Jane

Jane is an MCP server that turns your team’s documentation into an AI-accessible knowledge base. Built with TypeScript and the official MCP SDK, Jane lets Claude and other MCP-compatible clients search, access, and manage standard library documentation and project specifications with fast SQLite-powered performance.

How to use

You connect an MCP client to Jane to search and retrieve documentation, APIs, coding standards, and project specifications. Use Jane to run full-text searches, fetch specific standard library entries, and access project specifications. Jane keeps your knowledge base organized and quickly searchable to accelerate onboarding and architecture inquiries.

How to install

Prerequisites you need before install: Node.js 18 or newer and npm 8 or newer. Jane runs as an MCP server local to your development machine or inside your CI environment.

Step 1 – Install and build Jane on your machine.

git clone <repository-url>
cd jane-mcp-server
npm install
npm run build

Step 2 – Start the Jane MCP server.

npm start

Step 3 – Connect your MCP client to Jane. Use the standard stdio configuration shown below to point your client at the local Jane process.

{
  "type": "stdio",
  "name": "jane",
  "command": "node",
  "args": ["/absolute/path/to/jane-mcp-server/dist/index.js"]
}

Configuration and structure

Jane organizes documents under a simple hierarchy and uses a SQLite database for fast full-text search. The document store is designed to handle two types of content: Standard Library Docs (stdlib) and Project Specifications (specs). The database, document metadata, and content are kept locally for quick queries.

Document format uses Markdown with YAML frontmatter, enabling rich metadata such as title, description, and tags.

Two key folders define the content layout:

• stdlib: language-specific documentation (e.g., javascript, typescript, python)

• specs: project specifications, architecture docs, API specs, team guidelines

Document management with symlinks

If you want private documentation separated from the MCP server, you can create a private storage location and link it to Jane using a symlink.

Setup private storage

# Create your private Jane documents directory
mkdir -p ~/Documents/Jane/{stdlib,specs}

# Remove default Jane directory (if it exists)
rm -rf ~/dev/jane-mcp-server/Jane

# Create symlink from MCP server to your private docs
ln -s ~/Documents/Jane ~/dev/jane-mcp-server/Jane

Benefits include privacy, independent backups, and clean Git history since your private docs live outside the server repository.

Development and troubleshooting

Development tasks include running in development mode, testing, linting, and inspecting the SQLite index.

Common commands

# Development mode with hot reload
npm run dev

# Run tests
npm test

# Lint code
npm run lint

# Check SQLite database
sqlite3 document-index.db "SELECT COUNT(*) FROM documents;"

If you encounter issues, verify the server startup, document presence, and database integrity using diagnostic commands and file-system checks.

Tools and usage patterns

Jane provides a set of MCP tools to access and manage documents. You can discover available libraries and specs, perform full-text searches, retrieve specific documents, and manage content.

Available tools

list_stdlibs

Browse available programming languages and their documentation

list_specs

Explore your project specifications and technical docs

search

Full-text search across all documents with filtering options

get_stdlib

Retrieve specific standard library documentation

get_spec

Access project specifications and technical documents

create_document

Add new documentation with structured metadata

update_document

Modify existing documents and their metadata