Model Context Protocol

oterm has support for Anthropic's open-source Model Context Protocol. While Ollama does not yet directly support the protocol, oterm attempts to bridge MCP servers with Ollama.

To add an MCP server to oterm, simply add the server shim to oterm's config.json. The following MCP transports are supported

Supported MCP Features

Tools

By transforming MCP tools into Ollama tools oterm provides full support.

Note

Not all models are equipped to support tools. For those models that do not, the tool selection will be disabled.

A lot of the smaller LLMs are not as capable with tools as larger ones you might be used to. If you experience issues with tools, try reducing the number of tools you attach to a chat, increase the context size, or use a larger LLM.

Tool support oterm using the git MCP server to access its own repo.

Prompts

oterm supports MCP prompts. Use the "Use MCP prompt" command to invoke a form with the prompt. Submitting will insert the prompt messages into the chat.

Prompt support oterm displaying a test MCP prompt.

Sampling

oterm supports MCP sampling, acting as a geteway between Ollama and the servers it connects to. This way, an MCP server can request oterm to run a completion and even declare its model preferences and parameters!

Transports

`stdio` transport

Used for running local MCP servers, the configuration supports the command, args, env & cwd parameters. For example for the git MCP server you would add something like the following to the mcpServers section of the oterm configuration file:

{
  ...
  "mcpServers": {
    "git": {
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run",
        "--rm",
        "-i",
        "--mount",
        "type=bind,src=/Users/ggozad/dev/open-source/oterm,dst=/oterm",
        "mcp/git"
      ]
    }
  }
}

`Streamable HTTP` transport

Typically used to connect to remote MCP servers through Streamable HTTP, the only accepted parameter is the url parameter (should start with http:// or https://). For example,

{
  ...
  "mcpServers": {
    "my_mcp": {
            "url": "http://remote:port/path"
        }
  }
}

`Websocket` transport

Also used to connect to remote MCP servers, but through websockets. The only accepted parameter is the url parameter (should start with ws:// or wss://). For example,

{
  ...
  "mcpServers": {
    "my_mcp": {
            "url": "wss://remote:port/path"
        }
  }
}

Authentication

HTTP bearer authentication

oterm supports HTTP bearer authentication by use of tokens. Use

{
  ...
  "mcpServers": {
    "my_mcp": {
            "url": "http://remote:port/path",
      "auth": {
        "type": "bearer",
        "token": "XXX"
      }
    }
  }
}