Admin UI¶
MCP Gateway includes a built-in Admin UI for managing all entities in real time via a web browser.
🖥️ Accessing the UI¶
After launching the gateway (make serve or make podman-run), open your browser and go to:
http://localhost:4444/admin - or the corresponding URL / port / protocol (ex: https when launching with make podman-run-ssl)
Login using the BASIC_AUTH_USER and BASIC_AUTH_PASSWORD set in your .env.
🧭 UI Overview¶
The Admin UI is built with HTMX, Alpine.js, and Tailwind CSS, offering a dynamic, SPA-like experience without JavaScript bloat.
It provides tabbed access to:
- Servers Catalog: Define or edit MCP servers (real or virtual)
- Tools: Register REST or native tools, configure auth/rate limits, test responses
- Resources: Add templated or static resources, set MIME types, enable caching
- Prompts: Define Jinja2 prompt templates with argument schemas and preview rendering
- Gateways: View and manage federated peers, toggle activity status
- Roots: Register root URIs for agent or resource scoping
- Metrics: Real-time usage and performance metrics for all entities
- 📊 Metadata Tracking: View comprehensive audit information in entity detail modals
✍️ Common Actions¶
| Action | How |
|---|---|
| Register a tool | Use the Tools tab → Add Tool form |
| Bulk import tools | Use API endpoint /admin/tools/import (see Bulk Import) |
| View prompt output | Go to Prompts → click View |
| View entity metadata | Click "View" on any entity → scroll to "Metadata" section |
| Toggle server activity | Use the "Activate/Deactivate" buttons in Servers tab |
| Delete a resource | Navigate to Resources → click Delete (after confirming) |
All actions are reflected in the live API via /tools, /prompts, etc.
🔐 Auth + JWT from UI¶
Upon successful login, the UI automatically sets a secure JWT token as an HTTP-only cookie (jwt_token).
This token is reused for all Admin API calls from within the UI.
🔄 Live Reloading (Dev Only)¶
If running in development mode (DEV_MODE=true or make run), changes to templates and routes reload automatically.