Inistate MCP Server

MCP server for the Inistate platform — module discovery, entry management, and activity submission.

Setup

Environment Variables

| Variable | Required | Default | Description | |----------|----------|---------|-------------| | INISTATE_API_TOKEN | Yes | — | Bearer token for Inistate API authentication | | INISTATE_API_BASE | No | https://api.inistate.com | API base URL | | INISTATE_MCP_MODE | No | configure | Initial mode: runtime, configure, or frontend (see Modes) | | INISTATE_MCP_NO_SETUP | No | — | Set to 1 to force server mode from a terminal (skip the interactive wizard) | | INISTATE_DEBUG_FILE | No | — | Set to 1 to log write-path tool calls to ./debug.log, or to a path to log there. Off by default; logs identifiers only, never field values |

Install from npm (recommended)

No clone or build needed — npx will fetch and run the published package on demand:

npx -y inistate-mcp

Or install globally:

npm install -g inistate-mcp
inistate-mcp

Interactive setup (recommended)

Run the binary in a terminal with no MCP client attached and it walks you through entering your API token and picks the right config file for your client:

npx -y inistate-mcp
# or, explicitly:
npx -y inistate-mcp setup

Supported clients: Claude Desktop, Claude Code (global or project-local .mcp.json), Cursor, Windsurf, Codex CLI, VS Code (user profile or workspace .vscode/mcp.json), Cline, Gemini CLI (global or workspace). Pick "Print config only" to get a JSON block to paste anywhere else.

The wizard only runs when stdin is a TTY (i.e., you launched it yourself). When an MCP client spawns the binary via piped stdio, it skips the wizard and runs as a normal MCP server — set INISTATE_MCP_NO_SETUP=1 if you need to force server mode from a terminal.

Claude Desktop Configuration

Add to your claude_desktop_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "inistate": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "inistate-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "INISTATE_API_TOKEN": "your-token-here"
      }
    }
  }
}

Claude Code Configuration

claude mcp add inistate -e INISTATE_API_TOKEN=your-token-here -- npx -y inistate-mcp

Install from source

git clone https://github.com/Inistate/inistate-mcp.git
cd inistate-mcp
npm install
npm run build

Then point your MCP client at node /absolute/path/to/inistate-mcp/build/index.js.

Tools

Tools marked (configure) are only exposed in configure mode — see Modes. Tools the active backend cannot serve (e.g. scaffold_module on the hosted Platform) stay registered but return a structured capability message instead of failing silently.

| Tool | Description | |------|-------------| | list_workspaces | List workspaces the user has access to | | set_workspace | Set the active workspace | | list_modules | List all discoverable modules in the workspace | | get_module_schema | Get the canvas schema (basic or extended tier) — available in every mode | | get_module_canvas | Get full module definition with stable IDs (round-trippable) (configure) | | list_entries | Query entries with filters, sorting, and pagination | | get_entry | Read a single entry by ID | | get_form | Get form fields and defaults for an activity | | submit_activity | Create, edit, delete, or run custom activities | | submit_activities | Bulk variant — same activity applied to up to 100 entries in one call | | get_entry_history | Get entry audit trail and comments | | request_upload_url | Default upload path — get a presigned S3 URL to PUT file bytes to | | confirm_upload | Confirm a presigned upload completed; returns the File/Image field path | | upload_file | Fallback upload via base64/multipart (use only if the presigned flow fails) | | download_file | Download a file (returns pre-signed URL) | | design_workflow | Generate a scaffolded module template from a description (configure) | | validate_design | Validate a module schema before creating or updating (configure) | | create_module | Create a new module with schema (configure) | | update_module | Update an existing module's schema (configure) | | scaffold_module | Draft a module schema from existing data (SQLite, Notion, or Airtable table) (configure) — served by the local runtime (inistate-core); on the hosted Platform backend it returns a capability message pointing to design_workflow | | switch_mode | Switch the active mode (runtime / configure / frontend) |

Resources

| URI | Description | |-----|-------------| | inistate://modules | List all modules | | inistate://modules/{name}/canvas | Basic module schema (fields + states) | | inistate://modules/{name}/canvas/extended | Extended schema with activities and flows | | inistate://guardrails | Server-enforced submit_activity rules (read once per session) | | inistate://schema/runtime | Runtime schema — entry/activity/file types and filter operators (default) | | inistate://schema/configure | Module-design schema — write format, field types, colors (configure) | | inistate://design-guide | FACTS Module Design Guide (configure) | | inistate://frontend-guide | REST API reference for hand-written UIs (frontend) |

Prompts

| Prompt | Description | |--------|-------------| | design_factsops_workflow | Guide an agent through designing a complete workflow module (configure) | | execute_activity | Guide an agent through executing a specific activity | | diagnose_entry | Guide an agent through investigating an entry's state and history | | modify_module | Guide an agent through modifying an existing module's schema (configure) |

Modes

The server exposes a focused tool/resource surface depending on the active mode, keeping agent context lean. Use switch_mode to change it, or set the initial mode via the INISTATE_MCP_MODE env var (default: configure).

| Mode | Surface | |------|---------| | runtime | Entry and activity operations only — querying, reading, submitting, files, history. The leanest surface for using existing modules. | | configure | Everything in runtime plus the module-design tools, resources, and prompts (marked (configure) above). | | frontend | Everything in configure plus the inistate://frontend-guide resource for building hand-written UIs against the REST API. |

Tools and resources marked (configure) / (frontend) are absent from the tool list in narrower modes — switch modes to reveal them.

Typical Workflow

list_workspaces → set_workspace — select a workspace (auto-selected when exactly one matches; both return the workspace's module list, so list_modules is only needed to refresh)
get_module_schema — understand a module's fields, states, and activities
get_form — discover required fields before the first submission per (module, activity); reuse its schema for further entries
submit_activity — create or update entries (submit_activities for bulk)
list_entries — query and browse data (use the fields parameter to keep payloads small)
get_entry_history — review entry history

Development

npm run watch          # Watch mode for TypeScript compilation
npm run inspector      # Test with MCP Inspector

MCP Setup

Setup

curl -L "https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/registry/releases/latest/download/mcp-publisher_$(uname -s | tr '[:upper:]' '[:lower:]')_$(uname -m | sed 's/x86_64/amd64/;s/aarch64/arm64/').tar.gz" | tar xz mcp-publisher && sudo mv mcp-publisher /usr/local/bin/

$arch = if ([System.Runtime.InteropServices.RuntimeInformation]::ProcessArchitecture -eq "Arm64") { "arm64" } else { "amd64" }; Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/registry/releases/latest/download/mcp-publisher_windows_$arch.tar.gz" -OutFile "mcp-publisher.tar.gz"; tar xf mcp-publisher.tar.gz mcp-publisher.exe; rm mcp-publisher.tar.gz

Verify

mcp-publisher --help

Authenticate

mcp-publisher login github

Publish: see below

Packaging & Versioning

# Example adding new feature
git checkout -b feat/add-user-tool


# After coding
npx changeset

# Choose:
# 
# minor
# Added new user search tool

# Release
npm run release

# This does:
# install dependencies
# test
# bump version + update changelog + sync server.json
# validate MCP server config
# build (via npm prepare hook)
# publish to npm
# publish to MCP registry

PM2 (Ubuntu/AWS)

Run the HTTP transport in production using PM2:

npm install
npm run build
npm run pm2:start
npx pm2 save

Enable startup on reboot:

sudo npx pm2 startup systemd -u ubuntu --hp /home/ubuntu
npx pm2 save

Common operations:

npm run pm2:restart
npm run pm2:logs
npm run pm2:stop

Set required environment variables (INISTATE_API_TOKEN, and optionally INISTATE_API_BASE, INISTATE_WORKSPACE_ID, OAUTH_ISSUER_URL, INISTATE_APP_URL) in your shell, PM2 ecosystem env, or deployment secret manager before starting.

Testing

Run all tests

npm test

Watch mode (re-runs on file changes)

npm run test:watch

Test structure

Tests are in src/ alongside the source files and use Vitest:

| File | Type | What it covers | |------|------|----------------| | src/schema.test.ts | Unit tests (76) | designWorkflow, validateDesign (including platform parity and input normalization), helper functions (isValidFieldType, isValidColor, isValidActor, suggestColorForState) | | src/activity-guard.test.ts | Unit tests (42) | submit_activity guard rules — human/hybrid actor, state-change confirmation, confidence-inflation, reference-shape validation | | src/tools.schema.test.ts | Unit tests (19) | Tool input-schema shapes and validation | | src/backend-capabilities.test.ts | Unit tests (9) | Capability gating — tools the active backend cannot serve return a capability message | | src/flagged-annotation.test.ts | Integration tests (5) | Flagged-response annotation — suppressed transitions are explained (flag_reason + agent_action) so agents stop retrying with higher confidence | | src/server.test.ts | Integration tests (17) | Spins up the MCP server as a child process and exercises it through the official MCP SDK client — mode-gated tool/resource/prompt discovery, switch_mode, resource reads, prompt retrieval, and local tool calls |

Unit tests cover:

Field type and color validation against the schema
State color suggestion logic
Design validation: duplicate names, invalid types/colors/actors, initial state rules, flow integrity, unreachable states, unused activities, AI confidence warnings
Input normalization: field-type, state-color, and industry aliases; parsing states from a description
Workflow design: pattern detection (approval, ticket, pipeline, record list), industry defaults

Integration tests verify (no API token needed):

Mode-gated tool/resource/prompt discovery — runtime mode hides the configure surface, switch_mode reveals and collapses it
design_workflow, validate_design work end-to-end through the MCP protocol
Static resources (inistate://schema/runtime, inistate://design-guide) return valid content
All 4 prompts return correctly templated messages

Interactive testing with MCP Inspector

INISTATE_API_TOKEN=your-token npm run inspector

Opens a browser UI where you can interactively call tools, inspect schemas, and see responses.

Inistate MCP