Search HackerNews Posts by Date

Instructions

Implementation Reference

• src/index.ts:85-100 (handler)

  The handler function that implements the core logic of the 'search-posts-by-date' tool. It builds URL parameters from inputs and calls the fetchHN helper to query the HackerNews Algolia API's /search_by_date endpoint.

  async ({ query, tags, numericFilters, page, hitsPerPage }) => {
    const params = new URLSearchParams();
    if (query) params.append('query', query);
    if (tags) params.append('tags', tags);
    if (numericFilters) params.append('numericFilters', numericFilters);
    if (page !== undefined) params.append('page', page.toString());
    if (hitsPerPage !== undefined) params.append('hitsPerPage', hitsPerPage.toString());
    
    const endpoint = `/search_by_date?${params.toString()}`;
    const result = await fetchHN(endpoint);
    
    return {
      content: [{ type: 'text', text: JSON.stringify(result, null, 2) }],
      structuredContent: result
    };
  }

• src/index.ts:67-83 (schema)

  Input and output schema definitions for the 'search-posts-by-date' tool using Zod, including optional parameters for query, tags, numeric filters, pagination.

  {
    title: 'Search HackerNews Posts by Date',
    description: 'Search HackerNews posts sorted by date (most recent first)',
    inputSchema: {
      query: z.string().optional().describe('Search query text (optional)'),
      tags: z.string().optional().describe('Filter tags (e.g., "story", "comment", "poll", "show_hn", "ask_hn", "front_page", "author_USERNAME", "story_ID")'),
      numericFilters: z.string().optional().describe('Numeric filters (e.g., "points>100", "created_at_i>1672531200")'),
      page: z.number().optional().describe('Page number for pagination (default: 0)'),
      hitsPerPage: z.number().optional().describe('Number of results per page (default: 20)')
    },
    outputSchema: {
      hits: z.array(z.any()),
      nbHits: z.number(),
      nbPages: z.number(),
      page: z.number(),
      hitsPerPage: z.number()
    }

• src/index.ts:65-101 (registration)

  The server.registerTool call that registers the 'search-posts-by-date' tool with the MCP server, including its schema and handler function.

  server.registerTool(
    'search-posts-by-date',
    {
      title: 'Search HackerNews Posts by Date',
      description: 'Search HackerNews posts sorted by date (most recent first)',
      inputSchema: {
        query: z.string().optional().describe('Search query text (optional)'),
        tags: z.string().optional().describe('Filter tags (e.g., "story", "comment", "poll", "show_hn", "ask_hn", "front_page", "author_USERNAME", "story_ID")'),
        numericFilters: z.string().optional().describe('Numeric filters (e.g., "points>100", "created_at_i>1672531200")'),
        page: z.number().optional().describe('Page number for pagination (default: 0)'),
        hitsPerPage: z.number().optional().describe('Number of results per page (default: 20)')
      },
      outputSchema: {
        hits: z.array(z.any()),
        nbHits: z.number(),
        nbPages: z.number(),
        page: z.number(),
        hitsPerPage: z.number()
      }
    },
    async ({ query, tags, numericFilters, page, hitsPerPage }) => {
      const params = new URLSearchParams();
      if (query) params.append('query', query);
      if (tags) params.append('tags', tags);
      if (numericFilters) params.append('numericFilters', numericFilters);
      if (page !== undefined) params.append('page', page.toString());
      if (hitsPerPage !== undefined) params.append('hitsPerPage', hitsPerPage.toString());
      
      const endpoint = `/search_by_date?${params.toString()}`;
      const result = await fetchHN(endpoint);
      
      return {
        content: [{ type: 'text', text: JSON.stringify(result, null, 2) }],
        structuredContent: result
      };
    }
  );

• src/index.ts:11-17 (helper)

  Supporting helper function fetchHN used by the tool handler to perform HTTP requests to the HackerNews Algolia API.

  async function fetchHN(endpoint: string): Promise<any> {
    const response = await fetch(`${HN_API_BASE}${endpoint}`);
    if (!response.ok) {
      throw new Error(`HN API error: ${response.status} ${response.statusText}`);
    }
    return await response.json();
  }