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MCP Development Overview

MCP is the extension system for AI Chat. It lets developers package external tools as installable servers that users can enable inside chat workflows.

If Skills package strategy behavior for trading agents, MCP servers package tool behavior for the chat interface.

What MCP Adds

Use MCP when you want to expose:

  • market data and analytics tools
  • news, research, and on-chain context
  • exchange or protocol read-only capabilities
  • operator utilities that are useful during an interactive chat session

Write-capable tools, such as order placement or signing, need stricter controls. In Orien, MCP is best treated as the chat-side capability layer, while execution-sensitive workflows should remain behind explicit confirmation, risk checks, or Skill-based agent runtimes.

Platform Flow

The current marketplace flow is:

developer submits snippet
  -> platform discovers server metadata and tools
  -> submission enters pending review
  -> admin approves, rejects, or requests changes
  -> users install and enable the approved server
  -> AI Chat can call enabled MCP tools

Approved MCP servers are visible in the MCP Market. Installed servers are user-scoped, and disabled installations are not exposed to AI Chat.

Supported Server Shapes

The platform stores MCP server configuration as a JSON snippet. A snippet contains exactly one mcpServers entry:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "okx-cex-market": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@okx_ai/okx-trade-mcp", "--modules", "market"]
    }
  }
}

stdio servers are useful for package-based tools. Remote servers can use HTTP transports when they are designed for hosted operation.

MCP vs Skill

ExtensionPrimary SurfaceMain Use
MCPAI ChatTools, data, research, operator actions
SkillTrading AgentsStrategy cycles, risk gates, execution behavior

The two systems are intentionally separate. MCP expands what chat can ask tools to do. Skills define how agents trade in repeatable runtime cycles.

Next Steps

Overview