unraid-mcp/CLAUDE.md

CLAUDE.md

This file provides guidance to Claude Code (claude.ai/code) when working with code in this repository.

Project Overview

This is an MCP (Model Context Protocol) server that provides tools to interact with an Unraid server's GraphQL API. The server is built using FastMCP with a modular architecture consisting of separate packages for configuration, core functionality, subscriptions, and tools.

Development Commands

Setup

# Initialize uv virtual environment and install dependencies
uv sync

# Install dev dependencies
uv sync --group dev

Running the Server

# Local development with uv (recommended)
uv run unraid-mcp-server

# Direct module execution
uv run -m unraid_mcp.main

Code Quality

# Lint and format with ruff
uv run ruff check unraid_mcp/
uv run ruff format unraid_mcp/

# Type checking with ty (Astral's fast type checker)
uv run ty check unraid_mcp/

# Run tests
uv run pytest

Docker Development

# Build the Docker image
docker build -t unraid-mcp-server .

# Run with Docker Compose
docker compose up -d

# View logs
docker compose logs -f unraid-mcp

# Stop service
docker compose down

Environment Setup

• Copy .env.example to .env and configure:
  • UNRAID_API_URL: Unraid GraphQL endpoint (required)
  • UNRAID_API_KEY: Unraid API key (required)
  • UNRAID_MCP_TRANSPORT: Transport type (default: streamable-http)
  • UNRAID_MCP_PORT: Server port (default: 6970)
  • UNRAID_MCP_HOST: Server host (default: 0.0.0.0)

Architecture

Core Components

• Main Server: unraid_mcp/server.py - Modular MCP server with FastMCP integration
• Entry Point: unraid_mcp/main.py - Application entry point and startup logic
• Configuration: unraid_mcp/config/ - Settings management and logging configuration
• Core Infrastructure: unraid_mcp/core/ - GraphQL client, exceptions, and shared types
• Subscriptions: unraid_mcp/subscriptions/ - Real-time WebSocket subscriptions and diagnostics
• Tools: unraid_mcp/tools/ - Domain-specific tool implementations
• GraphQL Client: Uses httpx for async HTTP requests to Unraid API
• Transport Layer: Supports streamable-http (recommended), SSE (deprecated), and stdio

Key Design Patterns

• Consolidated Action Pattern: Each tool uses action: Literal[...] parameter to expose multiple operations via a single MCP tool, reducing context window usage
• Pre-built Query Dicts: QUERIES and MUTATIONS dicts prevent GraphQL injection and organize operations
• Destructive Action Safety: DESTRUCTIVE_ACTIONS sets require confirm=True for dangerous operations
• Modular Architecture: Clean separation of concerns across focused modules
• Error Handling: Uses ToolError for user-facing errors, detailed logging for debugging
• Timeout Management: Custom timeout configurations for different query types (90s for disk ops)
• Data Processing: Tools return both human-readable summaries and detailed raw data
• Health Monitoring: Comprehensive health check tool for system monitoring
• Real-time Subscriptions: WebSocket-based live data streaming
• Persistent Subscription Manager: live action subactions use a shared SubscriptionManager that maintains persistent WebSocket connections. Resources serve cached data via subscription_manager.get_resource_data(action). A "connecting" placeholder is returned while the subscription starts — callers should retry in a moment. When UNRAID_AUTO_START_SUBSCRIPTIONS=false, resources fall back to on-demand subscribe_once.

Tool Categories (1 Tool, ~107 Subactions)

The server registers a single consolidated unraid tool with action (domain) + subaction (operation) routing. Call it as unraid(action="docker", subaction="list").

action	subactions
system (19)	overview, array, network, registration, variables, metrics, services, display, config, online, owner, settings, server, servers, flash, ups_devices, ups_device, ups_config
health (4)	check, test_connection, diagnose, setup
array (13)	parity_status, parity_history, parity_start, parity_pause, parity_resume, parity_cancel, start_array, stop_array*, add_disk, remove_disk*, mount_disk, unmount_disk, clear_disk_stats*
disk (6)	shares, disks, disk_details, log_files, logs, flash_backup*
docker (7)	list, details, start, stop, restart, networks, network_details
vm (9)	list, details, start, stop, pause, resume, force_stop*, reboot, reset*
notification (12)	overview, list, create, archive, mark_unread, recalculate, archive_all, archive_many, unarchive_many, unarchive_all, delete*, delete_archived*
key (7)	list, get, create, update, delete*, add_role, remove_role
plugin (3)	list, add, remove*
rclone (4)	list_remotes, config_form, create_remote, delete_remote*
setting (2)	update, configure_ups*
customization (5)	theme, public_theme, is_initial_setup, sso_enabled, set_theme
oidc (5)	providers, provider, configuration, public_providers, validate_session
user (1)	me
live (11)	cpu, memory, cpu_telemetry, array_state, parity_progress, ups_status, notifications_overview, notification_feed, log_tail, owner, server_status

* = destructive, requires confirm=True

Destructive Actions (require confirm=True)

• array: stop_array, remove_disk, clear_disk_stats
• vm: force_stop, reset
• notifications: delete, delete_archived
• rclone: delete_remote
• keys: delete
• storage: flash_backup
• settings: configure_ups
• plugins: remove

Environment Variable Hierarchy

The server loads environment variables from multiple locations in order:

1. ~/.unraid-mcp/.env (primary — canonical credentials dir, all runtimes)
2. ~/.unraid-mcp/.env.local (local overrides, only used if primary is absent)
3. /app/.env.local (Docker container mount)
4. ../.env.local (project root local overrides)
5. ../.env (project root fallback)
6. unraid_mcp/.env (last resort)

Transport Configuration

• streamable-http (recommended): HTTP-based transport on /mcp endpoint
• sse (deprecated): Server-Sent Events transport
• stdio: Standard input/output for direct integration

Error Handling Strategy

• GraphQL errors are converted to ToolError with descriptive messages
• HTTP errors include status codes and response details
• Network errors are caught and wrapped with connection context
• All errors are logged with full context for debugging

Performance Considerations

• Increased timeouts for disk operations (90s read timeout)
• Selective queries to avoid GraphQL type overflow issues
• Optional caching controls for Docker container queries
• Log file overwrite at 10MB cap to prevent disk space issues

Critical Gotchas

Mutation Handler Ordering

Mutation handlers MUST return before the QUERIES[action] lookup. Mutations are not in the QUERIES dict — reaching that line for a mutation action causes a KeyError. Always add early-return if action == "mutation_name": ... return blocks BEFORE the QUERIES lookup.

Test Patching

• Patch at the tool module level: unraid_mcp.tools.info.make_graphql_request (not core)
• conftest.py's mock_graphql_request patches the core module — wrong for tool-level tests
• Use conftest.py's make_tool_fn() helper or local _make_tool() pattern

Test Suite Structure

tests/
├── conftest.py           # Shared fixtures + make_tool_fn() helper
├── test_*.py             # Unit tests (mock at tool module level)
├── http_layer/           # httpx-level request/response tests (respx)
├── integration/          # WebSocket subscription lifecycle tests (slow)
├── safety/               # Destructive action guard tests
└── schema/               # GraphQL query validation (99 tests, all passing)

Running Targeted Tests

uv run pytest tests/safety/          # Destructive action guards only
uv run pytest tests/schema/          # GraphQL query validation only
uv run pytest tests/http_layer/      # HTTP/httpx layer only
uv run pytest tests/test_docker.py   # Single tool only
uv run pytest -x                     # Fail fast on first error

Scripts

# HTTP smoke-test against a live server (11 tools, all non-destructive actions)
./tests/mcporter/test-actions.sh [MCP_URL]  # default: http://localhost:6970/mcp

# stdio smoke-test, no running server needed (good for CI)
./tests/mcporter/test-tools.sh [--parallel] [--timeout-ms N] [--verbose]

See tests/mcporter/README.md for transport differences and docs/DESTRUCTIVE_ACTIONS.md for exact destructive-action test commands.

API Reference Docs

• docs/UNRAID_API_COMPLETE_REFERENCE.md — Full GraphQL schema reference
• docs/UNRAID_API_OPERATIONS.md — All supported operations with examples

Use these when adding new queries/mutations.

Version Bumps

When bumping the version, always update both files — they must stay in sync:

• pyproject.toml → version = "X.Y.Z" under [project]
• .claude-plugin/plugin.json → "version": "X.Y.Z"

Credential Storage (~/.unraid-mcp/.env)

All runtimes (plugin, direct, Docker) load credentials from ~/.unraid-mcp/.env.

• Plugin/direct: unraid action=health subaction=setup writes this file automatically via elicitation, Safe to re-run: always prompts for confirmation before overwriting existing credentials, whether the connection is working or not (failed probe may be a transient outage, not bad creds). or manual: mkdir -p ~/.unraid-mcp && cp .env.example ~/.unraid-mcp/.env then edit.
• Docker: docker-compose.yml loads it via env_file before container start.
• No symlinks needed. Version bumps do not affect this path.
• Permissions: dir=700, file=600 (set automatically by elicitation; set manually if using cp: chmod 700 ~/.unraid-mcp && chmod 600 ~/.unraid-mcp/.env).

Symlinks

AGENTS.md and GEMINI.md are symlinks to CLAUDE.md for Codex/Gemini compatibility:

ln -sf CLAUDE.md AGENTS.md && ln -sf CLAUDE.md GEMINI.md