow the autocad-connector skill".

Using Claude Code or Cursor instead? Install steps for both are in the mcp-connector-skills repository, which also hosts free skills for the rest of the MCP Connector family.

Quickstart

Tool Reference

MCP Connector for Advance Steel serves two sets of tools, grouped by category below. The steel tools come first, then the AutoCAD drawing tools the connector inherits, including a read-only free tier that works without a licence. Every tool name shown is the exact identifier exposed to your AI client. The Edition column shows whether a tool is available in the free edition or needs a Pro licence. A tool marked Opt-in does not register at all until you enable it - see raw command execution. Under each description is an example prompt showing how to ask for it in natural language - click any prompt to copy it, paste it into your AI client, and adjust the names and numbers to suit your drawing.

Steel model and drawings

These tools exist only because the host is Advance Steel. Every one of them needs a Pro licence. Property changes, section changes, applying an annotation template and deleting dimensions and labels default to a preview (dry_run: true). Review the proposed changes before asking the AI to apply them. Numbering, creating drawings, creating beams and plates, and adding a single dimension or label take effect immediately.

Steel: Model and objects

Steel: Assemblies and numbering

Steel: Catalogue

Steel: Drawings

Steel: Dimensions and labels

These tools work on the detail drawing that is open in Advance Steel. Dimensions and labels are created by Advance Steel's own commands, so they are real Advance Steel objects that belong to their view. Linear dimensions and leader labels are read and created. Angular and arc dimensions, level marks, weld symbols and section marks are not. The wording of a new label comes from Advance Steel's label definition for the object it lands on. When a drawing is updated, Advance Steel re-checks manually added dimensions and, with its default settings, can remove them or drop points from them, so add dimensions after the last update or keep them in an annotation template and apply it again afterwards. Labels are not affected.

Steel: Annotation templates

A template holds the dimensions and labels of one finished drawing, each stored relative to its view. Applying it to the drawing of a similar assembly moves each point onto the nearest real point of the same sort and reports anything that has no match. It is a matching rule for similar assemblies, not a guarantee: check the result. Applying a template again adds only what is missing.

Steel: Export

Connectivity

Drawing and Document

Entities and Selection

Geometry Creation

3D Solids

Modification

Layers

Blocks

Annotation

Views and Navigation

Layouts and Plotting

Styles

External References

UCS

Search and Text

Utility and Measurement

Management Pack

Folder-batch tools for whole-project maintenance. Each one runs over every drawing in a folder using a side database, so your open drawing is never disturbed. Write operations are safe by default: a dry-run mode previews what would change without modifying any file.

FAQ

Changelog