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Merged
merged 4 commits into from
Nov 8, 2025
Merged

Honoring incoming request role in determining allowed permissions for describe-entities MCP tool #2956

merged 4 commits into from
Nov 8, 2025

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@souvikghosh04
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@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 commented Nov 6, 2025 •
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Why make this change?

  • Addresses follow ups to PR [MCP] describe_entities tool fixes and refactoring #2900
    The describe_entities tool response format needed improvements to better align with MCP specifications and provide more accurate, user-scoped information. Key issues included non-specification compliant response fields, overly broad permission reporting across all roles, and inconsistent entity/field naming conventions that didn't prioritize user-friendly aliases.

What is this change?

  • Removed non-spec fields from response: Eliminated mode and filter fields that were not part of the MCP specification
  • Scoped permissions to current user's role: Modified permissions logic to only return permissions available to the requesting user's role instead of all permissions across all roles
  • Implemented entity alias support: Updated entity name resolution to prefer GraphQL singular names (aliases) over configuration names, falling back to entity name only when alias is absent
  • Fixed parameter metadata format: Changed parameter default value key from @default to default in JSON response
  • Enhanced field name resolution: Updated field metadata to use field aliases when available, falling back to field names when aliases are absent
  • Added proper authorization context: Integrated HTTP context and authorization resolver to determine current user's role for permission filtering

How was this tested?

  • Manual Tests

Sample Request(s)

POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities"
  },
  "id": 1
}

POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "nameOnly": true
    }
  },
  "id": 2
}

POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "entities": ["Book", "Publisher"]
    }
  },
  "id": 1
}

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souvikghosh04 commented Nov 6, 2025

/azp run

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Azure Pipelines successfully started running 6 pipeline(s).

@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 self-assigned this Nov 6, 2025
@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 added mssql an issue thats specific to mssql mcp-server labels Nov 6, 2025
@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 added this to the Nov 2025 milestone Nov 6, 2025
@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 moved this from Todo to In Progress in Data API builder Nov 6, 2025
@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 linked an issue Nov 6, 2025 that may be closed by this pull request
[Bug]: MCP describe-entities does not honor the incoming request role #2954
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@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 added the bug Something isn't working label Nov 6, 2025
@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 marked this pull request as ready for review November 6, 2025 11:02
Copilot AI review requested due to automatic review settings November 6, 2025 11:02
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Pull Request Overview

This pull request adds role-based permission filtering to the DescribeEntitiesTool, ensuring that entity metadata only includes permissions relevant to the current user's role rather than all configured permissions.

  • Extracts the current user's role from the HTTP request headers
  • Filters entity permissions to show only those available to the current user's role
  • Updates entity and field names to use GraphQL aliases when available
  • Refactors parameter metadata to use dictionaries instead of anonymous objects
Comments suppressed due to low confidence (1)

src/Azure.DataApiBuilder.Mcp/BuiltInTools/DescribeEntitiesTool.cs:87

  • This assignment to authResolver is useless, since its value is never read.
                IAuthorizationResolver authResolver = serviceProvider.GetRequiredService<IAuthorizationResolver>();

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souvikghosh04 commented Nov 6, 2025

/azp run

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Azure Pipelines successfully started running 6 pipeline(s).

@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 moved this from In Progress to Review In Progress in Data API builder Nov 6, 2025
Aniruddh25
Aniruddh25 approved these changes Nov 6, 2025
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LGTM as long as you have verified anonymous role value is set on the X_MS_API_ROLE header

@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 changed the title Follow-up changes and fixes to describe-entities tool Honoring incoming request role in determining allowed permissions for describe-entities MCP tool Nov 7, 2025
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souvikghosh04 commented Nov 7, 2025

LGTM as long as you have verified anonymous role value is set on the X_MS_API_ROLE header

confirming the same here after validating.
image

anushakolan
anushakolan requested changes Nov 7, 2025
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souvikghosh04 commented Nov 7, 2025

/azp run

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Azure Pipelines successfully started running 6 pipeline(s).

@souvikghosh04 souvikghosh04 enabled auto-merge (squash) November 7, 2025 06:55
@anushakolan anushakolan disabled auto-merge November 7, 2025 19:30
@anushakolan anushakolan enabled auto-merge (squash) November 7, 2025 19:30
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Aniruddh25 commented Nov 7, 2025

/azp run

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Azure Pipelines successfully started running 6 pipeline(s).

@anushakolan anushakolan merged commit 7b31e9a into main Nov 8, 2025
11 checks passed
@anushakolan anushakolan deleted the Usr/sogh/describeentitypermroles branch November 8, 2025 01:05
@github-project-automation github-project-automation bot moved this from Review In Progress to Done in Data API builder Nov 8, 2025
souvikghosh04 added a commit that referenced this pull request Nov 10, 2025
@souvikghosh04
Honoring incoming request role in determining allowed permissions for…
169ad84 
… describe-entities MCP tool (#2956)

## Why make this change?

- Addresses follow ups to PR #2900
The `describe_entities` tool response format needed improvements to
better align with MCP specifications and provide more accurate,
user-scoped information. Key issues included non-specification compliant
response fields, overly broad permission reporting across all roles, and
inconsistent entity/field naming conventions that didn't prioritize
user-friendly aliases.


## What is this change?

- **Removed non-spec fields from response**: Eliminated `mode` and
`filter` fields that were not part of the MCP specification
- **Scoped permissions to current user's role**: Modified permissions
logic to only return permissions available to the requesting user's role
instead of all permissions across all roles
- **Implemented entity alias support**: Updated entity name resolution
to prefer GraphQL singular names (aliases) over configuration names,
falling back to entity name only when alias is absent
- **Fixed parameter metadata format**: Changed parameter default value
key from `@default` to `default` in JSON response
- **Enhanced field name resolution**: Updated field metadata to use
field aliases when available, falling back to field names when aliases
are absent
- **Added proper authorization context**: Integrated HTTP context and
authorization resolver to determine current user's role for permission
filtering

## How was this tested?

- [x] Manual Tests

## Sample Request(s)

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities"
  },
  "id": 1
}
```

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "nameOnly": true
    }
  },
  "id": 2
}
```

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "entities": ["Book", "Publisher"]
    }
  },
  "id": 1
}
```
souvikghosh04 added a commit that referenced this pull request Nov 10, 2025
@souvikghosh04
Honoring incoming request role in determining allowed permissions for…
b18b132 
… describe-entities MCP tool (#2956)

## Why make this change?

- Addresses follow ups to PR #2900
The `describe_entities` tool response format needed improvements to
better align with MCP specifications and provide more accurate,
user-scoped information. Key issues included non-specification compliant
response fields, overly broad permission reporting across all roles, and
inconsistent entity/field naming conventions that didn't prioritize
user-friendly aliases.


## What is this change?

- **Removed non-spec fields from response**: Eliminated `mode` and
`filter` fields that were not part of the MCP specification
- **Scoped permissions to current user's role**: Modified permissions
logic to only return permissions available to the requesting user's role
instead of all permissions across all roles
- **Implemented entity alias support**: Updated entity name resolution
to prefer GraphQL singular names (aliases) over configuration names,
falling back to entity name only when alias is absent
- **Fixed parameter metadata format**: Changed parameter default value
key from `@default` to `default` in JSON response
- **Enhanced field name resolution**: Updated field metadata to use
field aliases when available, falling back to field names when aliases
are absent
- **Added proper authorization context**: Integrated HTTP context and
authorization resolver to determine current user's role for permission
filtering

## How was this tested?

- [x] Manual Tests

## Sample Request(s)

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities"
  },
  "id": 1
}
```

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "nameOnly": true
    }
  },
  "id": 2
}
```

```
POST http://localhost:5000/mcp

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "method": "tools/call",
  "params": {
    "name": "describe_entities",
    "arguments": {
      "entities": ["Book", "Publisher"]
    }
  },
  "id": 1
}
```
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@Aniruddh25 Aniruddh25 Aniruddh25 approved these changes

@anushakolan anushakolan anushakolan approved these changes

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bug Something isn't working mcp-server mssql an issue thats specific to mssql

Projects

Data API builder
Status: Done

Milestone

Nov 2025

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[Bug]: MCP describe-entities does not honor the incoming request role

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@souvikghosh04 @Aniruddh25 @anushakolan