MCP server

MCP server

The built-in assistant lets you build jobs by chatting inside the console. The MCP server lets you do the same thing from an AI tool you already use: connect claude.ai or ChatGPT to your machine and it can create, change and remove jobs from its own chat — the same safe, jobs-only actions as the built-in assistant.

It’s a Business-and-up feature, and it ships off. Until you switch it on, no outside connection can reach your jobs — the door doesn’t exist.

MCP (Model Context Protocol) is the open standard that lets an AI chat connect to outside tools. Cronable exposes exactly one set of tools over it: the ones that create, change and delete jobs.

How it works

It’s the same trust model as remote access and the webhook relay: your daemon never opens an inbound port. The connection is opened outbound by your server, brokered by Cronable’s hosted relay at mcp.cronable.ai, and bound to your license — so nothing is exposed on the machine running your jobs, and no other customer can reach your daemon.

  1. You turn the MCP server on for the daemon (see below).
  2. In your AI tool, you add a custom connector pointing at Cronable and sign in with your Cronable account (the same one you manage your subscription with).
  3. You approve the connection and pick the machine it should act on.
  4. From then on, asking the AI to “add a job that…” reaches that daemon over the tunnel, runs through the same job-authoring path as everything else, and the new job shows up on your canvas.

Turn it on

  1. Open Settings → MCP in the dashboard.
  2. Flip the enable toggle. (It’s off by default; on a plan without MCP, the toggle shows an upgrade prompt.)
  3. Copy the connection address shown there — https://mcp.cronable.ai/mcp — and, in claude.ai or ChatGPT, add it as a custom connector. Sign in with your Cronable account, approve, and pick this machine.
  4. Optional but recommended: use Download skill file on the same tab and add it to your AI tool. It’s a short instruction sheet that teaches the AI how to use the connection well.

Requirements

  • A Business-and-up license — the MCP entitlement rides those plans.
  • Two-factor authentication on the account the connection acts as. MCP is a remote surface, so the connection is refused if that account doesn’t have 2FA turned on. Set it up first under Settings → Security. See Security.
  • The MCP server enabled on the daemon (off by default — step above).

What it can and can’t do

Exactly what the built-in assistant can: create, change and delete jobs, and nothing else. It can’t run a command, open a shell, browse, or read a secret value. Every change runs as the mapped Cronable user, through the same role checks, change-approval gate and audit trail as a job you edited by hand. Turn the toggle off and the door is closed again.

See also

  • AI assistant — the same actions, built into the console (no setup in an outside tool)
  • Remote access — reach the full dashboard from any browser, same tunnel model
  • OpenClaw & Hermes — orchestrating your own agents
  • Security — the on-prem trust model, roles and audit
AI assistantOpenClaw & Hermes