diff --git a/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json b/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json
index ce3acb4..9ab1cda 100644
--- a/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json
+++ b/.devcontainer/devcontainer.json
@@ -12,7 +12,7 @@
 	// "forwardPorts": [],
 
 	// Use 'postCreateCommand' to run commands after the container is created.
-	"postCreateCommand": "pip3 install --user -r requirements.txt"
+	"postCreateCommand": "pip3 install --user -r requirements.txt -r requirements-dev.txt"
 
 	// Configure tool-specific properties.
 	// "customizations": {},
diff --git a/.github/workflows/ci.yml b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
index 53d1400..412ba54 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/ci.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
@@ -13,6 +13,6 @@ jobs:
       - name: "Install test dependencies"
         run: |
           python -m pip install --upgrade pip
-          pip install -r requirements.txt
+          pip install -r requirements.txt -r requirements-dev.txt
       - name: "Run tests"
         run: python -m pytest
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/requirements-dev.txt b/requirements-dev.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..8db956a
--- /dev/null
+++ b/requirements-dev.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,4 @@
+pytest==8.3.3
+mypy==1.13.0
+mypy-extensions==1.0.0
+types-requests==2.32.0.20241016
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/requirements.txt b/requirements.txt
index 30ce159..af01943 100644
--- a/requirements.txt
+++ b/requirements.txt
@@ -1,3 +1,2 @@
 requests==2.32.3
-ruamel.yaml==0.18.6
-pytest==8.3.3
\ No newline at end of file
+ruamel.yaml==0.18.6
\ No newline at end of file
diff --git a/tests/test_syntax.py b/tests/test_syntax.py
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..76ae99f
--- /dev/null
+++ b/tests/test_syntax.py
@@ -0,0 +1,39 @@
+# based on https://gist.github.com/bbarker/4ddf4a1c58ae8465f3d37b6f2234a421
+
+import os
+import subprocess
+import sys
+import unittest
+from typing import List
+
+
+class MyPyTest(unittest.TestCase):
+
+    def __call_mypy__(self, args, files):
+        result: int = subprocess.call(self.base_mypy_call + args + files, env=os.environ, cwd=self.pypath)
+        self.assertEqual(result, 0, '')
+
+    def test_run_mypy_app(self):
+        mypy_args: List[str] = [
+            "--disable-error-code", "var-annotated"
+        ]
+        self.__call_mypy__(mypy_args, ["main.py"])
+
+    # Run test again, but without disabling any error codes.
+    # This is expected to fail, but we intentionally keep this test around to
+    #   1) try not to add any more errors to what's already in the baseline
+    #   2) as a reminder to try to move the codebase towards having type checking eventually
+    @unittest.expectedFailure
+    def test_run_strict_mypy_app(self):
+        mypy_args: List[str] = []
+        self.__call_mypy__(mypy_args, ["main.py"])
+
+    def __init__(self, *args, **kwargs) -> None:
+        super(MyPyTest, self).__init__(*args, **kwargs)
+        my_env = os.environ.copy()
+        self.pypath: str = my_env.get("PYTHONPATH", os.getcwd())
+        self.base_mypy_call: List[str] = [sys.executable, "-m", "mypy", "--ignore-missing-imports"]
+
+
+if __name__ == '__main__':
+    unittest.main()