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swsd-mcp

Quick start

This guide gets swsd-mcp running locally via npx. For Microsoft Copilot Studio, see Deployment → Copilot Studio — it uses HTTP transport, which is a different setup.

What you need

Section titled “What you need”
  • An MCP client installed — any MCP-compatible client works (client compatibility matrix)
  • Node.js 24.15.0 or newer (for npx; current LTS line, matches package.json engines)
  • A SolarWinds Service Desk admin token — see below

Generate an SWSD admin token

Section titled “Generate an SWSD admin token”

In the SWSD web UI, navigate:

  1. Setup → Users & Groups → Users
  2. Click your user to open the detail page
  3. Click Actions → Generate JSON Web Token
  4. Copy the token (it’s a long JWT string)

Add the MCP config

Section titled “Add the MCP config”

Every stdio-capable MCP client uses the same JSON shape. Add this block under mcpServers in your client’s config file:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "swsd": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "swsd-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "SWSD_TOKEN": "your-jwt-here",
        "SWSD_BASE_URL": "https://api.samanage.com"
      }
    }
  }
}

Replace your-jwt-here with the token from the previous step. EU tenants use https://apieu.samanage.com instead.

Find the right config file

Section titled “Find the right config file”
ClientConfig file path
Claude Desktop (macOS)~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Claude Desktop (Windows)%APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
Claude Desktop (Linux)~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
Claude Code~/.claude.json (or use the shortcut below)
Cursor~/.cursor/mcp.json
Continue, Cline, other clientscheck your client’s docs — same JSON shape

Create the file if it doesn’t exist. Then restart your client so it picks up the new server.

Claude Code shortcut

Section titled “Claude Code shortcut”

Skip editing the file manually. This single line pastes verbatim into any shell (bash, zsh, PowerShell, cmd):

Terminal window
claude mcp add swsd --env SWSD_TOKEN="your-jwt-here" --env SWSD_BASE_URL="https://api.samanage.com" -- npx -y swsd-mcp

This writes the same config block as above to ~/.claude.json.

Verify it works

Section titled “Verify it works”

In your MCP client, ask the agent:

“Use swsd to check if you can connect.”

The agent should call the swsd_health_check tool and report success. Once you see that, you’re set up.

If something doesn’t work, see Configuration for the full env-var reference and common troubleshooting.

What you can do now

Section titled “What you can do now”

Try asking the agent things like:

  • “What tickets are assigned to me?” → calls swsd_get_me + swsd_list_my_incidents (the agent identifies you from the JWT, no manual email entry; renders the incident-list widget in MCP Apps-capable hosts)
  • “Show me incident 60310 with comments and audit trail.” → calls swsd_get_incident + swsd_list_incident_comments + swsd_get_record_audits. Id-keyed tools accept either the internal id or the human-facing number visible in the SWSD UI.
  • “List incidents updated in the last 7 days.” → uses swsd_list_incidents with updated_within: "7d" (also "24h", "1w", "30d").
  • “What’s blocking ticket 60310?” → calls swsd_list_incident_tasks (sub-tasks new in v2.1).
  • “Search the knowledge base for ‘VPN troubleshooting’.” → calls swsd_search_solutions.
  • “What services can I request through the catalog?” → calls swsd_list_catalog_items.
  • “Submit a Software Request for Adobe Acrobat Pro.” → calls swsd_get_catalog_item to read the form schema; in MCP Apps-capable hosts the catalog-item-form widget submits via swsd_create_service_request directly.
  • “What custom fields are available on incidents?” → calls swsd_describe_custom_fields (with a searchable explorer UI in capable hosts).

The full tool catalog is in Tools reference.

Next steps

Section titled “Next steps”