gods-eye-view/docs/TOOLS.md

Tools and the MCP server

Tools answer questions from God's Eye View data for language-model clients. They are defined once and exposed through adapters; the Model Context Protocol (MCP) is the first.

Layers

Owner	Responsibility
src/tools/	Tool definitions, catalog composition, argument validation, shared area and result helpers
src/tools/queries/	Queries, one file per domain, reading only portable source contracts
src/tools/mcp/	MCP protocol (JSON-RPC) and a stateless HTTP transport; knows the catalog interface, not queries
server/mcp/	Node composition: points the sources at a running app's /api routes and serves stdio

Dependencies point downward only. gods-eye-view/tools and gods-eye-view/tools/mcp are portable exports: they reach no application, rendering, Node, Cesium or browser-global code, which npm run check:boundaries enforces. Nothing in the application imports them.

Definitions and composition

defineTool({ name, kind, title, description, inputSchema, requires, run }) validates and freezes a tool. kind is query (answers from data, read-only) or action. inputSchema uses a JSON Schema subset that src/tools/schema.js checks completely; unsupported keywords are rejected at definition time. run(args, { services, signal }) resolves to { summary, data }: one sentence for people and a structured object for programs. A tool may also return images, each { mimeType, data } with base64 data; the MCP adapter sends them as image content.

composeCatalog({ tools, services, replace, interceptors }) builds a catalog:

• Tools: an application adds its own tools to coreTools. Reusing a name fails unless the name is listed in replace.
• Services: each tool names the services it reads in requires. Tools whose services are not supplied are left out.
• Interceptors: (call, next) => next(call) functions wrap every call, outermost first. They can observe, reject or change a call.

Expected failures throw ToolError with one of invalid_arguments, unavailable, unsupported, malformed or retry_later. Other errors are reported to clients without details.

Services

Services are the portable source factories the layers already use, such as createUsgsEarthquakeSource, createFirmsSource and createLaunchSource, plus a places service with resolve(name, { signal }). Sources request relative /api/... paths through an injected fetchImpl, so the same tool code runs wherever an application routes those paths. The weather, regional, terrain, summary and features services are the application request services from gods-eye-view/application/requests. situation_brief runs each section whose services are supplied and marks the others unavailable. The bikeshare service is { systems, getStations }: the system registry and the GBFS source. createGeocodePlaceService resolves place names through /api/geocode; createPlaceSearchService searches /api/google/* and reports when no search key is configured; createRouteService plans routes through /api/route.

The area argument

Location-scoped tools take area as exactly one of a place name, a bbox ([west, south, east, north], crossing the antimeridian when west exceeds east), or lat, lon and radius_km. Lists default to 25 rows, at most 200, and report total, returned and truncated.

MCP

createMcpServer({ catalog, name, version, instructions, descriptions, decorate }) implements initialize, ping, tools/list and tools/call for protocol revisions 2025-11-25, 2025-06-18 and 2025-03-26. descriptions overrides a tool's title or description for this surface; decorate(definition, tool) merges extra fields into each listed definition. createMcpHttpHandler(server) returns a Request-to-Response handler for stateless Streamable HTTP: one JSON-RPC message per POST, answered with JSON. The host owns routing and any access control in front of it.

Running locally

Start the app (npm run dev or npm run preview), then register the stdio server with an MCP client, for example Claude Code:

claude mcp add gods-eye-view -- npm --prefix /path/to/gods-eye-view run --silent mcp

npm run mcp -- --api-base http://localhost:4173 selects another server. The local server makes no requests other than to the app's /api routes and the public feeds the sources already use.

Tools

Tool	Reads	Returns
get_earthquakes	earthquakes	USGS M2.5+ events in the last 24 hours, strongest first
get_active_fires	fires	NASA FIRMS detections in an area, highest radiative power first
get_recent_launches	launches	Launch Library 2 launches in the last 30 days, newest first
aircraft_in_area	aircraft	Aircraft in an area, nearest first; military: true reads the military feed
find_aircraft	aircraft	Aircraft anywhere by callsign, ICAO address or registration
get_aircraft_track	aircraft	Recent positions of one aircraft, thinned to 200 points
get_aircraft_info	aircraft	Aircraft type and registration, and flight route, from adsbdb
next_satellite_pass	satellites	Next pass over a point (default the ISS), with naked-eye visibility
satellites_overhead	satellites	Satellites in a CelesTrak group above a point now, highest first
find_cctv_cameras	cctv	Public cameras in an area, nearest first
get_cctv_snapshot	cctv	The current image from one camera, returned as image content
find_radio_stations	radio	Radio Browser stations by area and/or search terms, with stream URLs
search_places	placeSearch	Points of interest matching a query within an area (Google Places)
places_nearby	placeSearch	Notable places around a point (Google Places)
plan_route	routing	Walking, driving or cycling route over OpenStreetMap, with a simplified path
get_bike_share	bikeshare	Live GBFS stations in an area, with bikes and docks available
get_transit_vehicles	transit	Live GTFS-Realtime vehicle positions in an area, optionally one route
get_weather	weather	Current conditions at a place or point
get_regional_brief	regional	What and where a location is, its weather and recent headlines
get_cyclones	cyclones	Active NHC/CPHC tropical cyclones, optionally in an area
get_fire_perimeters	perimeters	Mapped WFIGS wildfire perimeters in an area, largest first
get_terrain_height	terrain	Ground, geoid and ellipsoid heights at up to 20 points
find_military_installations	installations	OpenStreetMap military sites in an area of at most 10° per side
get_map_features	features	Administrative areas, named places or monuments at a location (needs Overpass)
situation_brief	weather	Weather, earthquakes, fires, aircraft and cyclones for an area, by section
get_hud_caption	weather, summary	The app's heads-up display caption for an area