Deployment

Deployment Options

erpnext-agent supports local stdio, a loopback-only development listener, a least-privilege stdio container, and a remote authenticated HTTPS boundary. Provider endpoint, credential, selector, identity, and trust material are supplied at runtime through AgentConfig; none is stored in this repository.

Installed stdio process

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "erpnext": {
      "command": "erpnext-mcp",
      "args": [],
      "env": {"MCP_TOOL_MODE": "intent"}
    }
  }
}

Loopback development listener

erpnext-mcp --transport streamable-http --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8000

Do not expose this listener beyond loopback. Network deployments require direct TLS or an explicitly trusted TLS-terminating ingress, configured authentication, exact MCP_ALLOWED_HOSTS, and an exact trusted-proxy CIDR policy.

Least-privilege local container

docker run -i --rm \
  --read-only \
  --cap-drop=ALL \
  --security-opt=no-new-privileges \
  --pids-limit=256 \
  --tmpfs /tmp:rw,noexec,nosuid,nodev,size=64m \
  -e TRANSPORT=stdio \
  registry.example.invalid/erpnext-agent@sha256:<digest> erpnext-mcp

The operator projects the selected AgentConfig profile into the process at runtime; the image remains immutable and contains no environment connection profile.

Remote authenticated HTTPS endpoint

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "erpnext": {"url": "https://service.example.invalid/mcp"}
  }
}

Store the real remote URL, outbound identity reference, and TLS-profile reference in AgentConfig, not in MCP client JSON or documentation.

This page covers running erpnext-agent as a long-lived server: the transports, a Docker Compose stack, putting it behind a Caddy reverse proxy, and giving it a DNS name with Technitium. To provision the ERPNext / Frappe site it connects to, see Backing Platform.

erpnext-agent ships two console scripts: an MCP server (erpnext-mcp) that exposes a typed, deterministic tool surface a policy router / agent calls, and an optional A2A agent server (erpnext-agent) that wraps those tools in a Pydantic-AI agent. Most deployments run the MCP server; the agent server is documented in Agent server below.

Run the MCP server

The transport is selected with --transport (or the TRANSPORT env var):

stdio (default)streamable-httpsse

erpnext-mcp

For IDE / desktop MCP clients that launch the server as a subprocess.

erpnext-mcp --transport streamable-http --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8000

A network server with a /health endpoint and /mcp route.

erpnext-mcp --transport sse --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8000

Health check (HTTP transports):

curl -s http://localhost:8000/health        # {"status":"OK"}

Configuration (environment)

erpnext-agent is configured entirely from the environment. The required set:

Var	Default	Meaning
ERPNEXT_URL	Required	ERPNext / Frappe site base URL
ERPNEXT_TOKEN	(empty)	API token in api_key:api_secret form

Optional connection and runtime settings:

Var	Default	Meaning
ERPNEXT_AGENT_USERNAME	(empty)	Username for session login (alternative to a token)
ERPNEXT_AGENT_PASSWORD	(empty)	Password for session login
TLS_PROFILE	(empty)	Named AgentConfig transport-security profile; verification is mandatory
TLS_PROFILES_REF	(empty)	Runtime secret reference for the TLS profile catalog
AUTHENTICATIONTOOL	True	Register the authentication tool set
RESOURCETOOL	True	Register the resource (document/method) tool set
HOST / PORT / TRANSPORT	0.0.0.0 / 8000 / stdio	HTTP transport binding

The connector remains inactive when no ERPNEXT_URL / credentials are supplied. A template lives in .env.example — copy it to .env and fill in your site endpoint and token.

Docker Compose

The repo ships docker/mcp.compose.yml. It reads a sibling .env and publishes the HTTP server on :8000:

services:
  erpnext-agent-mcp:
    image: example/erpnext-agent@sha256:<digest>
    container_name: erpnext-agent-mcp
    hostname: erpnext-agent-mcp
    restart: always
    env_file:
      - ../.env
    environment:
      - PYTHONUNBUFFERED=1
      - HOST=0.0.0.0
      - PORT=8000
      - TRANSPORT=streamable-http
      - ERPNEXT_URL
      - ERPNEXT_TOKEN
    ports:
      - "8000:8000"
    healthcheck:
      test: ["CMD", "python3", "-c", "import urllib.request; urllib.request.urlopen('http://localhost:8000/health')"]
      interval: 30s
      timeout: 10s
      retries: 3

cp .env.example .env          # then edit ERPNEXT_URL / ERPNEXT_TOKEN
docker compose -f docker/mcp.compose.yml up -d
docker compose -f docker/mcp.compose.yml logs -f

Behind a Caddy reverse proxy

Expose the HTTP server on a hostname with automatic TLS. Add to your Caddyfile:

# Internal (self-signed) — homelab .example.invalid zone
erpnext-agent.example.invalid {
    tls internal
    reverse_proxy erpnext-agent-mcp:8000
}

# Public — automatic Let's Encrypt
erpnext-agent.example.com {
    reverse_proxy erpnext-agent-mcp:8000
}

Reload Caddy:

docker compose -f services/caddy/compose.yml exec caddy caddy reload --config /etc/caddy/Caddyfile

DNS with Technitium

Point the hostname at the host running Caddy. Via the Technitium API:

curl -s "http://technitium.example.invalid:5380/api/zones/records/add" \
  --data-urlencode "token=$TECHNITIUM_DNS_TOKEN" \
  --data-urlencode "domain=erpnext-agent.example.invalid" \
  --data-urlencode "zone=arpa" \
  --data-urlencode "type=A" \
  --data-urlencode "ipAddress=192.0.2.10" \
  --data-urlencode "ttl=3600"

…or add an A record erpnext-agent.example.invalid → <caddy-host-ip> in the Technitium web console (http://technitium.example.invalid:5380). The ecosystem technitium-dns-mcp automates this as a tool.

Register with an MCP client

Add to your client's mcp_config.json:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "erpnext-agent": {
      "command": "uv",
      "args": ["run", "erpnext-mcp"],
      "env": {
        "ERPNEXT_URL": "<configured-endpoint>",
        "ERPNEXT_TOKEN": "<runtime-secret>"
      }
    }
  }
}

For a remote HTTP server, point the client at http://erpnext-agent.example.invalid/mcp instead.

Agent server

In addition to the MCP server, erpnext-agent ships a Pydantic-AI agent server (console script erpnext-agent). It connects to one or more MCP servers and exposes a conversational agent over A2A:

# Run the agent server, wiring it to a running MCP endpoint
erpnext-agent --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8001 --mcp-url http://erpnext-agent-mcp:8000/mcp

The agent reads its toolset from an mcp_config.json (default: the bundled erpnext_agent/mcp_config.json) or from the --mcp-url of an already-running MCP server. A companion Compose service mirrors the MCP stack — publish the agent on its own port (for example :8001) and set MCP_URL to the MCP server it should call:

services:
  erpnext-agent:
    image: example/erpnext-agent@sha256:<digest>
    container_name: erpnext-agent
    hostname: erpnext-agent
    restart: always
    entrypoint: ["erpnext-agent"]
    env_file:
      - ../.env
    environment:
      - PYTHONUNBUFFERED=1
      - HOST=0.0.0.0
      - PORT=8001
      - MCP_URL=http://erpnext-agent-mcp:8000/mcp
    ports:
      - "8001:8001"
    depends_on:
      - erpnext-agent-mcp

Provision an LLM provider for the agent through the standard agent-utilities environment variables (provider/model selection via --provider / --model-id).