ufind-mcp

An MCP server for u:find, the course catalogue of the University of Vienna. Ask your assistant what a department offers this semester, when a course meets, who teaches it, or where a room is. Read only, no account, no API key.

Install

git clone https://github.com/ParadoxTR/ufind-mcp.git
cd ufind-mcp
uv sync

Add it to Claude Code:

claude mcp add ufind --scope user -- uv --directory /absolute/path/to/ufind-mcp run ufind-mcp

Or add it to Claude Desktop, Cursor or any other MCP client:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ufind": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["--directory", "/absolute/path/to/ufind-mcp", "run", "ufind-mcp"]
    }
  }
}

What you can ask

Which courses does the Bachelor Informatik programme offer in 2026W?

When and where does 180013 meet, and who teaches it?

Find logic courses next semester with fewer than 3 ECTS.

What is Benjamin Schnieder teaching this winter?

Give me the module structure of the Master Philosophie curriculum.

Tools

Tool	What it does
search_courses	Free text course search across titles, LV numbers, lecturers and semesters
get_course	One course in full: groups, lecturers, every date and room, curriculum placement, description, registration window, exams
get_course_schedule	Weekly pattern and all dates of a group, or the raw iCal feed
list_departments	Every top level unit of the Vorlesungsverzeichnis for a semester
list_programs	Bachelor, Master, Doktorat and extension curricula, filterable by department or name
get_program_courses	Every course a department or programme offers in a semester, grouped by module
get_program_modules	Curriculum structure without the courses
search_staff, get_staff	Staff lookup with room, email and affiliations
search_units, get_unit	Institutes, departments and faculties
search_exams	Courses that have exam records
list_semesters	Which semester codes exist and which one is current

Semesters are written 2026W (winter 2026/27) or 2027S. Every tool also accepts current, next and previous.

Configuration

Variable	Default	Meaning
UFIND_MCP_LANG	de	Set to en for English pages and titles
UFIND_MCP_CACHE_DIR	~/.cache/ufind-mcp	Where responses are cached
UFIND_MCP_NO_CACHE	unset	Set to 1 to disable the cache
UFIND_MCP_TIMEOUT_S	60	Request timeout, the staff search page can be slow
UFIND_MCP_MIN_GAP_S	0.25	Minimum pause between requests
UFIND_MCP_USER_AGENT	ufind-mcp/0.1 ...	User agent sent to u:find

Good to know

u:find has no public API. This server reads the XML endpoints that the mobile clients use and, for the parts those endpoints do not cover, the public web pages. That means the university can change things without notice. Requests go out one at a time with a small pause, and every response is cached on disk, so normal use stays light on their servers.

A semester that has not started yet is incomplete. Course descriptions, registration windows and exam dates often stay empty until the term begins.

Catalogue paths are specific to one semester, so a programme has a different id in 2026W than in 2026S. The server resolves programmes by name for the semester you ask about and warns you if a path belongs to a different term.

A course that counts towards several modules appears once per module in a programme listing. Output always states how many entries and how many distinct courses that is.

Tests

uv run python tests/smoke.py      # live data, parsing and completeness
uv run python tests/mcp_smoke.py  # calls every tool over the MCP protocol

Disclaimer

This project is not affiliated with, endorsed by or supported by the University of Vienna. It reads endpoints that are not part of a documented public API, so it can break at any time. Use it for your own studies and keep the default rate limiting in place. If you need guaranteed access, ask the university.

License

MIT