Ownly MCP

Ownly MCP is a local-first MCP server for Ownly ownership, recurring-cost, review, history, and Planner data. It reads the canonical Markdown directly and can perform explicitly enabled, two-phase writes with a safety backup.

Data location

--data-dir and OWNLY_DATA_DIR accept either:

• a parent directory containing the default Ownly/ data folder; or
• a custom Ownly data root containing Objects/ directly.

ownly-mcp --data-dir /path/to/vault
ownly-mcp --data-dir /path/to/custom-data-root

The server fails closed when the location is missing, unreadable, or invalid.

Modes

Read-only is the default:

npx -y @ownly-app/mcp --data-dir /path/to/vault

Enable persistent mutations explicitly:

npx -y @ownly-app/mcp --data-dir /path/to/vault --allow-write

or set OWNLY_MCP_ALLOW_WRITE=1.

Every mutation has two phases:

1. Call an ownly_prepare_* tool and inspect its before / after preview.
2. After user confirmation, pass its short-lived operation_id to ownly_commit_operation.

Commit creates a full Ownly backup in the sibling Ownly Backups/ directory before changing data. It rejects stale previews if the target file changed and is idempotent when the same operation ID is retried.

Planner routing

Planner reads canonical Trip Places/, Trip Visits/, and Trip Legs/ facts and exposes the derived execution timeline through ownly_planner_get_trip. Walking, driving, and bicycling leg refresh / travel-time optimization use OpenRouteService from the local MCP process:

OPENROUTESERVICE_API_KEY=your-key npx -y @ownly-app/mcp --data-dir /path/to/vault --allow-write

The key is optional unless an OpenRouteService-backed Planner tool is called. It remains in the local MCP process environment and is never shipped to the static Web/PWA. Public-transit travel time remains an explicit user-verified fact.

Tools

Read tools:

• ownly_summary, ownly_search, ownly_get_object, ownly_object_history
• ownly_recurring_costs, ownly_recurring_due, ownly_recurring_by_account
• ownly_review_needed, ownly_doctor
• ownly_planner_summary, ownly_planner_get_trip, ownly_planner_budget_estimate
• ownly_planner_get_calendar_ics

Write workflow tools:

• ownly_prepare_create_object, ownly_prepare_update_object
• ownly_prepare_retire_object, ownly_prepare_cancel_recurring_cost
• ownly_prepare_add_object_log, ownly_prepare_create_review
• ownly_prepare_create_snapshot
• ownly_prepare_archive_object, ownly_prepare_restore_object
• ownly_planner_prepare_add_visit, ownly_planner_prepare_remove_visit, ownly_planner_prepare_reorder_day
• ownly_planner_prepare_set_stay_span, ownly_planner_prepare_drop_place, ownly_planner_prepare_restore_place
• ownly_planner_prepare_add_expense, ownly_planner_prepare_set_fx_rates
• ownly_planner_prepare_set_travel_leg, ownly_planner_prepare_refresh_day_travel
• ownly_planner_prepare_optimize_day_travel_time, ownly_planner_prepare_apply_schedule_proposal
• ownly_commit_operation, ownly_discard_operation

Privacy boundary

The Ownly source-of-truth stays in the user-controlled local folder. Only facts returned by a requested tool enter the connected MCP client context. Ownly MCP does not create a hosted mirror or send analytics, file paths, or background indexes to Ownly services.

Development

npm ci
npm run test:mcp
npm run build --prefix packages/mcp
node packages/mcp/dist/index.js --help
(cd packages/mcp && npm pack --dry-run)

See ../../docs/MCP.md for setup, safety semantics, and examples.