reference-database-mcp

MCP (Model Context Protocol) server wrapper for the reference database (docsearch) REST API.

Provides tools that allow an LLM to search, retrieve, upload, and manage documents stored in a reference database server.

Tools

Health & Indexing

Tool	Description
health_check	Check if the server is running and healthy
remove_from_index	Remove a file from the index by path
list_folder	List files and subdirectories of an indexed directory

Search

Tool	Description
search_documents	Full-text search across documents and textbook chapters

Documents

Tool	Description
get_document	Get metadata for an indexed document by ID
get_document_content	Get the extracted text content of a document
download_document_file	Download the original file to a local path
get_document_meta	Get sidecar metadata for a document
update_document_meta	Update a key/value pair in sidecar metadata
get_document_bibtex	Export BibTeX citation data for a paper
move_document	Move a document to a new location within the database
attach_file	Attach a physical file to a reference-only entry (converts to source_type='file')
detach_file	Detach the physical file from a document (converts to source_type='reference')

Upload

Tool	Description
upload_file	Upload a local file to the server for indexing
upload_paper	Upload a paper PDF with optional DOI embedding
upload_textbook	Upload a textbook PDF or create a directory-type textbook
upload_chapter	Upload a chapter file to a directory-type textbook

References (metadata-only)

Tool	Description
add_paper_reference	Register a paper reference without uploading a file
add_textbook_reference	Register a textbook reference without uploading a file
add_generic_reference	Register a generic document reference without uploading a file

Textbooks

Tool	Description
list_chapters	List all chapters in a textbook
get_chapter	Retrieve a specific chapter with full text

Setup

pip install -e .

Usage

reference-database-mcp --server-url http://localhost:8000

Or via your MCP client's stdio/SSE transport configuration.

Disabled Tools

The following tools exist in code but are disabled (their @mcp.tool decorator is commented out). They can be re-enabled by uncommenting their decorators:

Tool	Endpoint	Reason
scan_index	POST /api/index/scan	Recursively scans directories; not intended for agent use
add_to_index	POST /api/index/add	Adds existing server-side files to index; not intended for agent use
add_paper	POST /api/documents/papers/add	Adds papers by server-side path; prefer upload_paper instead