MCP server fails to resolve environment variables in config

[FrankTub]

When I add a MCP server in altimate code that uses an environment variable in the configuration it fails to use it. In the tool itself I can see that it can succesfully connect:

---

Metadata

Field	Value
CLI Version	0.5.17
Platform	darwin
Architecture	arm64
OS Release	25.3.0
Category	bug
Working Directory	data-warehouse-etl-dbt
Session ID	ses_2aba8ca90ffeLGmZEZ4sNP90Ng

[anandgupta42]

Resolved in v0.5.19.

[FrankTub]

Technical Findings

The {env:...} syntax in altimate-code.json is not being resolved when passed to MCP servers.

Config tested (~/.config/altimate-code/altimate-code.json):

{
 "mcp": {
 "gitlab": {
 "type": "local",
 "command": ["node", ".../gitlab-mcp-server/dist/index.js"],
 "environment": {
 "GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN": "{env:GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN}",
 "GITLAB_API_URL": "https://gitlab.com/api/v4"
 }
 }
 }
}

Observed behavior:

• The MCP server starts successfully but returns: MCP error -32603: This operation requires user authentication
• The env var GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN is set in the shell environment
• Passing the token directly via userCredentials parameter works — confirming the MCP server itself is functional
• The issue is that {env:GITLAB_PERSONAL_ACCESS_TOKEN} is passed as a literal string instead of being resolved to the actual value