@vibeleading/mcp-real-time-scout

The Real-Time Scout — the Web & API Connector. Conditions change constantly; this server keeps the Pilot updated on market shifts and competitor moves, piping intelligence into the HUD for course corrections before competitors see the turn coming.

Implements the "Real-Time Scout" server from Vibe Leading The AI — one of the "3 Must-Have MCP Servers".

What it does

• Fetches live web pages from anywhere over HTTP(S).
• Runs web searches (Brave Search API or Tavily) to scan the competitive landscape.
• Parses RSS/Atom feeds with zero dependencies and friendly in-memory caching.
• Tracks competitor mentions across curated or custom feeds.

Install

npm install -g @vibeleading/mcp-real-time-scout

Or run on demand with npx:

npx -y @vibeleading/mcp-real-time-scout
# or run straight from the GitHub source (builds automatically):
npx -y github:VibeLeading/mcp-real-time-scout

Requirements

• Node.js >= 22 — required. The server uses the global fetch API and AbortSignal.timeout; on older Node versions the process fails to start, which MCP clients report generically as "connection closed".
• Optional — web search keys. The search_web tool needs MCP_SEARCH_PROVIDER (brave | tavily) and MCP_SEARCH_API_KEY set. Without them it returns a clear error; all other tools work unconfigured.
• No other runtime dependencies.

Client configuration

Add to your MCP client config (e.g. Claude Desktop, Cursor, or opencode):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "real-time-scout": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@vibeleading/mcp-real-time-scout"]
    }
  }
}

Tools

| Tool | Arguments | Description | |------|-----------|-------------| | fetch_url | url: string | Fetch a web page; returns HTTP status, title, and text content (capped at ~100k chars, 15s timeout). | | search_web | query: string, num_results?: number | Web search; returns normalized {title, url, snippet} results. | | monitor_feed | feed_url: string, limit?: number | Parse an RSS/Atom feed and return latest items (cached in-memory 5 min). | | track_competitor | company: string, feeds?: string[], recent_days?: number | Aggregate feed items mentioning a company, newest first. |

Environment variables

| Variable | Required | Description | |----------|----------|-------------| | MCP_SEARCH_PROVIDER | For search_web | brave or tavily. | | MCP_SEARCH_API_KEY | For search_web | API key for the configured provider. |

The server never calls a search engine without a key. If these variables are unset, search_web returns an instructive configuration error.

Production notes

• fetch_url rejects non-http(s) URLs and enforces a 15-second timeout so it cannot hang.
• search_web: get a Brave Search API key (free tier) or a Tavily key and set the two env vars before starting the server.
• monitor_feed caches parsed items in an in-memory LRU (max ~200 feeds) with a 5-minute TTL to avoid hammering publishers.
• track_competitor defaults to a curated set of well-known tech-news feeds; pass your own feeds to watch specific sources, and recent_days to bound the time window.
• Runs over stdio via StdioServerTransport, so it drops cleanly into any MCP-compatible client.

Publishing

Published to the npm registry via OIDC trusted publishing — no npm tokens stored anywhere. Pushing a version tag triggers the .github/workflows/publish.yml workflow:

npm version patch -m "release: v%s"
git push origin main --follow-tags

• One-time bootstrap. The very first published version cannot use trusted publishing (the trust relationship attaches to an existing package). Publish 0.1.1 once manually (npm publish after npm login, or a short-lived publish-scoped token), then configure Trusted Publisher on npmjs.com → the package → Settings → Trusted publishing → GitHub Actions → owner VibeLeading, repo mcp-real-time-scout, workflow publish.yml, action allow npm publish (requires 2FA once per package).
• Requires Node.js >= 22 and npm >= 11.5.1 on the runner (handled by the workflow).

License & Attribution

MIT — Copyright (c) 2026 Jean Machuca (see LICENSE).

This server implements concepts from the book Vibe Leading The AI: The Corporate Race Against Machines by Jean Machuca (ISBN 9798252505008, © 2026 Jean Machuca). The book is copyrighted commercial material; this repository does not republish its text. Buy the book at https://vibeleading.org or https://a.co/d/04L5YatK. Author website: jeanmachuca.com · Support on GitHub Sponsors: github.com/sponsors/jeanmachuca. See NOTICE.