aspire-mcp-inspector

name	aspire-mcp-inspector
description	Add MCP Inspector to .NET Aspire AppHost for local SQL MCP Server validation and tool discovery.
license	MIT

Aspire MCP Inspector

Use when

• Debugging MCP endpoint connectivity in Aspire.
• Validating MCP tool availability from DAB.
• Reproducing the Microsoft Learn Aspire quickstart pattern.

Workflow

1. Add CommunityToolkit.Aspire.Hosting.McpInspector to the AppHost.
2. Run the DAB container with dab-config.json mounted and an HTTP endpoint.
3. Add Inspector with AddMcpInspector("mcp-inspector").WithMcpServer(mcp).
4. Use the Aspire dashboard Inspector link; ports are assigned dynamically.
5. Validate list_tools, describe_entities, and a safe read_records call.

Guardrails

• SQL MCP Server uses streamable HTTP at /mcp in the Aspire container pattern.
• Ensure target MCP resource is healthy before inspector startup.
• Keep Inspector local to Aspire dev; it is a browser UI plus proxy, not a production gateway.
• If tools are missing, check DAB version, runtime.mcp.enabled, entity mcp.dml-tools, and role permissions.

Related skills

• data-api-builder-mcp
• data-api-builder-mcp-mastery
• aspire-data-api-builder

Microsoft Learn

• https://learn.microsoft.com/azure/data-api-builder/mcp/quickstart-dotnet-aspire
• https://github.com/modelcontextprotocol/inspector