rustpad-mcp

A Model Context Protocol server for Rustpad, the efficient, minimal, self-hosted collaborative text editor.

It gives an AI assistant read and write access to the pads of a Rustpad instance. Reads go through Rustpad's HTTP API; writes speak the operational-transformation WebSocket protocol, so targeted edits (append_to_document, replace_in_document) merge cleanly with what human collaborators type at the same time instead of overwriting it. While the server edits a pad, it is visible to everyone in the pad as a collaborator named rustpad-mcp.

📖 Full documentation at rustpad-mcp.ni-c.de

Requirements

• A reachable Rustpad instance (self-hosted; the server is stateless and needs no credentials — Rustpad has no authentication)

• Node.js >= 22, or Docker

Related MCP server: SSH MCP Server

Configuration

The same URL serves the HTTP API, the WebSocket endpoint and the share links returned by the tools (<RUSTPAD_URL>/#<pad-id>). Booleans must be exactly true. The server starts and lists its tools without configuration; every call then fails with setup instructions.

Keep in mind what Rustpad is: pads are ephemeral (lost on server restart and after 24 hours of inactivity, unless the instance is run with SQLITE_URI) and anyone who knows a pad id can read and write it. Do not put secrets in pads.

Installation

Claude Code

claude mcp add rustpad --env RUSTPAD_URL=https://rustpad.example.net -- npx rustpad-mcp

Claude Desktop

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "rustpad": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["rustpad-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "RUSTPAD_URL": "https://rustpad.example.net"
      }
    }
  }
}

Codex

~/.codex/config.toml:

[mcp_servers.rustpad]
command = "npx"
args = ["-y", "rustpad-mcp"]

[mcp_servers.rustpad.env]
RUSTPAD_URL = "https://rustpad.example.net"

Docker

docker run -i --rm -e RUSTPAD_URL=https://rustpad.example.net ghcr.io/ni-c/rustpad-mcp

Tools

With RUSTPAD_READ_ONLY=true only the first three are registered.

Safety

• Pad content is world-writable and therefore untrusted: every read result is prefixed with a marker telling the model to treat it as data, never as instructions.

• Replacing a non-empty pad is irreversible and guarded by a single-use confirmation token that only ever appears in a previous tool result.

• Tool results are size-capped; upstream error bodies are sanitized before they reach the model.

• RUSTPAD_INSECURE_TLS relaxes certificate validation only for the configured connection, never process-wide.

Development

npm install
npm run lint && npm run build && npm test

The test suite talks to an in-memory fake of rustpad-server (including OT transformation of concurrent edits) over the real MCP protocol; no live instance is needed. The architecture diagram and social card are generated — edit docs/assets/architecture.source.svg and run npm run assets, never the rendered copies.

Releasing

Releases are tag-driven. Bump package.json, move the [Unreleased] notes in CHANGELOG.md under the new version, commit, then:

git tag -s vX.Y.Z -m "vX.Y.Z"
git push origin main vX.Y.Z

The release workflow publishes to npm via Trusted Publishing (OIDC, with provenance), pushes the multi-arch container image to GHCR, creates the GitHub release from the CHANGELOG section, and updates the entry in the official MCP registry.

License

MIT © Willi Thiel