# AGENTS.md
Guidelines for AI coding assistants working with this repository.
For domain-specific guidance, see subdirectory AGENTS.md files:
- `tests/AGENTS.md` - Testing conventions and workflows
- `plugins/AGENTS.md` - Plugin framework and development
- `charts/AGENTS.md` - Helm chart operations
- `deployment/AGENTS.md` - Infrastructure and deployment
- `docs/AGENTS.md` - Documentation authoring
- `mcp-servers/AGENTS.md` - MCP server implementation
**Note:** The `llms/` directory contains guidance for LLMs *using* ContextForge solution (end-user runtime guidance), not for code agents working on this codebase.
## Project Overview
ContextForge is a production-grade AI gateway, registry, and proxy that sits in front of any MCP, A2A, or REST/gRPC APIs, exposing a unified control plane with centralized governance, discovery, and observability. It federates tools, agents, models, and APIs (plus model/provider proxying), optimizes agent and tool calling, and supports plugins, auth/RBAC, rate-limiting, virtual servers, multi-transport protocols, and an optional Admin UI.
## Project Structure
```
mcpgateway/ # Core FastAPI application
├── main.py # Application entry point
├── config.py # Environment configuration
├── db.py # SQLAlchemy ORM models and session management
├── schemas.py # Pydantic validation schemas
├── services/ # Business logic layer (50+ services)
├── routers/ # HTTP endpoint definitions (19 routers)
├── middleware/ # Cross-cutting concerns (16 middleware)
├── transports/ # Protocol implementations (SSE, WebSocket, stdio, streamable HTTP)
├── plugins/ # Plugin framework infrastructure
└── alembic/ # Database migrations
tests/ # Test suite (see tests/AGENTS.md)
plugins/ # Plugin implementations (see plugins/AGENTS.md)
plugins_rust/ # Rust plugin implementations for performance-sensitive paths
plugin_templates/ # Starter templates for building new plugins
charts/ # Helm charts (see charts/AGENTS.md)
deployment/ # Infrastructure configs (see deployment/AGENTS.md)
docs/ # Architecture and usage documentation (see docs/AGENTS.md)
a2a-agents/ # A2A agent implementations (used for testing/examples)
agent_runtimes/ # Agent runtime integrations (for example LangChain runtime)
mcp-servers/ # MCP server templates (see mcp-servers/AGENTS.md)
tools_rust/ # Rust utilities (for example stdio wrapper tooling)
llms/ # End-user LLM guidance (not for code agents)
```
## Essential Commands
### Setup
```bash
cp .env.example .env && make install-dev check-env # Complete setup
make venv # Create virtual environment with uv
make install-dev # Install with dev dependencies
make check-env # Verify .env against .env.example
```
### Development
```bash
make dev # Dev server on :8000 with autoreload
make serve # Production gunicorn on :4444
make serve-ssl # HTTPS on :4444 (creates certs if needed)
```
### Code Quality
```bash
# After writing code
make autoflake isort black pre-commit
# Before committing, use ty, mypy and pyrefly to check just the new files, then run:
make flake8 bandit interrogate pylint verify
```
## Authentication & RBAC Overview
ContextForge implements a **two-layer security model**:
1. **Token Scoping (Layer 1)**: Controls what resources a user CAN SEE (data filtering)
2. **RBAC (Layer 2)**: Controls what actions a user CAN DO (permission checks)
### Token Scoping Quick Reference
The `teams` claim in JWT tokens determines resource visibility:
| JWT `teams` State | `is_admin: true` | `is_admin: false` |
|-------------------|------------------|-------------------|
| Key MISSING | PUBLIC-ONLY `[]` | PUBLIC-ONLY `[]` |
| `teams: null` | ADMIN BYPASS | PUBLIC-ONLY `[]` |
| `teams: []` | PUBLIC-ONLY `[]` | PUBLIC-ONLY `[]` |
| `teams: ["t1"]` | Team + Public | Team + Public |
**Key behaviors:**
- Missing `teams` key = public-only access (secure default)
- Admin bypass requires BOTH `teams: null` AND `is_admin: true`
- `normalize_token_teams()` in `mcpgateway/auth.py` is the single source of truth
### Security Invariants (Required)
- Treat `public` as platform-public scope, not internet-anonymous scope.
- Explicit exception: when `MCP_REQUIRE_AUTH=false`, unauthenticated `/mcp` requests are allowed with public-only visibility.
- Keep the two-layer model on every path:
- Layer 1: token scoping controls what a caller can see.
- Layer 2: RBAC controls what a caller can do.
- Do not re-implement token team interpretation logic; always use `normalize_token_teams()` in `mcpgateway/auth.py`.
- Do not accept inbound client auth tokens via URL query parameters.
- Legacy `INSECURE_ALLOW_QUERYPARAM_AUTH` is interop-only for outbound peer auth and must remain opt-in and host-restricted.
- High-risk transports must be feature-flagged and disabled by default.
- Transport/session endpoints must authenticate before session establishment (or message forwarding) and enforce RBAC before processing actions.
- Token-scoped route authorization must be default-deny for unmapped protected paths.
- Never trust client-provided ownership fields (`owner_email`, `team_id`, session owner); derive authorization from authenticated identity and server-side state.
- Security-sensitive changes must include deny-path regression tests (unauthenticated, wrong team, insufficient permissions, feature disabled).
### Built-in Roles
| Role | Scope | Key Permissions |
|------|-------|-----------------|
| `platform_admin` | global | `*` (all) |
| `team_admin` | team | teams.*, tools.read/execute, resources.read |
| `developer` | team | tools.read/execute, resources.read |
| `viewer` | team | tools.read, resources.read (read-only) |
### Documentation
- **Full RBAC guide**: `docs/docs/manage/rbac.md`
- **Multi-tenancy architecture**: `docs/docs/architecture/multitenancy.md`
- **OAuth token delegation**: `docs/docs/architecture/oauth-design.md`
## Key Environment Variables
Defaults come from `mcpgateway/config.py`. `.env.example` intentionally overrides a few for local/dev convenience.
```bash
# Core
HOST=127.0.0.1 # .env.example uses 0.0.0.0
PORT=4444
DATABASE_URL=sqlite:///./mcp.db # or postgresql+psycopg://...
REDIS_URL=redis://localhost:6379/0
RELOAD=false
# Auth
JWT_SECRET_KEY=your-secret-key
BASIC_AUTH_USER=admin
BASIC_AUTH_PASSWORD=changeme
AUTH_REQUIRED=true # Set false ONLY for development
AUTH_ENCRYPTION_SECRET=my-test-salt # For encrypting stored secrets
# Features
MCPGATEWAY_UI_ENABLED=false # .env.example sets true
MCPGATEWAY_ADMIN_API_ENABLED=false # .env.example sets true
MCPGATEWAY_A2A_ENABLED=true
PLUGINS_ENABLED=false
PLUGIN_CONFIG_FILE=plugins/config.yaml
# Logging
LOG_LEVEL=ERROR
LOG_TO_FILE=false
STRUCTURED_LOGGING_DATABASE_ENABLED=false
# Observability
OBSERVABILITY_ENABLED=false
OTEL_EXPORTER_OTLP_ENDPOINT= # .env.example sets http://localhost:4317
```
## MCP Helpers
```bash
# Generate JWT token
python -m mcpgateway.utils.create_jwt_token --username admin@example.com --exp 10080 --secret KEY
# Export for API calls
export MCPGATEWAY_BEARER_TOKEN=$(python -m mcpgateway.utils.create_jwt_token --username admin@example.com --exp 0 --secret KEY)
# Expose stdio server via HTTP/SSE
python -m mcpgateway.translate --stdio "uvx mcp-server-git" --port 9000
```
### Adding an MCP Server
1. Start: `python -m mcpgateway.translate --stdio "server-command" --port 9000`
2. Register: `POST /gateways`
3. Create virtual server: `POST /servers`
4. Access via SSE/WebSocket endpoints
## Technology Stack
- **FastAPI** with **Pydantic** validation and **SQLAlchemy** ORM (Starlette ASGI)
- **HTMX + Alpine.js** for admin UI
- **SQLite** default, **PostgreSQL** support, **Redis** for caching/federation
- **Alembic** for migrations
## Alembic Database Migrations
When adding new database columns or tables, create an Alembic migration.
### Creating Migrations
```bash
# CRITICAL: Always check the current head FIRST
cd mcpgateway && alembic heads
# Generate a new migration (auto-generates from model changes)
alembic revision --autogenerate -m "add_column_to_table"
# Or create an empty migration for manual edits
alembic revision -m "add_column_to_table"
```
### Migration File Requirements
The `down_revision` MUST point to the current head. **Never guess or copy from older migrations.**
```python
# CORRECT: Points to actual current head (verified via `alembic heads`)
revision: str = "abc123def456"
down_revision: Union[str, Sequence[str], None] = "43c07ed25a24" # Current head
# WRONG: Creates multiple heads (breaks all tests)
down_revision: Union[str, Sequence[str], None] = "some_old_revision"
```
### Idempotent Migrations Pattern
Always write idempotent migrations that check before modifying:
```python
def upgrade() -> None:
inspector = sa.inspect(op.get_bind())
# Skip if table doesn't exist (fresh DB uses db.py models directly)
if "my_table" not in inspector.get_table_names():
return
# Skip if column already exists
columns = [col["name"] for col in inspector.get_columns("my_table")]
if "new_column" in columns:
return
op.add_column("my_table", sa.Column("new_column", sa.String(), nullable=True))
```
### Verification
```bash
# Verify single head after creating migration
cd mcpgateway && alembic heads
# Should show only ONE head
# Run tests to confirm migrations work
make test
```
### Common Errors
- **"Multiple heads are present"**: Your `down_revision` points to wrong parent. Fix by updating to actual current head.
- **"Target database is not up to date"**: Run `alembic upgrade head` first.
## Coding Standards
- **Python >= 3.11** with type hints; strict mypy
- **Formatting**: Black (line length 200), isort (profile=black)
- **Linting**: Ruff (`E3`,`E4`,`E7`,`E9`,`F`,`D1`), Pylint per `pyproject.toml`
- **Naming**: `snake_case` functions/modules, `PascalCase` classes, `UPPER_CASE` constants
- **Imports**: Group per isort sections (stdlib, third-party, first-party `mcpgateway`, local)
## Commit & PR Standards
- **Sign commits**: `git commit -s` (DCO requirement)
- **Conventional Commits**: `feat:`, `fix:`, `docs:`, `refactor:`, `chore:`
- **Link issues**: `Closes #123`
- Include tests for behavior changes
- Require green lint and tests before PR
- Don't push until asked, and if it's an external contributor, see todo/force-push.md first to push to the contributor's branch.
## GitHub Issues (Brief)
- Prefer issue templates in `.github/ISSUE_TEMPLATE/`: `bug-report-code.md`, `feature-request.md`, `docs-issue.md`, `testing--bug--unit--manual--or-new-test-.md`, `chore-task--devops--linting--maintenance-.md`.
- Title style should include type prefix, for example: `[BUG]: ...`, `[FEATURE]: ...`, `[DOCS]: ...`, `[TESTING]: ...`, `[CHORE]: ...`.
- Label baseline: one primary type label (`bug` or `enhancement` or `documentation` or `testing` or `chore`) plus `triage` on new issues.
- Add 1-3 optional scope labels as needed (for example `security`, `performance`, `ui`, `api`, `python`, `devops`, `a2a`, `mcp-protocol`).
- Epic title format: `[EPIC][SECURITY]: Security clearance levels plugin - Bell-LaPadula MAC implementation #1245`.
- Epic labels: `epic`, `security`, `enhancement`, `triage` (plus optional scope labels).
## Maintenance Guardrails (Brief)
- Source of truth precedence: `mcpgateway/config.py` and runtime code > `Makefile` targets/dependencies > `.env.example` (dev overrides) > docs/comments.
- When auditing repo state, prioritize active source directories and ignore transient/workbench content unless explicitly requested: `todo/`, `tmp/`, `artifacts/`, `logs/`, `coverage/`.
- Issue lifecycle labels: use `awaiting-user` when blocked on reporter feedback, `blocked` for dependency blockers, `planned` when accepted but deferred, and `fixed` only after the resolving change is merged.
- Avoid brittle numeric claims (counts of services/routers/middleware/plugins) unless you are actively validating and updating them in the same change; otherwise describe with approximate wording.
## Important Constraints
- Never mention AI assistants in PRs/diffs
- Do not include test plans or effort estimates in PRs
- Never create files unless absolutely necessary; prefer editing existing files
- Never proactively create documentation files unless explicitly requested
- Never commit secrets; use `.env` for configuration
## Key Files
- `README.md` - Canonical project overview and quick start
- `mcpgateway/main.py` - Application entry point
- `mcpgateway/config.py` - Environment configuration
- `mcpgateway/db.py` - SQLAlchemy ORM models and session management
- `mcpgateway/schemas.py` - Pydantic schemas
- `pyproject.toml` - Project configuration
- `Makefile` - Build automation
- `.env.example` - Environment template
## CLI Tools Available
- `gh` for GitHub operations
- `make` for build/test automation
- `uv` for virtual environment management
- Standard tools: pytest, black, isort, ruff, pylint
