stuckbar

A straightforward CLI tool & MCP server for getting that annoying Windows taskbar unstuck.

When the Windows taskbar gets stuck (especially when configured to auto-hide), this utility provides a quick way to restart explorer.exe from the command line or via MCP tool calls, snapping the taskbar back to normal.

🪟 Windows Only: This tool is designed specifically for Windows and will not work on macOS or Linux.

Installation

Using cargo (recommended)

# Basic installation (CLI only)
cargo install stuckbar

# With MCP server support (STDIO transport)
cargo install stuckbar --features mcp

# With full MCP support (STDIO + HTTP transports)
cargo install stuckbar --features mcp-full

From source

git clone https://github.com/bkataru/stuckbar.git
cd stuckbar
cargo install --path .

# Or with MCP features
cargo install --path . --features mcp-full

Usage

Basic CLI Usage

# Restart explorer.exe (default action)
stuckbar

# Or explicitly use the restart command
stuckbar restart

# Just kill explorer.exe
stuckbar kill

# Just start explorer.exe
stuckbar start

# Show help
stuckbar --help

# Show version
stuckbar --version

Commands

Command	Description
restart	Kill and restart explorer.exe (default)
kill	Terminate explorer.exe process
start	Start explorer.exe process
serve	Start MCP server (requires mcp feature)

MCP Server (AI Agent Integration)

Stuckbar can run as a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server, allowing AI agents to programmatically control Windows Explorer operations.

Features

When running as an MCP server, stuckbar exposes three tools:

Tool	Description
kill_explorer	Terminate the explorer.exe process
start_explorer	Start the explorer.exe process
restart_explorer	Restart explorer.exe (recommended for stuck taskbar)

Running the MCP Server

STDIO Transport (for direct process communication)

# Requires: cargo install stuckbar --features mcp
stuckbar serve --stdio

This is the recommended transport for most MCP clients like Claude Desktop.

HTTP Transport (SSE-based, for network communication)

# Requires: cargo install stuckbar --features mcp-full
stuckbar serve --http

# With custom host and port
stuckbar serve --http --host 0.0.0.0 --port 3000

The HTTP server uses Server-Sent Events (SSE) and exposes:

• SSE endpoint: http://<host>:<port>/sse
• Message endpoint: http://<host>:<port>/message

Configuration Examples

Claude Desktop

Add to your claude_desktop_config.json:

Windows:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "stuckbar": {
      "command": "stuckbar",
      "args": ["serve", "--stdio"]
    }
  }
}

Or with full path:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "stuckbar": {
      "command": "C:\\Users\\<username>\\.cargo\\bin\\stuckbar.exe",
      "args": ["serve", "--stdio"]
    }
  }
}

Other MCP Clients

For clients that support SSE transport:

stuckbar serve --http --port 8080
# Connect to: http://localhost:8080/sse

Feature Flags

Feature	Description
(default)	Basic CLI functionality
mcp	MCP server with STDIO transport
mcp-http	MCP server with SSE HTTP transport (includes mcp)
mcp-full	All MCP features (alias for mcp-http)

Building from Source

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/bkataru/stuckbar.git
cd stuckbar

# Build with default features
cargo build --release

# Build with MCP support
cargo build --release --features mcp-full

# Run tests
cargo test

# Run tests with all features
cargo test --all-features

How It Works

When the Windows taskbar becomes unresponsive or stuck (often happens with auto-hide enabled), the typical fix is to restart Windows Explorer. This tool automates that process by:

1. Kill: Forcefully terminating explorer.exe using taskkill /F /IM explorer.exe
2. Wait: Pausing briefly (500ms) to ensure the process is fully terminated
3. Start: Launching a new instance of explorer.exe

This restores the taskbar, desktop icons, and file explorer functionality.

Platform Support

This tool is Windows-only. Running on macOS or Linux will display an error message:

stuckbar is a Windows-only tool.
Current platform 'linux' is not supported.
This tool restarts explorer.exe which only exists on Windows.

License

MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request :)