Network Assistant — MCP Server for Network Engineers

This project sets up a Model Context Protocol (MCP) server designed specifically for network engineers.
It allows Claude for Desktop (or other LLM clients) to access structured knowledge about your network — such as routing policies and device health — via the tools primitive.

🧠 Prerequisite Knowledge

This quickstart assumes you're familiar with:

• Python
• LLMs like Claude

💻 System Requirements

• Python 3.10 or higher
• MCP Python SDK v1.2.0 or newer

⚙️ Set Up Your Environment

1. Install uv

MacOS/Linux:

brew install uv

🔁 Restart your terminal to ensure the uv command is available.

2. Set Up Your Project

uv init

uv venv
source .venv/bin/activate # or .venv\Scripts\activate on Windows

uv add "mcp[cli]"

▶️ Run Your Server

python network-assistant.py

This launches your MCP server over stdio, ready to connect to Claude.

🧪 Test with Claude for Desktop

Claude for Desktop is currently only available on macOS and Windows.

1. Download Claude for Desktop from here.
2. Open your Claude Desktop app.
3. Configure the MCP server in:
   • ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json (macOS)
   • C:\Users\<YOU>\AppData\Roaming\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json (Windows)

Example config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "network": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": [
        "--directory",
        "/ABSOLUTE/PATH/TO/network-assistant",
        "run",
        "network_assistant.py"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Use which uv (macOS/Linux) or where uv (Windows) to get the path to uv if needed.

Restart Claude Desktop after saving the config file.

🔨 Tools Available in Claude

Click the 🛠 hammer icon in Claude. You should see:

• get_network_standards()
• get_device_status(device_name)

Now ask Claude:

- What routing protocols do we use in our network?
- What is the current status of my network devices?
- What is the status of all devices in the network?

🔍 What’s Happening Behind the Scenes?

1. Claude parses your prompt and finds relevant tools.
2. It calls get_network_standards() or get_device_status() over MCP.
3. Your server executes the tool logic and returns structured data.
4. Claude responds using your actual context