Ticket Demo MCP Server

MCP Ticket Demo — A Full-Stack MCP Reference Server

A production-shaped MCP server you can run in under five minutes. Ships with 10 tools, 3 resources, 5 prompts, three auth modes, API key management, per-tool gates, rate limiting, a live observability dashboard, and a VS Code / Bob / Cursor / Windsurf control-plane extension.

Use it to learn MCP, test IDE integrations, run live demos, or as a reference implementation when building your own server.

Companion to MCP as a Platform: What I Learned Building a Portfolio of MCP Servers · MCP Dev Summit Toronto · 5 October 2026 · Talk slides →

Personal open-source project. Not an IBM product.

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What makes this useful beyond a hello-world

Most MCP examples stop at "here is a tool that returns a string." This one goes further:

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Quickstart — five minutes

# Run directly from npm — no clone needed
npx mcp-ticket-demo           # stdio (IDE spawns this)
MCP_MODE=http npx mcp-ticket-demo  # HTTP — opens /health /test /admin /mcp

# Or clone and run
git clone https://github.com/markusvankempen/mcp-ticket-demo
cd mcp-ticket-demo/server && npm install && npm run http

Then open in a browser:

Laptop login: demo / demo. On a public bind (HOST=0.0.0.0, container, Code Engine) set ADMIN_PASSWORD — the default is disabled. Write smoke is /test?write=1 after admin sign-in.

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Add to your IDE (one line)

VS Code / GitHub Copilot — .vscode/mcp.json:

{
  "servers": {
    "mcp-ticket-demo": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["mcp-ticket-demo"],
      "env": { "MCP_MODE": "stdio" }
    }
  }
}

Bob / Cursor / Windsurf — .bob/mcp.json / .cursor/mcp.json / .windsurf/mcp.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "mcp-ticket-demo": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["mcp-ticket-demo"],
      "env": { "MCP_MODE": "stdio" }
    }
  }
}

Or install the extension and click Register server with all IDEs — it writes all four configs at once: VS Code Marketplace · Open VSX

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10 Tools

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3 Resources

Resources are addressable and pinnable — clients can subscribe and refresh. Tools are for agent loops.

Call resources/list to browse — you do not need to know a URI ahead of time. A denied read is a JSON-RPC error (not a fake ticket document you can pin).

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5 Prompts

User-facing prompts — the user picks these, the model executes them.

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Auth model

off    All tools open. No credential needed. Default for local dev.
write  Read tools open. write + pii tools need a credential.
all    Every tool call requires a credential.

Credentials: Authorization: Bearer <api key> over HTTP · MCP_API_KEY env var over stdio.

Issue keys, set modes, toggle per-tool gates, and lock individual tools on /admin. A change broadcasts notifications/tools/list_changed to connected SSE and Streamable HTTP sessions (Cursor/Bob after initialize). One-shot POST /mcp (curl) has no session — it sees the new list on the next call.

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Repo layout

mcp-ticket-demo/
  server/       MCP server — tools, resources, prompts, auth, HTTP pages
  extension/    VS Code / Bob / Cursor / Windsurf control-plane extension
  docs/         Walkthroughs, lessons learned, publishing guide
  Dockerfile    UBI9 minimal, non-root USER 1001, WORKDIR /app

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Docs

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Environment variables

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Honest limits

• Tickets live in memory — a new container starts from seed data.
• Admin auth is a session cookie, not SSO. Cookie is HttpOnly (+ Secure on HTTPS).
• /health being green does not mean the ticket went to the right person.
• Public /test does not create or close tickets. Use /test?write=1 after admin sign-in.

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Author: Markus van Kempen · markus.van.kempen@gmail.com · markusvankempen.github.io · MCP Dev Summit Toronto talk · Talk slides · npm · VS Code Marketplace · Open VSX