Igor Pro Bridge

An MCP server that exposes a running Igor Pro instance to Claude (or any MCP client) as a set of tools: run commands, read wave data, manage compilation, launch/relaunch Igor Pro, and more. It talks to Igor Pro over the ZeroMQ-XOP's CallFunction JSON protocol (a plain localhost TCP socket), calling into Igor-side helper functions in procedure/ZMQ_BridgeHelpers.ipf (the ZBR independent module).

Key functions

• Run code — run_igor_code compiles and runs procedure code as a ProcGlobal function (flow control, local variables, the experiment's own constants and functions). It is the default way to run anything beyond a short command.
• Run commands — execute_igor_command runs a command line and returns what it printed and its error message. By default Igor's Debugger is disabled for the call, so a Debugger pause can't hang it; errors never open a modal dialog.
• Long-running commands — submit_igor_command queues a command and returns a token immediately without waiting; poll_igor_command checks completion later. Reliable across bridge/Claude Desktop restarts, and across waits of any length (hours to weeks), since all state lives in Igor Pro's own data waves, not in this bridge's process.
• Tests — run_igor_tests compiles changed procedures and starts a test run of IgorTest; get_igor_test_results returns its results from the JUnit output once the run has finished.
• Read data back — get_wave returns an existing wave's full data and metadata (any dimensionality, numeric/complex/text/wave-reference). read_session_history reads back everything sent to Igor's history area.
• Compilation management — check_compilation_state / reload_and_compile_procedures check and refresh Igor's compiled state after editing a .ipf file on disk.
• Windows and dialogs — list_igor_windows lists Igor's top-level windows, e.g. a modal dialog blocking the bridge, with the texts and buttons of each dialog; click_igor_dialog_button clicks a button by its caption, close_igor_window closes a dialog (WM_CLOSE, Escape, and only on request Enter, which selects the default button), send_key_to_igor_window sends a key and capture_igor_window returns a screenshot of a window, e.g. of an unknown dialog, all without needing OS focus. check_bridge_health reports such dialogs, and load_experiment answers the old instance's "save changes to experiment?" question with "No".
• Debugger control — get_debugger_state / set_debugger_enabled / restore_debugger_settings read, change, and restore Igor's Debugger settings (must be disabled for unattended/automated use).
• Environment inspection — get_environment_summary summarizes the live instance (version, loaded experiment, XOPs, included procedure files, data folders, Debugger settings). read_help_file reads an Igor help file (.ihf) as structured text, optionally with character styles, and caches it; edit_help_file edits a help file with Notebook operations and verifies its topics. get_bridge_version reports the running bridge/Python/package versions.
• Launching and switching instances — configure_igor_launch records the Igor Pro executable path to use, and optionally a custom ZeroMQ port (for talking to more than one Igor Pro instance, one at a time); launch_igor_pro_unattended launches it with /UNATTENDED and waits for it to become reachable; load_experiment quits the running instance and relaunches it with a .pxp file path as a launch argument; switch_igor_profile quits Igor Pro, activates another profile (user files folder Igor Pro <N> User Files_<profile> in Documents\WaveMetrics) by renaming the folders, and relaunches it.
• Health check — check_bridge_health diagnoses whether this bridge can reach Igor Pro's ZeroMQ server right now.

How to install

This bridge is a local MCP server (stdio transport): it only works from a Claude Desktop session running on the same Windows machine as Igor Pro.

1. One-time Igor-side setup:

   1. Add the ZeroMQ XOP to Igor Pro
   2. The XOP is shipped in the ZeroMQ-XOP folder
   3. Unpack the zip file with subfolders
   4. Open Igor Pro and from the Help menu choose Show Igor Pro User Files
   5. navigate to the output\win\x64\xop\Release subfolder from the unpacked XOP
   6. Put a shortcut to ZeroMQ-64.xop in the Igor Extensions (64-bit) folder
   7. Put a shortcut to the procedure\ZMQ_BridgeHelpers.ipf file in the Igor Procedures folder
   8. Put a shortcut to the procedure\ZBR_UserProcedures folder in the User Procedures folder. The bridge includes ZBR_ProcGlobal.ipf from there on demand (run_igor_code), see below.

2. Install the pinned Python dependencies, into the same Python environment Claude Desktop itself resolves when it launches the bridge:

   .\install.ps1
   

   Run this from an elevated PowerShell (elevation is required only for pywin32's one-time COM-support DLL registration, not for running the bridge or Igor Pro afterward). Optionally, pass -PythonPath to target a specific interpreter if auto-resolution picks the wrong one. See Get-Help ./install.ps1 -Full for details.

3. Install the Claude Desktop extension (.mcpb). A pre-built package is included at mcp/igor-pro-bridge-<version>.mcpb (build a new one with mcpb pack mcp). In Claude Desktop, go to Settings → Extensions → Advanced settings → Extension Developer → Install Extension, and select that file. Do not register this bridge by manually editing claude_desktop_config.json — that does not work reliably for local MCP servers in current Claude Desktop builds.

4. Restart Claude Desktop fully, then call the bridge's get_bridge_version tool to confirm it's running, and check_bridge_health to confirm it can reach Igor Pro.

First steps

• When starting Igor Pro there should be a printout in the history Igor Pro Bridge MCP bound through ZMQ at port 5680.
• Close Igor Pro
• In Claude Desktop (or your agent), say you want to start Igor Pro. It should ask you for the path. Give the path and it will remember it and start Igor Pro.
• Ask to print "Hello World" to the Igor Pro history

The general idea is that you have some repository / folder where your .ipf files are that you work on. Allow Claude write access to this folder. Then it can edit these files on disk and reload the changes in Igor Pro and recompile. It is worthwhile to hint Claude that it should read the Igor Help for specific tasks first as it has a dedicated function for this included.

Working with the bridge

• run_igor_code is the default for running code. It runs as a compiled ProcGlobal function: flow control, local variables, WAVE/NVAR/SVAR references and the experiment's own constants and functions all work. Use print to return data.
• execute_igor_command is for quick queries and for what only works outside functions, e.g. Quit or Execute/P .... On Igor's command line, results of built-in functions must be printed or assigned, there is no flow control, and SVAR/NVAR/WAVE references are not allowed.
• Recompiling stops background tasks. run_igor_code recompiles every time and refuses while named background tasks run (e.g. a data acquisition); call already compiled code with execute_igor_command then.
• Reload before tests. run_igor_tests compiles changed procedure files first, otherwise Igor Pro goes uncompiled in the middle of the run when it notices them.
• When the bridge does not answer, check_bridge_health tells whether Igor Pro runs, is busy or shows a dialog; list_igor_windows/close_igor_window close such dialogs.

Advanced Use

The mcp folder includes some session notes to help Claude.

run_igor_code compiles and runs scratch code as functions in ProcGlobal, e.g. small utility functions. The code is written to procedure\ZBR_UserProcedures\ZBR_Scratch.ipf, which ZBR_ProcGlobal.ipf includes. On first use the bridge adds ZBR_ProcGlobal.ipf to the experiment with INSERTINCLUDE; remove_scratch_procedures takes it out again. While it is included, commands run in ProcGlobal context as well, so the experiment's constants and functions resolve as on Igor's own command line.

The MCP Bridge is able to run multiple instances of Igor Pro with different ports for ZeroMQ communication. You can ask Claude to start a new Igor Pro instance with a custom port. (default is 5680) Then Claude can talk and identify each instance by its port and work with each Igor Pro instance independently.

Claude Desktop can take advantage of the Igor Programming Tool ! If you put ipt in your working folder or PATH then Claude can call it to generate symbol tables or the advanced syntax tree of your Igor Pro code and thus, understand it better. The ipt tool is also suitable for automatically formatting Igor code.

Requirements

• Igor Pro 9.00 or later, running on Windows, with the ZeroMQ-XOP installed and loaded.
• procedure/ZMQ_BridgeHelpers.ipf (or a copy of it) #include-d and compiled into the target experiment.
• Python (accessible as python on PATH), with the pinned packages in requirements.txt installed into that same environment — mcp, pyzmq, and (on Windows) pywin32 and comtypes. requirements.txt pins every package, direct and transitive, with hashes for supply-chain integrity; install with install.ps1 rather than a plain pip install.