I built Manifold, an operation-first foundation for .NET.
The idea is simple: define an operation once, then generate fast CLI and MCP surfaces from that single definition.
I made it because I kept running into the same problem in real projects: the same capability needed to be exposed through multiple developer-facing surfaces, but the definitions, bindings, and runtime wiring kept drifting apart over time.
Manifold focuses on:
one handwritten operation definition as the source of truth
source-generator-first design
generated CLI bindings
generated MCP tool metadata and invocation
samples for CLI, MCP stdio, and MCP Streamable HTTP
Repo:
https://github.com/Garume/Manifold
Release:
https://github.com/Garume/Manifold/releases/tag/v1.0.0
Wiki:
https://github.com/Garume/Manifold/wiki
Iād especially love feedback on whether this API shape feels natural for .NET, and whether a foundation like this is useful for MCP-oriented tooling.