Podman MCP Server

Instructions

Implementation Reference

• main_b.py:506-509 (handler)

  The primary handler function for the 'start_container' tool. It extracts the container name from arguments, runs 'podman start' via the run_podman helper, and returns a success or error message.

  async def start_container(self, args: Dict[str, Any]) -> Dict[str, Any]:
      container = args.get("container")
      result = run_podman(["start", container])
      return {"output": f"Started container: {container}" if result["success"] else f"Error: {result['stderr']}"}

• main_b.py:197-210 (schema)

  JSON schema definition for the 'start_container' tool input, specifying the required 'container' string parameter.

  Tool(
      name="start_container",
      description="Start a stopped container",
      inputSchema={
          "type": "object",
          "properties": {
              "container": {
                  "type": "string",
                  "description": "Container name or ID"
              }
          },
          "required": ["container"]
      }
  ),

• main_b.py:459-472 (registration)

  Registration of tool handlers in a dictionary used in handle_tools_call to map 'start_container' to its handler method.

  tool_handlers = {
      "list_containers": self.list_containers,
      "container_info": self.container_info,
      "start_container": self.start_container,
      "stop_container": self.stop_container,
      "restart_container": self.restart_container,
      "container_logs": self.container_logs,
      "run_container": self.run_container,
      "remove_container": self.remove_container,
      "exec_container": self.exec_container,
      "list_images": self.list_images,
      "pull_image": self.pull_image,
      "container_stats": self.container_stats,
  }

• main.py:170-173 (handler)

  Alternative handler for 'start_container' using FastMCP decorator, which also serves as registration and schema via Pydantic Field.

  @mcp.tool(title="Start container", description="Start a stopped container.")
  def start_container(container: str = Field(..., description="Container name or ID")) -> str:
      result = run_podman(["start", container])
      return f"Started container: {container}" if result["success"] else f"Error: {result['stderr']}"

• main_b.py:50-72 (helper)

  Shared helper function that executes podman subprocess commands and returns structured results, used by the start_container handler.

  def run_podman(args: List[str]) -> Dict[str, Any]:
      """Run a podman command and capture output"""
      try:
          cmd = ["podman"] + args
          logger.info(f"Running command: {' '.join(cmd)}")
          result = subprocess.run(
              cmd,
              capture_output=True,
              text=True,
              timeout=30
          )
          return {
              "success": result.returncode == 0,
              "stdout": result.stdout.strip(),
              "stderr": result.stderr.strip(),
              "returncode": result.returncode,
          }
      except subprocess.TimeoutExpired:
          logger.error("Command timed out")
          return {"success": False, "stdout": "", "stderr": "Command timed out", "returncode": -1}
      except Exception as e:
          logger.error(f"Command error: {e}")
          return {"success": False, "stdout": "", "stderr": str(e), "returncode": -1}