MCPfinder

Overview
MCPfinder is an AI-first discovery layer over the Official MCP Registry, Glama, and Smithery. Its job is to help an assistant find missing capabilities, inspect trust signals, review required secrets, and generate install-ready config snippets for MCP clients.

Canonical interface
- Canonical package: @mcpfinder/server
- Canonical transport: stdio
- Registry entry: dev.mcpfinder/server

Important product note
Use the local stdio server as the canonical experience. Do not assume any public HTTP endpoint is feature-equivalent unless the product explicitly says so.

Tools (4 canonical)
1. search_mcp_servers
Purpose: search by keyword, technology, or use case.
Use when: the user needs a capability you do not already have.
Examples:
- postgres
- slack
- filesystem
- github issues

2. get_server_details
Purpose: inspect trust signals, environment variables, tools, warnings, and install method.
Use when: before recommending or installing a candidate.
This is the gate that should catch stale projects, missing repositories, and secrets.

3. get_install_config
Purpose: generate a client-specific JSON config snippet.
Use when: after selecting a candidate and choosing a client platform.

4. browse_categories
Purpose: single-call category exploration. Omit `category` to list all categories with counts; provide `category` to get top servers in that category. Use when the user knows a domain (database, filesystem, security, communication) but not a specific technology.

Recommended agent workflow
1. Search for candidate servers.
2. Read the details of the top one or two results.
3. Prefer servers with stronger trust signals:
- official registry presence
- verification
- multiple sources
- recent updates
- clear repository URL
- install method that is easy to explain
4. Warn the user if secrets are required.
5. Only then generate install config.

What structured data MCPfinder exposes
- confidenceScore
- recommendationReason
- warningFlags
- sourceCount
- environmentVariables
- toolsExposed when available
- next_actions for chaining

How to interpret warningFlags
- single-source-only: only one registry knows about this server
- missing-update-date: no recency signal
- missing-repository-url: weak inspection path
- install-method-unclear: no clean auto-generated config path
- stale-over-12-months / stale-over-18-months: review carefully before recommending

How to interpret installComplexity
- low: zero or one non-secret environment variable; runs cleanly via npx/uvx/docker or a remote URL
- medium: a few environment variables, some of them secrets — warn the user and ask for values
- high: many required secrets or the registry does not expose a clean auto-install path — expect the user to follow the upstream repository's setup docs

How to interpret capabilityCount
- Number of tools/capabilities the downstream MCP server itself exposes, when the upstream registry publishes a tool manifest. 0 means MCPfinder has no tool manifest from upstream — it does not mean the server has no tools; it means you cannot pre-advertise them to the user.

Install example
{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mcpfinder": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@mcpfinder/server"]
    }
  }
}

Platforms supported for generated install config
- claude-desktop
- cursor
- claude-code
- cline
- windsurf

Project links
- Website: https://mcpfinder.dev
- README: https://github.com/mcpfinder/mcpfinder/blob/main/README.md
- npm: https://www.npmjs.com/package/@mcpfinder/server
- Registry: https://registry.modelcontextprotocol.io/v0/servers?search=dev.mcpfinder