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Set Up Your Dev Environment

Code-native integrations and custom connectors are built with TypeScript using the @prismatic-io/spectral SDK. This article outlines recommendations on how to set up your development environment.

Operating system considerations​

You can develop Prismatic connectors and integrations on any operating system that supports Node.js (Windows, Linux, MacOS, etc). If you use Windows, you may find it helpful to work in a Windows Subsystem for Linux WSL environment.

Install Node.js​

Custom connectors and integrations are written in Node.js (with TypeScript layered on top). While many versions of Node.js can be used to build custom connectors and integrations, we recommend using the latest LTS version available on NodeJS.org.

Once you install Node.js, ensure that you can run both node --version and npm --version.

Node package managers​

While npm is the default package manager for Node.js, you can also use yarn, pnpm or bun if you prefer.

Install an IDE​

If you have a favorite code editor, use that. We've found that VS Code works great for custom connector development, but some of our developers prefer Sublime or neovim.

If you use VS Code, scaffolded projects include a .vscode/ directory with recommended extensions and settings, and VS Code prompts you to install them when you open the project.

You may also want to install the Prismatic VS Code extension to enhance your development workflow with test runners, config wizards, and execution result views directly in your editor.

Install the Prismatic CLI tool​

The Prismatic CLI tool, prism is used for initializing and publishing custom connectors and integrations. You can install it after installing Node.js and npm with this command:

Install prism
npm install --global @prismatic-io/prism
Scaffolding toolchain

prism components:init and prism integrations:init scaffold new projects with our recommended toolchain. If you run into issues with the recommended toolchain, you can scaffold with the previous toolchain by passing --toolchain legacy - and please contact support so we can address it.

Once you've installed prism, log in by typing prism login. You'll be prompted to enter your Prismatic credentials, and then to authorize prism to access your Prismatic account. Click Accept.

Once you've logged in, run prism me to verify that you are logged in.

$ prism me
Name: John Doe
Email: john.doe@example.com
Organization: Example Corp - US Region
Endpoint URL: https://app.prismatic.io

AI-assisted development​

To accelerate your development workflow, Prismatic provides two AI tools:

  • The Prism MCP dev server connects any AI coding assistant (Cursor, GitHub Copilot, etc.) to your Prismatic tenant, giving it tools to list components, publish integrations, generate manifests, and more.
  • Prismatic Skills is a Claude Code plugin with specialized agents and knowledge bases for building custom connectors and code-native integrations end-to-end.