Scaffold a starter MCP server with a tool, resource, and prompt.

build-your-own-mcp

Table of contents

• Getting started
• What you get
  • Project structure
  • Starter primitives
• Guides
• Running

Getting started

npx build-your-own-mcp my-mcp-server
cd my-mcp-server

This scaffolds a new project, installs dependencies, and initialises a git repository.

What you get

Project structure

my-mcp-server/
  src/
    index.js       # MCP server with stub callbacks
    database.js    # JSON file helpers for journal entries
  docs/
    creating_a_tool.md
    creating_a_resource.md
    creating_a_prompt.md
  package.json

Starter primitives

The server registers three MCP primitives with empty callbacks for you to fill in:

| Primitive | Name | Description | | ---------- | -------------- | ----------------------------------- | | Tool | create-entry | Create a new journal entry | | Resource | entries | List all journal entries as JSON | | Prompt | reflect | Reflect on recent journal entries |

Guides

Each guide walks you through implementing one primitive and includes the completed solution:

1. docs/creating_a_tool.md
2. docs/creating_a_resource.md
3. docs/creating_a_prompt.md

Running

npm start

The server communicates over stdio. To use it with Claude Code, add it to your MCP configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "journal": {
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["path/to/my-mcp-server/src/index.js"]
    }
  }
}