delete_collection

Permanently removes a collection and all its documents from the MCP Outline Server. Use to delete obsolete or unneeded sections of content, clean up workspace organization, or remove entire project collections. WARNING: Action is irreversible.

Instructions

    Permanently removes a collection and all its documents.
    
    Use this tool when you need to:
    - Remove an entire section of content
    - Delete obsolete project collections
    - Remove collections that are no longer needed
    - Clean up workspace organization
    
    WARNING: This action cannot be undone and will delete all documents

within the collection.

    Args:
        collection_id: The collection ID to delete
        
    Returns:
        Result message confirming deletion

Input Schema

TableJSON Schema

Name	Required	Description	Default
`collection_id`	Yes

Implementation Reference

src/mcp_outline/features/documents/collection_tools.py:276-317 (handler)

The MCP tool handler implementation for delete_collection, decorated with @mcp.tool() and conditionally defined inside register_tools based on environment variables. Calls get_outline_client() and client.delete_collection().

@mcp.tool(
    annotations=ToolAnnotations(
        readOnlyHint=False,
        destructiveHint=True,
        idempotentHint=True,
    )
)
async def delete_collection(collection_id: str) -> str:
    """
    Permanently removes a collection and all its documents.

    Use this tool when you need to:
    - Remove an entire section of content
    - Delete obsolete project collections
    - Remove collections that are no longer needed
    - Clean up workspace organization

    WARNING: This action cannot be undone and will delete all
    documents within the collection.

    Args:
        collection_id: The collection ID to delete

    Returns:
        Result message confirming deletion
    """
    try:
        client = await get_outline_client()
        success = await client.delete_collection(collection_id)

        if success:
            return (
                "Collection and all its documents deleted "
                "successfully."
            )
        else:
            return "Failed to delete collection."
    except OutlineClientError as e:
        return f"Error deleting collection: {str(e)}"
    except Exception as e:
        return f"Unexpected error: {str(e)}"

src/mcp_outline/utils/outline_client.py:436-448 (helper)

The OutlineClient helper method that performs the actual API call to delete the collection via POST to collections.delete endpoint.

async def delete_collection(self, collection_id: str) -> bool:
    """
    Delete a collection and all its documents.

    Args:
        collection_id: The ID of the collection to delete

    Returns:
        Success status
    """
    response = await self.post("collections.delete", {"id": collection_id})
    return response.get("success", False)

src/mcp_outline/features/documents/__init__.py:33-33 (registration)
Invocation of collection_tools.register_tools(mcp) which contains the conditional registration of the delete_collection tool.
```
collection_tools.register_tools(mcp)
```
src/mcp_outline/server.py:32-32 (registration)
Top-level registration of all features via register_all(mcp), which chains to documents.register(mcp) and then collection_tools.register_tools(mcp).
```
register_all(mcp)
```

MCP Outline Server