Installation

Table of contents

  1. Installation
    1. VS Code extension
      1. From the Marketplace (recommended)
      2. From a GitHub release
      3. VS Code-compatible editors
    2. IntelliJ IDEA / JetBrains IDEs
      1. From the JetBrains Marketplace (recommended)
      2. From a GitHub release (install from disk)
      3. From source
    3. CLI + MCP server
      1. macOS / Linux — Homebrew
      2. macOS / Linux — curl
      3. Windows — PowerShell
      4. From source (Cargo)

VS Code extension

Search LID in the VS Code Extensions panel and click Install — this works even behind a corporate proxy.

Or install directly from the VS Code Marketplace.

Note: The CLI command code --install-extension lid-tools.lid may fail with a certificate error on machines with SSL inspection. Use the Extensions panel or install from a VSIX instead (see below).

lid-lsp is bundled — nothing else to install.

From a GitHub release

Download lid-vscode-<platform>.vsix from the latest release, then:

  1. Open the Extensions panel → ⋯ → Install from VSIX…
  2. Select the downloaded .vsix

VS Code-compatible editors

The LID extension uses only standard VS Code API surface and is published to Open VSX — the registry used by most VS Code forks. It works out of the box in Cursor, Windsurf, and VSCodium with no extra steps.

Editor Install method
Cursor Search LID in the Extensions panel
Windsurf Search LID in the Extensions panel
VSCodium Search LID in the Extensions panel (Open VSX)
Positron Download lid-vscode-<platform>.vsix from the latest release → Extensions: Install from VSIX

lid-lsp is bundled — nothing else to install.

Note: Cursor and Windsurf also support lid-mcp natively via their built-in MCP integration. See MCP Server for per-client configuration snippets.

IntelliJ IDEA / JetBrains IDEs

The plugin works in all JetBrains IDEs: IntelliJ IDEA, GoLand, PyCharm, RustRover, WebStorm, and more.

Or open Settings → Plugins → Marketplace, search LID, and click Install.

Or install directly from the JetBrains Marketplace.

lid-lsp is bundled — nothing else to install.

From a GitHub release (install from disk)

Download lid-intellij-<version>.zip from the latest release, then:

  1. Open Settings → Plugins → ⚙ → Install Plugin from Disk…
  2. Select the downloaded .zip
  3. Restart when prompted

From source

Requires JDK 21+.

# Build lid-lsp first
cargo build --release --bin lid-lsp
cp target/release/lid-lsp extensions/intellij/server/lid-lsp

# Build the plugin zip
cd extensions/intellij
./gradlew buildPlugin
# → build/distributions/lid-intellij-<version>.zip

# Or launch a sandboxed IDE with the plugin pre-installed
./gradlew runIde

CLI + MCP server

macOS / Linux — Homebrew 

brew tap EtaCassiopeia/lid
brew install lid-tooling

Installs lidc, lid-mcp, and lid-lsp on your $PATH.

macOS / Linux — curl

Supported platforms: macOS (Apple Silicon, Intel), Linux x86_64, Linux ARM64 (Graviton, Raspberry Pi, Ampere).

# lidc only
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/EtaCassiopeia/lid-tooling/main/install.sh | bash

# lidc + lid-mcp
curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/EtaCassiopeia/lid-tooling/main/install.sh | bash -s -- --mcp

Windows — PowerShell 

# lidc only
irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/EtaCassiopeia/lid-tooling/main/install.ps1 | iex

# lidc + lid-mcp
& ([scriptblock]::Create((irm https://raw.githubusercontent.com/EtaCassiopeia/lid-tooling/main/install.ps1))) -Mcp

From source (Cargo) 

cargo install --git https://github.com/EtaCassiopeia/lid-tooling lidc lid-mcp