Outline Wiki MCP Server

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A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that enables LLMs to interact with Outline wiki through structured API calls. This server provides document management, search, collections, comments, and AI-powered smart features including RAG-based Q&A.

Why This Server?

Most Outline MCP servers provide basic API wrappers. This one adds optional Smart Features:

Feature	What it does
ask_wiki	Ask questions in natural language, get answers based on your wiki content (RAG)
find_related	Find semantically similar documents, not just keyword matches
summarize_document	Generate summaries of long documents
suggest_tags	Get tag suggestions based on content analysis

When you might need this:

• Your team's wiki has grown large and search isn't enough
• You want to query your documentation conversationally
• You need semantic search across your knowledge base

When basic MCP is sufficient:

• You only need CRUD operations on documents
• You don't want to set up OpenAI API
• Your wiki is small and well-organized

Smart features require ENABLE_SMART_FEATURES=true and an OpenAI API key. Without these, the server works as a standard Outline MCP.

Example Usage

User: "What's our policy on remote work?"
→ ask_wiki searches your wiki and returns an answer with source links

User: "Find documents related to the onboarding guide"
→ find_related returns semantically similar docs (not just keyword matches)

User: "Summarize the Q4 planning document"
→ summarize_document generates a concise summary in your preferred language

Supported Clients

Client	Tools	Resources	Prompts
Claude Desktop	✅	✅	✅
Claude Code	✅	✅	✅
VS Code GitHub Copilot	✅	✅	✅
Cursor	✅	-	✅
Windsurf	✅	-	-
ChatGPT Desktop	✅	-	-

Getting Started

Requirements

• Node.js 18.0.0 or higher
• Outline instance with API access
• (Optional) OpenAI API key for smart features

Getting Your Outline API Token

1. Log in to your Outline instance
2. Go to Settings → API
3. Click Create API Key
4. Copy the generated token (starts with ol_api_)

Installation

<details> <summary>Claude Desktop</summary>

Add to your Claude Desktop configuration:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json
• Linux: ~/.config/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

</details>

<details> <summary>Claude Code</summary>

Run the following command:

claude mcp add outline -e OUTLINE_URL=https://your-outline-instance.com -e OUTLINE_API_TOKEN=ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx -- npx -y outline-smart-mcp

Or add to ~/.claude.json (global) or .mcp.json (project-local):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

Note: The ~/.claude/settings.json file is ignored for MCP servers. Use ~/.claude.json or .mcp.json instead.

</details>

<details> <summary>VS Code GitHub Copilot</summary>

Add to your VS Code settings (.vscode/mcp.json):

{
  "servers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

</details>

<details> <summary>Cursor</summary>

Add to Cursor MCP settings (~/.cursor/mcp.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

</details>

<details> <summary>Windsurf</summary>

Add to Windsurf MCP settings (~/.codeium/windsurf/mcp_config.json):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

</details>

<details> <summary>ChatGPT Desktop</summary>

ChatGPT supports MCP through its desktop app. Add the server in Settings → MCP Servers with:

• Command: npx
• Arguments: -y outline-smart-mcp
• Environment variables as shown above

</details>

Configuration

Environment Variables

Variable	Description	Required	Default
OUTLINE_URL	Your Outline instance URL	Yes	https://app.getoutline.com
OUTLINE_API_TOKEN	Your Outline API token	Yes	-
READ_ONLY	Enable read-only mode	No	false
DISABLE_DELETE	Disable delete operations	No	false
MAX_RETRIES	API retry attempts	No	3
RETRY_DELAY_MS	Retry delay (ms)	No	1000
ENABLE_SMART_FEATURES	Enable AI features	No	false
OPENAI_API_KEY	OpenAI API key	No*	-

* Required when ENABLE_SMART_FEATURES=true

Smart Features Configuration

To enable AI-powered features (RAG Q&A, summarization, etc.), add these to your config:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "outline": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "outline-smart-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "OUTLINE_URL": "https://your-outline-instance.com",
        "OUTLINE_API_TOKEN": "ol_api_xxxxxxxxxxxxx",
        "ENABLE_SMART_FEATURES": "true",
        "OPENAI_API_KEY": "sk-xxxxxxxxxxxxx"
      }
    }
  }
}

Tools

Search & Discovery

Tool	Description
search_documents	Search documents by keyword with pagination
get_document_id_from_title	Find document ID by title
list_collections	Get all collections
get_collection_structure	Get document hierarchy in a collection
list_recent_documents	Get recently modified documents

Document Operations

Tool	Description
get_document	Get full document content by ID
export_document	Export document in Markdown
create_document	Create a new document
update_document	Update document (supports append)
move_document	Move document to another location

Document Lifecycle

Tool	Description
archive_document	Archive a document
unarchive_document	Restore archived document
delete_document	Delete document (soft/permanent)
restore_document	Restore from trash
list_archived_documents	List archived documents
list_trash	List trashed documents

Comments & Collaboration

Tool	Description
add_comment	Add comment (supports replies)
list_document_comments	Get document comments
get_comment	Get specific comment
get_document_backlinks	Find linking documents

Collection Management

Tool	Description
create_collection	Create collection
update_collection	Update collection
delete_collection	Delete collection
export_collection	Export collection
export_all_collections	Export all collections

Batch Operations

Tool	Description
batch_create_documents	Create multiple documents
batch_update_documents	Update multiple documents
batch_move_documents	Move multiple documents
batch_archive_documents	Archive multiple documents
batch_delete_documents	Delete multiple documents

Smart Features (AI-Powered)

Requires ENABLE_SMART_FEATURES=true and OPENAI_API_KEY.

Tool	Description
smart_status	Check status and indexed count
sync_knowledge	Sync docs to vector database
ask_wiki	RAG-based Q&A on wiki content
summarize_document	Generate AI summary
suggest_tags	AI-suggested tags
find_related	Find semantically related docs
generate_diagram	Generate Mermaid diagrams

Smart Features Usage

# 1. First, sync your wiki documents
sync_knowledge

# 2. Ask questions about your wiki
ask_wiki: "What is our deployment process?"

# 3. Summarize long documents
summarize_document: { documentId: "doc-id", language: "Korean" }

# 4. Find related content
find_related: { documentId: "doc-id", limit: 5 }

Technology Stack

Component	Technology
Vector Database	LanceDB (embedded)
Embeddings	OpenAI text-embedding-3-small
LLM	GPT-4o-mini
Text Chunking	LangChain

Safety Features

Read-Only Mode

READ_ONLY=true

Restricts to read operations only: search, get, export, list operations, and all smart features.

Disable Delete

DISABLE_DELETE=true

Blocks: delete_document, delete_collection, batch_delete_documents

Development

# Clone repository
git clone https://github.com/huiseo/outline-wiki-mcp.git
cd outline-wiki-mcp

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Build
npm run build

# Run tests
npm test

# Type check
npm run typecheck

License

MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

Links

• Outline Wiki
• Outline API Docs
• Model Context Protocol
• MCP Clients