Notifications MCP Server

MCP server that lets Claude Desktop or another MCP client trigger macOS sound and visual notifications through a task_status tool.

Current Status

This is a macOS-focused utility. It is not an automatic Claude completion detector by itself: an MCP client or model must call the task_status tool when it wants a notification.

What Works Today

• Registers a task_status MCP tool.

• Plays macOS system sounds with afplay.

• Sends visual notifications using terminal-notifier, AppleScript, PyObjC, or pync fallbacks.

• Supports separate start and completion sounds.

• Supports disabling visual notifications through an environment variable.

• Includes tests for the modular notification and sound managers.

Important Limitations

• macOS is the only implemented platform.

• Linux and Windows support are not implemented.

• Notifications only happen when the MCP tool is called.

• The packaged console script is claude-notifications.

• The Python package is notifications; there is no notifications_mcp_server module entry point.

• Custom sound configuration uses environment variables, not the JSON configuration block that older README versions showed.

Installation

pip install notifications-mcp-server

Optional visual notification dependencies:

pip install "notifications-mcp-server[visual]"
pip install "notifications-mcp-server[pync]"

For terminal-notifier fallback support:

brew install terminal-notifier

Claude Desktop Configuration

Use the console script installed by the package:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "notifications": {
      "command": "claude-notifications"
    }
  }
}

Restart Claude Desktop after changing the config.

Configuration

Environment variables:

export CLAUDE_START_SOUND="/System/Library/Sounds/Glass.aiff"
export CLAUDE_COMPLETE_SOUND="/System/Library/Sounds/Hero.aiff"
export CLAUDE_VISUAL_NOTIFICATIONS="true"
export CLAUDE_NOTIFICATION_ICON="/path/to/icon.png"

If no custom sounds are set, the server uses macOS system sounds.

MCP Tool

task_status

Input:

{
  "message": "Task completed"
}

Messages containing start or processing are treated as start notifications. Other messages are treated as completion notifications.

Verification Demo

Run the local diagnostic script on macOS to test the available notification paths:

python3 test_notification.py

The MCP tool returns a compact status object after attempting sound and visual notification delivery:

{
  "status": "success",
  "message": "Task completed",
  "sound": "/System/Library/Sounds/Hero.aiff",
  "visual": true
}

For a quieter smoke test that skips visual notification prompts:

CLAUDE_VISUAL_NOTIFICATIONS=false claude-notifications

Development

git clone https://github.com/charles-adedotun/notifications-mcp-server.git
cd notifications-mcp-server
pip install -e ".[dev]"
pytest

License

MIT