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🌳🌲Parks Server Sample ​

Welcome to the Parks Server Sample. In this sample, you will learn how to run the MCP Server locally, and then add it to Microsoft Copilot Studio. This sample exposes the NPS APIs as MCP tools and it's used to demonstrate how you can setup an MCP server that connects to an API which requires authentication using the API key method.

The MCP server ​

The MCP server uses the HTTP Streaming transport protocol to expose the following capabilities:

  • getParks | Get the list of the national US parks given a specific state
  • getActivities | Get the list of activities available in US parks

⚙️ Prerequisites ​

🚀 Minimal path to awesome ​

  1. Open Visual Studio Code on the subfolder samples/parks-http-typescript

  2. Open the terminal and navigate to the same folder

  3. Run npm run start

    Terminal view after building and starting the server

  4. Select PORTS at the top of the Visual Studio Code Terminal

    Image of VS Code where the terminal is open and the PORTS tab is highlighted

  5. Select the green Forward a Port button

    Image of VS Code where the PORTS tab is open and the green button is highlighted

  6. Enter 3000 as the port number (this should be the same as the port number you see when you ran the command in step 5). You might be prompted to sign in to GitHub, if so please do this, since this is required to use the port forwarding feature.

  7. Right click on the row you just added and select Port visibility > Public to make the server publicly available

  8. Ctrl + click on the Forwarded address, which should be something like: https://something-3000.something.devtunnels.ms

  9. Select Copy on the following pop-up to copy the URL

    View of the PORTS setup with highlighted the port, the forwarded address and the visibility

  10. Open to the browser of your choice and paste the URL in the address bar, type /mcp behind it and hit enter

If all went well, you will see the following error message:

json
{"jsonrpc":"2.0","error":{"code":-32000,"message":"Method not allowed."},"id":null}

Don't worry - this error message is nothing to be worried about!

👨‍💻 Use the Parks MCP Server in Microsoft Copilot Studio ​

  1. Go to https://make.preview.powerapps.com/customconnectors (make sure you’re in the correct environment) and click + New custom connector.

  2. Select Import from GitHub

  3. Select Custom as Connector Type

  4. Select dev as the Branch

  5. Select MCP-Streamable-HTTP as the Connector

  6. Select Continue

    View of the import from GitHub section

  7. Change the Connector Name to something appropriate, like for instance Events MCP

  8. Change the Description to something appropriate

  9. Paste your root URL (for instance something-3000.something.devtunnels.ms) in the Host field

  10. Move to the Security tab and select API Key as the Authentication Type

  11. Provide the following values for the configuration:

    • Parameter label: API key
    • Parameter name: x-api-key
    • Parameter location: Header

  12. Select Create connector

    You may see a warning and an error upon creation – it should be resolved soon - but you can ignore it for now.

  13. Close the connector

  14. Go to https://copilotstudio.preview.microsoft.com/

  15. Create your agent

  16. Select Tools > Add a tool > Model Context Protocol > And then select the MCP server you’ve just created

  17. You will be asked to provide the API key, which you can get for free from the NPS API documentation page.