Have Sally explain what a piece of code actually does, in plain English — no hand-holding, just the cold, clear truth. Use when the user wants a snippet or file explained, asks
AI agents call sally_explain to retrieve information from Cynical Sally without modifying anything — typically the context-gathering step in research, monitoring, and reporting workflows, before the agent takes action elsewhere.
This tool reads and analyzes code to produce a natural language explanation. It does not modify, execute, delete, or transmit any data; it only returns a textual description of what the code does. Misuse risk is minimal since it only processes input and returns an explanation.
From the tool's definition 'explain what a piece of code actually does, in plain English' — purely analytical/explanatory, no side effects
Documented attack patterns abuse exactly the kind of access sally_explain gives an agent:
PolicyLayer is an MCP gateway — it sits between your AI agents and Cynical Sally, and nothing reaches the server without passing your rules. This is the rule we recommend for sally_explain:
{
"version": "1",
"default": "deny",
"tools": {
"sally_explain": {}
}
}sally_explain is read-only, so it stays allowed — but everything else on the server is denied unless you say otherwise.
Free to start. No card required.
Have Sally explain what a piece of code actually does, in plain English — no hand-holding, just the cold, clear truth. Use when the user wants a snippet or file explained, asks. It is categorised as a Read tool in the Cynical Sally MCP Server, which means it retrieves data without modifying state.
Register the Cynical Sally MCP server in PolicyLayer and add a rule for sally_explain: allow, deny, rate-limit, or require approval. Point your MCP client at the PolicyLayer proxy URL and the rule is enforced on every call, before it reaches Cynical Sally. Nothing to install.
sally_explain is a Read tool with low risk. Read-only tools are generally safe to allow by default.
Yes. Add a rate_limit block to the sally_explain rule in your PolicyLayer policy. For example, setting max: 10 and window: 60 limits the tool to 10 calls per minute. Rate limits are tracked per agent session and reset automatically.
Set action: deny in the PolicyLayer policy for sally_explain. The AI agent will receive a policy violation error and cannot call the tool. You can also include a reason field to explain why the tool is blocked.
sally_explain is provided by the Cynical Sally MCP server (w1ckedxt/cynical-sally). PolicyLayer sits as a proxy in front of this server to enforce policies before tool calls reach the server.
Deterministic rules across all 8 Cynical Sally tools. Per-identity grants. Full audit log. Live in minutes. Nothing to install.
Free to start. No card required.
8 Cynical Sally tools catalogued and risk-classified — across an index of 42,500+ MCP servers.