getcourse-mcp

Automate a GetCourse account from an AI agent — grant lesson/training access, manage users and groups — with no official API.

English · Русский

Why

GetCourse has no public API for the things admins do every day — opening a lesson for a student, adding someone to a training, moving users between groups. Those actions live only in the admin UI.

getcourse-mcp exposes them as MCP tools. It drives a browser you're already logged into over CDP, so it reuses your real session cookie and CSRF token — no scraping of passwords, no fragile API keys. An AI agent (Claude, etc.) can then find a user, inspect their groups and grant access in one turn.

• 🔑 Uses your live session — connects over CDP to a logged-in Chromium/Yandex browser

• 👥 Access by groups — the GetCourse model: training/lesson access = group membership

• 🧩 5 focused tools — status, find user, list groups, check membership, add to groups

• 🪶 TypeScript, ESM — thin, strict, MIT, no account secrets in the repo

Related MCP server: Coursera MCP

How access works in GetCourse

Access to a training (and its lessons) is granted by group membership. "Full access" to a course often means membership in a Module 1 group plus a group that starts the drip schedule (module 1 now, the rest on a timer). To "give access like another student", read their groups and reproduce them:

gc_find_user            # student@example.com → id, name
gc_check_membership     # which of these groups is student X in?
gc_add_user_to_groups   # add student Y to the same groups

Requirements

1. A Chromium-based browser (Chrome / Yandex) launched with a debug port on a separate profile, logged into your account:

   browser.exe --remote-debugging-port=9222 --user-data-dir=C:\gc-cdp-profile

2. Node ≥ 18.

Setup

npm install
cp .env.example .env      # set GETCOURSE_BASE_URL (and GETCOURSE_CDP_URL if not :9222)
npm run build

Register it with your MCP client (see .mcp.json.example):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "getcourse": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["dist/index.js"],
      "env": { "GETCOURSE_BASE_URL": "https://your-account.getcourse.ru" }
    }
  }
}

Tools

Usage

Run the MCP server over stdio, or call a tool directly for scripting:

node dist/index.js                                   # MCP (stdio)

npx tsx src/run.ts gc_find_user '{"email":"user@example.com"}'
# → Found: Jane Doe | user@example.com | student | active | id: 100200300

npx tsx src/run.ts gc_add_user_to_groups \
  '{"email":"user@example.com","groupIds":["100001","100002"]}'
# → OK [done] import submitted

npx tsx src/run.ts gc_check_membership \
  '{"email":"user@example.com","groups":[{"id":"100001","name":"Module 1"}]}'
# → ✅ Module 1 (100001)

Implementation notes

• Granting access (gc_add_user_to_groups) uses the bulk Add users form (/pl/user/user/import?type=text): email + selected groups. For an existing user the "overwrite on match" flag is required (overwriteExisting, default true), otherwise the groups are not applied — the import carries only the email, so no profile data is touched.

• A direct mass action exists (POST /pl/logic/operation/prepare?operationType=user_addtogroup), but in the current UI it is a selection-builder wizard — a candidate to wire up as an alternative path.

• Membership is checked through the user list filtered by a user_ingrouprule rule (params.value.selected_id), which reflects membership immediately (the training student list mirrors access asynchronously and is not reliable for verification).

Contributing

Contributions are welcome — open an issue or a PR. Good first ideas:

• direct user_addtogroup mass action instead of the import form

• a "copy all groups from one student to another" tool

• revoking access (gc_remove_user_from_groups)

• exporting students; test coverage

1. Fork and branch: git checkout -b feature/my-change

2. npm install, make changes; npm run build and npx tsc --noEmit must pass

3. Never commit secrets (cookies/passwords/.env) or real account data

4. Open a PR describing what and why

Security

Secrets (cookies/passwords) live only in the browser and your environment — never in the repo. .env and a local .mcp.json are git-ignored.

License

MIT