mfa-servicenow-mcp 1.7.1

A Model Context Protocol (MCP) server implementation for ServiceNow

MFA ServiceNow MCP

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MFA-first ServiceNow MCP server. Authenticates via real browser (Playwright) so Okta, Entra ID, SAML, and any MFA/SSO login just works. Also supports API Key for headless/Docker environments.

# One command — MFA/SSO browser login, works on macOS/Linux/Windows
uvx --with playwright --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp \
  --instance-url "https://your-instance.service-now.com" \
  --auth-type "browser" \
  --browser-headless "false"

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Table of Contents

• Features
• AI-Powered Setup
• Prerequisites
• Quick Start
• MCP Client Configuration
• Authentication
• Tool Packages
• CLI Reference
• Keeping Up to Date
• Safety Policy
• Skills
• Docker
• Developer Setup
• Documentation
• Related Projects
• License

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AI-Powered Setup

One line. Any AI coding assistant. Everything configured automatically.

Paste this into Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, OpenCode, Windsurf, VS Code Copilot, or Gemini CLI:

Install and configure mfa-servicenow-mcp by following the instructions here:
curl -s https://raw.githubusercontent.com/jshsakura/mfa-servicenow-mcp/main/docs/llm-setup.md

Your AI will:

1. Install uv and Playwright (if needed)
2. Ask for your ServiceNow instance URL, auth type, and tool package
3. Generate the correct MCP config file for your client
4. Install 20 workflow skills (if supported)

No manual config editing. No format differences to worry about. Works on macOS, Linux, and Windows.

After setup, restart your AI client (or reload MCP servers) to load the new configuration. A browser window will open on the first tool call for MFA login.

For manual setup, see Prerequisites and Quick Start below.

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Features

• Browser authentication for MFA/SSO environments (Okta, Entra ID, SAML, MFA)
• 4 auth modes: Browser, Basic, OAuth, API Key
• 89 tools across 5 role-based packages — from read-only to full CRUD
• Safe write confirmation with confirm='approve'
• Payload safety limits, per-field truncation, and total response budget (200K chars)
• Transient network error retry with backoff
• Tool packages for standard users, service desk, portal developers, and platform developers
• Developer productivity tools: activity tracking, uncommitted changes, dependency mapping, daily summary
• Full coverage of core ServiceNow artifact tables (see Supported Tables)
• CI/CD with auto-tagging, PyPI publishing, and Docker multi-platform builds

Supported ServiceNow Tables

Artifact Type	Table Name	Source Search	Developer Tracking	Safety (Heavy Table)
Script Include	sys_script_include	O	O	O
Business Rule	sys_script	O	O	O
Client Script	sys_client_script	O	O	O
UI Action	sys_ui_action	O	O	O
UI Script	sys_ui_script	O	O	O
UI Page	sys_ui_page	O	O	O
Scripted REST API	sys_ws_operation	O	O	O
Fix Script	sys_script_fix	O	O	O
Service Portal Widget	sp_widget	O	O	O
Angular Provider	sp_angular_provider	-	O	-
Update XML	sys_update_xml	O	-	-

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Prerequisites

Install uv — it handles Python, packages, and execution in one tool.

• macOS / Linux:

  curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh
  

• Windows:

  powershell -c "irm https://astral.sh/uv/install.ps1 | iex"
  

Restart your terminal after installation. That's it — no Python install, no pip, no venv needed.

Chromium for MFA/SSO browser login is installed automatically on first use. Windows users: see Windows Installation Guide for details.

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Quick Start

No clone needed. One command — works on macOS, Linux, and Windows:

uvx --with playwright --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp \
  --instance-url "https://your-instance.service-now.com" \
  --auth-type "browser" \
  --browser-headless "false"

A browser window opens on the first tool call for Okta/Entra ID/SAML/MFA login. Chromium is auto-installed if missing. Session persists after login — no need to re-authenticate every time.

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MCP Client Configuration

Each project can connect to a different ServiceNow instance. Set the config in your project directory so each project has its own instance URL and credentials.

Client	Config File	Format
Claude Desktop	claude_desktop_config.json	JSON (mcpServers)
Claude Code	.mcp.json or claude mcp add	JSON / CLI
OpenCode	opencode.json	JSON (mcp, uses environment)
OpenAI Codex	.codex/agents.toml	TOML
AntiGravity	mcp_config.json	JSON (mcpServers)
Gemini / Vertex AI	project config	JSON (mcp)
Docker	—	Environment variables

Copy-paste configs for each client: Client Setup Guide

SERVICENOW_USERNAME / SERVICENOW_PASSWORD are optional — they prefill the MFA login form. On Windows, set these as system environment variables.

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Authentication

Choose the auth mode based on your ServiceNow environment.

Browser Auth (MFA/SSO) — Default

The Quick Start command uses browser auth. Optional flags:

Flag	Env Variable	Default	Description
--browser-username	SERVICENOW_USERNAME	—	Prefill login form username
--browser-password	SERVICENOW_PASSWORD	—	Prefill login form password
--browser-headless	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_HEADLESS	false	Run browser without GUI
--browser-timeout	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_TIMEOUT	120	Login timeout in seconds
--browser-session-ttl	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_SESSION_TTL	30	Session TTL in minutes
--browser-user-data-dir	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_USER_DATA_DIR	—	Persistent browser profile path
--browser-probe-path	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_PROBE_PATH	/api/now/table/sys_user?sysparm_limit=1&sysparm_fields=sys_id	Session validation endpoint
--browser-login-url	SERVICENOW_BROWSER_LOGIN_URL	—	Custom login page URL

Basic Auth

Use this for PDIs or instances without MFA.

uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp \
  --instance-url "https://your-instance.service-now.com" \
  --auth-type "basic" \
  --username "your_id" \
  --password "your_password"

OAuth

Current CLI support expects OAuth password grant inputs.

uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp \
  --instance-url "https://your-instance.service-now.com" \
  --auth-type "oauth" \
  --client-id "your_client_id" \
  --client-secret "your_client_secret" \
  --username "your_id" \
  --password "your_password"

If --token-url is omitted, the server defaults to https://<instance>/oauth_token.do.

API Key

uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp \
  --instance-url "https://your-instance.service-now.com" \
  --auth-type "api_key" \
  --api-key "your_api_key"

Default header: X-ServiceNow-API-Key (customizable with --api-key-header).

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Tool Packages

Set MCP_TOOL_PACKAGE to choose a specific tool set. Default: standard

All packages except none include the full set of read-only tools (55 tools). Higher packages add write capabilities for their domain.

Package	Tools	Description
standard	45	(Default) Read-only safe mode. All query/analysis tools across every domain.
service_desk	49	standard + incident create/update/resolve/comment
portal_developer	61	standard + portal/widget updates, script include writes, changeset commit/publish
platform_developer	69	standard + workflow CRUD, UI policy, incident/change management writes
full	89	All write operations across every domain

If a tool is not available in your current package, the server tells you which package includes it.

For the complete tool list by category, see Tool Inventory.

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CLI Reference

Server Options

Flag	Env Variable	Default	Description
--instance-url	SERVICENOW_INSTANCE_URL	required	ServiceNow instance URL
--auth-type	SERVICENOW_AUTH_TYPE	basic	Auth mode: basic, oauth, api_key, browser
--tool-package	MCP_TOOL_PACKAGE	standard	Tool package to load
--timeout	SERVICENOW_TIMEOUT	30	HTTP request timeout (seconds)
--debug	SERVICENOW_DEBUG	false	Enable debug logging

Basic Auth

Flag	Env Variable
--username	SERVICENOW_USERNAME
--password	SERVICENOW_PASSWORD

OAuth

Flag	Env Variable
--client-id	SERVICENOW_CLIENT_ID
--client-secret	SERVICENOW_CLIENT_SECRET
--token-url	SERVICENOW_TOKEN_URL
--username	SERVICENOW_USERNAME
--password	SERVICENOW_PASSWORD

API Key

Flag	Env Variable	Default
--api-key	SERVICENOW_API_KEY	—
--api-key-header	SERVICENOW_API_KEY_HEADER	X-ServiceNow-API-Key

Script Execution

Flag	Env Variable
--script-execution-api-resource-path	SCRIPT_EXECUTION_API_RESOURCE_PATH

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Keeping Up to Date

uvx automatically uses the latest cached version. In most cases, updates happen without any action.

To force the latest PyPI release immediately:

uvx --refresh --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp --version

pip upgrade

pip install --upgrade mfa-servicenow-mcp

Pinning a specific version

If you need a specific version (e.g., for stability):

# uvx with pinned version
uvx --from "mfa-servicenow-mcp==1.5.0" servicenow-mcp --version

# uv tool with pinned version
uv tool install "mfa-servicenow-mcp==1.5.0"

# pip with pinned version
pip install "mfa-servicenow-mcp==1.5.0"

Version release process

1. Version is defined in pyproject.toml (version = "x.y.z")
2. On push to main, CI auto-creates a git tag v{version} if it doesn't exist
3. Tagged pushes trigger PyPI publishing and GitHub Release creation
4. Docker images (standard + playwright variants) are built for amd64 and arm64

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Safety Policy

All mutating tools are protected by explicit confirmation.

Rules:

1. Mutating tools with prefixes such as create_, update_, delete_, remove_, add_, move_, activate_, deactivate_, commit_, publish_, submit_, approve_, reject_, resolve_, reorder_, and execute_ require confirmation.
2. You must pass confirm='approve'.
3. Without that parameter, the server rejects the request before execution.

This policy applies regardless of the selected tool package.

Portal Investigation Safety

Portal investigation tools are conservative by default:

• search_portal_regex_matches starts with widget-only scanning, linked expansion off, and small default limits.
• trace_portal_route_targets is the preferred follow-up for compact Widget -> Provider -> route target evidence.
• download_portal_sources does not pull linked Script Includes or Angular Providers unless explicitly requested.
• Large portal scans are capped server-side and return warnings when the request exceeds safe defaults.

Pattern matching modes:

Mode	Behavior
auto (default)	Plain strings treated literally, regex-looking patterns remain regex
literal	Always escape the pattern first; safest for route/token strings
regex	Use only when you intentionally need regex operators

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Performance Optimizations

The server includes several layers of performance optimization to minimize latency and token usage.

Serialization

• orjson backend: All JSON serialization uses json_fast (orjson when available, stdlib fallback). 2-4x faster than stdlib json for both loads and dumps.
• Compact output: Tool responses are serialized without indentation or extra whitespace, saving 20-30% tokens per response.
• Double-parse avoidance: serialize_tool_output detects already-compact JSON strings and skips re-serialization.

Caching

• OrderedDict LRU cache: Query results are cached with O(1) eviction using OrderedDict.popitem(). 256 max entries, 30-second TTL, thread-safe.
• Tool schema cache: Pydantic model_json_schema() output is cached per model type, avoiding repeated schema generation.
• Lazy tool discovery: Only tool modules required by the active MCP_TOOL_PACKAGE are imported at startup. Unused modules are skipped entirely.

Network

• HTTP session pooling: Persistent requests.Session with 20-connection pool, TCP keep-alive, TLS session resumption, and gzip/deflate compression.
• Parallel pagination: sn_query_all fetches the first page sequentially for total count, then retrieves remaining pages concurrently via ThreadPoolExecutor (up to 4 workers).
• Dynamic page sizing: When remaining records fit in a single page (<=100), the page size is enlarged to avoid extra round-trips.
• Batch API: sn_batch combines multiple REST sub-requests into a single /api/now/batch POST, with automatic chunking at the 150-request limit.
• Parallel chunked M2M queries: Widget-to-provider M2M lookups split into 100-ID chunks are executed concurrently rather than sequentially.

Schema & Startup

• Shallow-copy schema injection: Confirmation schema (confirm='approve') is injected via lightweight dict copy instead of copy.deepcopy, reducing list_tools overhead.
• No-count optimization: Subsequent pagination pages use sysparm_no_count=true to skip server-side total count computation.
• Payload safety: Heavy tables (sp_widget, sys_script, etc.) have automatic field clamping and limit restrictions to prevent context window overflow.

Skills

Tools are raw API calls. Skills are what make your LLM actually useful — verified pipelines with safety gates, rollback, and context-aware sub-agent delegation. MCP server + skills is the complete setup for LLM-driven ServiceNow automation.

20 skills today, more coming with every release.

	Tools Only	Tools + Skills
Safety	LLM decides	Gates enforced (snapshot → preview → apply)
Tokens	Source dumps in context	Delegate to sub-agent, summary only
Accuracy	LLM guesses tool order	Verified pipeline
Rollback	Might forget	Snapshot mandatory

Install Skills

# Claude Code
uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp-skills claude

# OpenAI Codex
uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp-skills codex

# OpenCode
uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp-skills opencode

# Gemini CLI
uvx --from mfa-servicenow-mcp servicenow-mcp-skills gemini

The installer downloads 20 skill files from this repository's skills/ directory and places them in a project-local LLM directory. No authentication or configuration needed.

Client	Install Path	Auto-Discovery
Claude Code	.claude/commands/servicenow/	/servicenow slash commands appear on next startup
OpenAI Codex	.codex/skills/servicenow/	Skills loaded on next agent session
OpenCode	.opencode/skills/servicenow/	Skills loaded on next session
Gemini CLI	.gemini/skills/servicenow/	Skills activated on next session

How it works: Each skill is a standalone Markdown file with YAML frontmatter (metadata) and pipeline instructions. The LLM client reads these files from the install path and exposes them as callable commands or skill triggers.

Update: Re-run the same install command — it replaces all existing skill files (clean install, no merge).

Remove: Delete the install directory (e.g., rm -rf .claude/commands/servicenow/).

Skill Categories

Category	Skills	Purpose
analyze/	6	Widget analysis, portal diagnosis, provider audit, dependency mapping, code detection, ESC audit
fix/	3	Widget patching (staged gates), debugging, code review
manage/	5	Page layout, script includes, source export, changeset workflow, local sync
deploy/	2	Change request lifecycle, incident triage
explore/	4	Health check, schema discovery, route tracing, ESC catalog flow

Skill Metadata

Each skill includes metadata that helps LLMs optimize execution:

context_cost: low|medium|high    # → high = delegate to sub-agent
safety_level: none|confirm|staged # → staged = mandatory snapshot/preview/apply
delegatable: true|false           # → can run in sub-agent to save context
triggers: ["위젯 분석", "analyze widget"]  # → LLM trigger matching

For the full skill reference, see skills/SKILL.md.

MCP Resources (Built-in Skill Guides)

Skills are also exposed as MCP resources directly from the server — no client-side installation required. Any MCP-compliant client can discover and read them on demand.

# List available skill guides
list_resources → skill://fix/widget-patching, skill://deploy/change-lifecycle, ...

# Read a specific guide
read_resource("skill://fix/widget-patching") → full pipeline with safety gates

Tools that have a matching skill guide show a → skill://... hint in their description. The guide content is pull-based — zero token cost until the client actually reads it.

Feature	Client-side Skills	MCP Resources
Availability	Requires install command	Built-in, any client
Token cost	Loaded by client	Pull on demand (0 until read)
Discovery	Slash commands / triggers	list_resources
Best for	Power users, slash commands	Universal guidance

Docker

API Key auth only (MFA browser auth requires GUI, not available in containers).

docker run -it --rm \
  -e SERVICENOW_INSTANCE_URL=https://your-instance.service-now.com \
  -e SERVICENOW_AUTH_TYPE=api_key \
  -e SERVICENOW_API_KEY=your-api-key \
  ghcr.io/jshsakura/mfa-servicenow-mcp:latest

See Client Setup Guide for SSE mode and local build options.

Developer Setup

If you want to modify the source locally:

git clone https://github.com/jshsakura/mfa-servicenow-mcp.git
cd mfa-servicenow-mcp

uv venv
uv pip install -e ".[browser,dev]"
uv run playwright install chromium

Running Tests

uv run pytest

Linting & Formatting

uv run black src/ tests/
uv run isort src/ tests/
uv run ruff check src/ tests/
uv run mypy src/

Building

uv build

Windows: see Windows Installation Guide

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Documentation

• Client Setup Guide — Copy-paste configs for every MCP client
• Tool Inventory — Complete list of 89 tools by category and package
• Windows Installation Guide
• Catalog Guide — Service catalog CRUD and optimization
• Change Management — Change request lifecycle and approval
• Workflow Management — Legacy workflow and Flow Designer tools
• Korean README

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Related Projects and Acknowledgements

• This repository includes tools consolidated and refactored from earlier internal / legacy ServiceNow MCP implementations. You can still see that lineage in modules such as core_plus.py and tool_utils.py.
• Some developer productivity workflows, especially server-side source lookup, were designed with ideas inspired by SN Utils. This project does not bundle or redistribute SN Utils code.
• This project is focused on MCP server use cases rather than browser-extension UX. If you want in-browser productivity features inside ServiceNow, SN Utils remains a strong companion tool.

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License

Apache License 2.0