Network MCP Server

AI-powered network device management via SNMP. Query any vendor's devices — Cisco, Juniper, Arista, UniFi, Fortinet, and more — through the Model Context Protocol.

Overview

Network MCP Server bridges the gap between AI assistants (Claude, Cursor, etc.) and network infrastructure. It provides 5 SNMP-based tools that let AI query device status, discover networks, and retrieve interface statistics — all through a standardized MCP interface.

Zero vendor lock-in: Works with any SNMP-enabled device from any manufacturer.

Architecture

AI Assistant (Claude Code / Cursor / etc.)
    ↕ MCP Protocol (stdio or HTTP)
Network MCP Server (FastMCP)
    ↕ SNMP v1/v2c (pysnmp-lextudio)
Network Devices (Cisco / Juniper / Arista / UniFi / ...)

The server uses FastMCP for the MCP transport layer and pysnmp-lextudio for SNMP operations. All queries are read-only by design — no configuration changes are made to devices.

Dependencies

Package	Version	Purpose
fastmcp	>=2.0.0	MCP server framework
pysnmp-lextudio	>=6.1.0	SNMP protocol implementation (actively maintained pysnmp fork)
pydantic	>=2.0	Input validation
pyyaml	>=6.0	Configuration file parsing

Runtime: Python 3.10+

Usage

Installation

pip install network-mcp-server
# or from source:
git clone https://github.com/dtzp555-max/network-mcp-server.git
cd network-mcp-server
pip install -e .

Quick Start

# Run the server (stdio mode for Claude Code)
network-mcp

# Or run directly
python -m network_mcp.server

Claude Code Integration

Add to ~/.claude/settings.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "network": {
      "command": "network-mcp",
      "env": {
        "SNMP_COMMUNITY": "your_community_string"
      }
    }
  }
}

Then in Claude Code:

• "Show me the device info for 192.168.1.1"
• "What's the interface status on the core switch?"
• "Discover all SNMP devices on 10.0.0.0/24"

Available Tools

Tool	Description
get_snmp_value	Query a single SNMP OID
walk_snmp_tree	Walk an OID subtree
get_device_info	Get device name, vendor, uptime, location
get_interfaces	Get interface status table with traffic stats
discover_devices	Scan a subnet for SNMP-enabled devices

Configuration

Environment Variables

Variable	Default	Description
SNMP_COMMUNITY	public	Default SNMP community string
SNMP_TIMEOUT	5.0	Query timeout in seconds
SNMP_RETRIES	1	Number of retries on timeout
NETWORK_MCP_CONFIG_DIR	~/.network-mcp	Config directory path

Device Inventory (Optional)

Create ~/.network-mcp/devices.yaml:

devices:
  core-switch:
    host: 192.168.1.1
    community: private_string

  firewall:
    host: 10.0.0.1
    community: fw_community

Error Handling

All tools return structured error responses instead of raising exceptions:

{
  "error": "SNMP error: No SNMP response received before timeout",
  "host": "192.168.1.1"
}

Common error scenarios:

• Timeout: Device is unreachable or SNMP is not enabled
• Authentication: Wrong community string (no SNMP response)
• Large subnet: Subnet scan limited to /22 (1024 hosts) max

Known Limitations

• SNMP v1/v2c only — SNMPv3 support planned for v0.2.0
• Read-only — No SET operations by design (safety first)
• 64-bit counters — ifHCInOctets/ifHCOutOctets used when available, falls back to 32-bit
• Subnet discovery — Max /22 (1024 hosts) to prevent accidental network floods
• No persistent state — Each query is independent, no caching

Development

# Setup
git clone https://github.com/dtzp555-max/network-mcp-server.git
cd network-mcp-server
python -m venv .venv
source .venv/bin/activate
pip install -e ".[dev]"

# Test
pytest tests/ -v

# Lint
ruff check src/ tests/

Roadmap

• v0.2.0: SNMPv3 support, SSH/Netmiko backend (Cisco IOS commands)
• v0.3.0: UniFi REST API backend
• v0.4.0: Configuration change tools (with safety guardrails)
• v1.0.0: Multi-backend, production-ready