MantisBT MCP Server

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that integrates the MantisBT REST API into Claude Code and other MCP-capable clients. Read, create, and update issues directly from your editor.

Requirements

• Node.js ≥ 18
• MantisBT installation with REST API enabled (version 2.23+)
• MantisBT API token (create under My Account → API Tokens)

Installation

Via npx (recommended):

Add to ~/.claude/claude_desktop_config.json (Claude Desktop) or your local claude_desktop_config.json (Claude Code):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mantisbt": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@dpesch/mantisbt-mcp-server"],
      "env": {
        "MANTIS_BASE_URL": "https://your-mantis.example.com/api/rest",
        "MANTIS_API_KEY": "your-api-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

Local build:

git clone https://codeberg.org/dpesch/mantisbt-mcp-server
cd mantisbt-mcp-server
npm run init
npm run build

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mantisbt": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/path/to/mantisbt-mcp-server/dist/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "MANTIS_BASE_URL": "https://your-mantis.example.com/api/rest",
        "MANTIS_API_KEY": "your-api-token"
      }
    }
  }
}

Configuration

Environment variables

| Variable | Required | Default | Description | |---|---|---|---| | MANTIS_BASE_URL | ✅ | – | Base URL of the MantisBT REST API | | MANTIS_API_KEY | ✅ | – | API token for authentication | | MANTIS_CACHE_DIR | – | ~/.cache/mantisbt-mcp | Directory for the metadata cache | | MANTIS_CACHE_TTL | – | 3600 | Cache lifetime in seconds | | TRANSPORT | – | stdio | Transport mode: stdio or http | | PORT | – | 3000 | Port for HTTP mode | | MCP_HTTP_HOST | – | 127.0.0.1 | Bind address for HTTP mode. Changed from 0.0.0.0 to 127.0.0.1 — the server now listens on localhost only by default. Set to 0.0.0.0 for Docker or remote access. | | MCP_HTTP_TOKEN | – | – | When set, the /mcp endpoint requires Authorization: Bearer <token>. The /health endpoint is always public. | | MANTIS_SEARCH_ENABLED | – | false | Set to true to enable semantic search | | MANTIS_SEARCH_BACKEND | – | vectra | Vector store backend: vectra (pure JS) or sqlite-vec (requires manual install) | | MANTIS_SEARCH_DIR | – | {MANTIS_CACHE_DIR}/search | Directory for the search index | | MANTIS_SEARCH_MODEL | – | Xenova/paraphrase-multilingual-MiniLM-L12-v2 | Embedding model name (downloaded once on first use, ~80 MB) | | MANTIS_SEARCH_THREADS | – | 1 | Number of ONNX intra-op threads for the embedding model. Default is 1 to prevent CPU saturation on multi-core machines and WSL. Increase only if index rebuild speed matters and the host is dedicated to this workload. | | MANTIS_UPLOAD_DIR | – | – | Restrict upload_file to files within this directory. When set, any file_path outside the directory is rejected (path traversal attempts via ../ are blocked). Without this variable there is no restriction. |

Available tools

Issues

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | get_issue | Retrieve an issue by its numeric ID | | list_issues | Filter issues by project, status, author, and more; optional select for field projection and status for client-side status filtering | | create_issue | Create a new issue; severity and priority must be canonical English names (e.g. minor, major, normal, high) — call get_issue_enums to see all valid values and their localized labels; optional handler parameter accepts a username as alternative to handler_id (resolved against project members) | | update_issue | Update an existing issue | | delete_issue | Delete an issue |

Notes

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | list_notes | List all notes of an issue | | add_note | Add a note to an issue | | delete_note | Delete a note |

Attachments

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | list_issue_files | List attachments of an issue | | upload_file | Upload a file to an issue — either by local file_path or Base64-encoded content + filename |

Relationships

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | add_relationship | Create a relationship between two issues; optional type_name parameter accepts a string name (e.g. "related_to", "duplicate_of") as alternative to numeric type_id | | remove_relationship | Remove a relationship from an issue (use the id from the relationship object, not the type) |

Monitors

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | add_monitor | Add yourself as a monitor of an issue | | remove_monitor | Remove a user as a monitor of an issue |

Tags

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | list_tags | List all available tags; falls back to the metadata cache when GET /tags returns 404 (run sync_metadata first to populate) | | attach_tags | Attach tags to an issue | | detach_tag | Remove a tag from an issue |

Projects

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | list_projects | List all accessible projects | | get_project_versions | Get versions of a project; optional obsolete and inherit booleans to include obsolete or parent-inherited versions | | get_project_categories | Get categories of a project | | get_project_users | Get users of a project |

Semantic search (optional)

Instead of exact keyword matching, semantic search understands the meaning behind a query. Ask in plain language — the search engine finds conceptually related issues even when the wording doesn't match:

• "login fails after password reset" — finds issues about authentication edge cases
• "performance problems on the checkout page" — surfaces related reports regardless of the exact terminology used
• "duplicate entries in the invoice list" — catches issues described as "shown twice", "double records", etc.

The embedding model (~80 MB) runs entirely offline — no OpenAI key, no external API. It is downloaded once on first start and cached locally. Issues are indexed incrementally on every server start (only new and updated issues are re-indexed).

Activate with MANTIS_SEARCH_ENABLED=true.

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | search_issues | Natural language search over all indexed issues — returns top-N results with cosine similarity score; optional select (comma-separated field names) enriches each result with the requested issue fields | | rebuild_search_index | Build or update the search index; full: true clears and rebuilds from scratch | | get_search_index_status | Return the current fill level of the search index: how many issues are indexed vs. total, and the timestamp of the last sync |

Which backend to choose?

| | vectra (default) | sqlite-vec | |---|---|---| | Dependencies | None (pure JS) | Requires native build tools | | Install | Included | npm install sqlite-vec better-sqlite3 | | Best for | Up to ~10,000 issues | 10,000+ issues | | Performance | Fast enough for most setups | Faster for large corpora |

Start with vectra. Switch to sqlite-vec if indexing or query times become noticeably slow.

npm install sqlite-vec better-sqlite3
# then set MANTIS_SEARCH_BACKEND=sqlite-vec

Metadata & system

| Tool | Description | |---|---| | get_issue_fields | Return all field names valid for the select parameter of list_issues | | get_metadata | Retrieve cached metadata (projects, users, versions, categories) | | sync_metadata | Refresh the metadata cache | | list_filters | List saved filters | | get_current_user | Retrieve your own user profile | | list_languages | List available languages | | get_config | Show server configuration (base URL, cache TTL) | | get_issue_enums | Return valid ID/name pairs for all issue enum fields (severity, status, priority, resolution, reproducibility) — use before create_issue / update_issue to look up correct values; on localized installations each entry may include a canonical_name with the standard English API name | | get_mantis_version | Get MantisBT version and check for updates | | get_mcp_version | Return the version of this mantisbt-mcp-server instance |

Available resources

MCP Resources are URI-addressable, read-only data that clients can fetch directly without calling a tool. They are the third MCP primitive alongside Tools and Prompts. Note that Resource support is less widely implemented in MCP clients than Tools — check your client's documentation.

| Resource URI | Description | |---|---| | mantis://me | Profile of the authenticated API user (live fetch) | | mantis://projects | All accessible MantisBT projects (cache-backed, refreshed via sync_metadata) | | mantis://enums | Valid values for all issue enum fields: severity, priority, status, resolution, reproducibility (live fetch) |

Available prompts

MCP prompt templates are conversation starters that instruct the LLM to collect structured input and then call the appropriate tool. They are not tools themselves — they initiate a guided workflow.

| Prompt | Required args | Optional args | Description | |---|---|---|---| | create-bug-report | project_id, category, summary, description | steps_to_reproduce, expected, actual, environment | Guides through a structured bug report and calls create_issue | | create-feature-request | project_id, category, summary, description | use_case | Guides through a feature request and calls create_issue | | summarize-issue | issue_id | – | Fetches an issue via get_issue and returns a concise summary | | project-status | project_id | – | Lists issues via list_issues and generates a status report grouped by severity |

HTTP mode

For use as a standalone server (e.g. in remote setups):

MANTIS_BASE_URL=... MANTIS_API_KEY=... TRANSPORT=http PORT=3456 node dist/index.js

# With token authentication and explicit bind address (required for Docker/remote):
# MCP_HTTP_TOKEN=secret MANTIS_BASE_URL=... MANTIS_API_KEY=... \
#   TRANSPORT=http PORT=3456 MCP_HTTP_HOST=0.0.0.0 node dist/index.js

Health check: GET http://localhost:3456/health (always public, no token required)

Documentation

• Cookbook — tool-oriented recipes with copy-paste-ready parameter examples for all registered tools
• Usage Examples — natural language prompt examples for everyday use cases (no tool names required)

Development

npm run init         # First-time setup: install deps, git hooks, typecheck
npm run build        # Compile TypeScript → dist/
npm run typecheck    # Type check without output
npm run dev          # Watch mode for development
npm test             # Run tests (vitest)
npm run test:watch   # Run tests in watch mode
npm run test:coverage # Coverage report

License

MIT – see LICENSE

Contributing

Contributions welcome! Please read CONTRIBUTING.md. Repository: codeberg.org/dpesch/mantisbt-mcp-server