MCP Notes Server

A minimal Model Context Protocol server, built from scratch in Python, that exposes a simple note-taking tool set to any MCP-compatible client (Claude Desktop, the MCP Inspector, a custom agent, etc).

Built as a from-scratch, non-toy example of all three MCP primitives — tools, a resource, and prompts — in one small, readable project.

What it does

• add_note(title, content) — save a new note

• list_notes() — list all saved note titles

• search_notes(keyword) — search notes by title or content

• delete_note(title) — delete a note by exact title

• notes://all — a resource exposing every note as readable markdown

• summarize_notes — a prompt that generates a ready-made "summarize all my notes" message

• clean_up_note — a prompt that turns rough pasted text into a clean, titled note

Notes are persisted to a local notes_data.json file (created automatically on first run).

Related MCP server: LLM Second Brain

Project structure

store.py     # data layer — save/load/search notes (plain Python, no MCP code)
prompts.py   # reusable prompt templates (plain strings with placeholders)
app.py       # the MCP server itself — wires store.py and prompts.py into
             # MCP tools, a resource, and prompts using MCPServer

Requirements

• Python 3.10+

• The official mcp Python SDK, v2.x

Setup

git clone https://github.com/<your-username>/mcp-notes-server.git
cd mcp-notes-server
pip install -r requirements.txt

Running it

Quick test with the built-in inspector (a browser UI for calling tools without a full client):

mcp dev app.py

This opens a browser tab where you can call each tool, read the resource, and run the prompts directly.

Connect it to Claude Desktop — add this to your Claude Desktop MCP config (adjust the path to wherever you cloned this repo):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "notes": {
      "command": "python",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/mcp-notes-server/app.py"]
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop, and it will be able to call these tools, read the resource, and offer the prompts directly inside a normal conversation.

Why it's built this way

store.py knows nothing about MCP — it's just a plain Python class that reads and writes a JSON file. app.py is a thin protocol wrapper on top of it. That separation is the one pattern worth taking away from this example: keep your actual logic MCP-agnostic, and wrap it at the edges. Swap NoteStore for a real database and nothing about the MCP layer has to change.

License

MIT — do whatever you want with this.