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🎓 MCP Stateful HTTP Server (Singleton Pattern) - Educational Reference

A Production-Ready Model Context Protocol Server Teaching Singleton Architecture and In-Memory State Best Practices

MCP Version TypeScript SDK Architecture

Learn by building a world-class MCP server with a focus on efficiency, clean architecture, and production-grade resilience.

🎯 Project Goal & Core Concepts

This repository is a deeply educational reference implementation that demonstrates how to build a production-quality MCP server using the Stateful Singleton Server pattern. It is the perfect starting point for creating stateful services that are efficient, robust, and easy to understand.

Through a fully-functional calculator server, this project will teach you:

  1. 🏗️ Architecture & Design: Master the Singleton Server Pattern, where a single, shared McpServer instance manages all business logic and state, while lightweight, per-session transports handle client connections.
  2. ⚙️ Protocol & Transport Mastery: Correctly implement the modern StreamableHTTPServerTransport, using a single /sse endpoint to handle the entire connection lifecycle (initialization, commands, and streaming).
  3. 🛡️ Production-Grade Resilience: Implement non-negotiable production features like graceful shutdowns to prevent data loss, robust CORS policies, and a /health check endpoint for monitoring.
  4. ⚡ State & Resource Management: Learn to manage session state efficiently using a simple in-memory map (sessionId -> transport), which is a clean and performant approach for single-node deployments.
  5. 🚨 Protocol-Compliant Error Handling: Understand the critical difference between generic errors and protocol-aware errors by using McpError with specific ErrorCodes to communicate failures clearly and effectively to clients.

🤔 When to Use This Architecture

The Singleton Server pattern is a powerful and efficient model. It is the ideal choice for:

  • Single-Instance Deployments: Perfect for applications running on a single server or virtual machine where all user sessions are handled by one process.
  • Rapid Prototyping: The simplest way to get a stateful MCP server running without the complexity of an external database or cache.
  • Services with Volatile State: Suitable for applications where session data does not need to persist if the server restarts.
  • Foundation for Scalability: This architecture can be extended with an external state store (like Redis) to support horizontal scaling, as demonstrated in the "Stateful HTTP" reference implementation.

🚀 Quick Start

Prerequisites

  • Node.js ≥ 20.0.0
  • npm or yarn
  • A basic understanding of TypeScript, Express.js, and JSON-RPC.

Installation & Running

# Clone the repository
git clone https://github.com/yigitkonur/example-mcp-server-sse
cd example-mcp-server-sse

# Install dependencies
npm install

# Start the server (defaults to port 1923)
npm start

Essential Commands

npm run dev        # Development mode with hot-reload (uses tsx)
npm run build      # TypeScript compilation to dist/
npm run start      # Run the production-ready server
npm run typecheck  # TypeScript validation
npm run lint       # ESLint validation
npm run inspector  # Launch the MCP Inspector for interactive testing

📐 Architecture Overview

Key Principles

This server is built on a set of core principles that define its efficiency and maintainability.

  1. Singleton Server Core: One McpServer instance containing all tools, resources, and business logic is created at startup. This is memory-efficient and provides a single, authoritative source for application state.
  2. Per-Session Transports: Each connecting client is assigned its own lightweight StreamableHTTPServerTransport. These transports are stored in a simple in-memory map, keyed by the session ID.
  3. Unified Endpoint: All MCP communication occurs over a single HTTP endpoint (/sse). The SDK's transport layer intelligently routes POST, GET, and DELETE requests internally.
  4. Decoupled Logic: The business logic (defined in the createCalculatorServer factory function) is functionally decoupled from the web server transport layer (the Express app), even though they reside in the same server.ts file for project simplicity. This separation makes the code easier to reason about and test.

Architectural Diagram

┌─────────────────────────────────────┐
│      Express HTTP Server            │  ← API Layer (Single /sse Endpoint)
├─────────────────────────────────────┤
│   Middleware (CORS, JSON Parsing)   │  ← Web Server Configuration
├─────────────────────────────────────┤
│   In-Memory Transport Store         │  ← Simple Session State
│    (Session ID → Transport Map)     │
├─────────────────────────────────────┤
│    Singleton MCP Server Core        │  ← SHARED Business Logic
│  • Tools • Resources • Prompts      │
├─────────────────────────────────────┤
│  StreamableHTTP Transport Layer     │  ← MCP Protocol Engine
└─────────────────────────────────────┘

🔧 Core Implementation Patterns

This section highlights the most critical, non-negotiable best practices demonstrated in this server.

Pattern 1: The Singleton Server Instance

The Principle: To ensure shared state (like calculationHistory) and efficient memory usage, a single, global McpServer instance is created when the application starts. This instance is then shared across all user connections.

The Implementation:

// src/server.ts

// The factory function defines all server capabilities.
function createCalculatorServer(): McpServer { /* ... all tools ... */ }

// ✅ BEST PRACTICE: Create ONE shared McpServer instance at startup.
const sharedMcpServer: McpServer = createCalculatorServer();
console.log('[Server] Shared Calculator MCP Server instance created.');

// This 'sharedMcpServer' will be connected to every new client transport.```

### Pattern 2: Per-Session Transport Management

**The Principle:** The main `/sse` route handler acts as a dispatcher. It checks for a session ID in the request header. If valid, it retrieves the existing transport. If not, it creates a new transport for the new session, connects it to the singleton server, and stores it for future requests. This logic is the heart of stateful session management.

**The Implementation:**
```typescript
// src/server.ts
const transports: { [sessionId: string]: StreamableHTTPServerTransport } = {};

app.all('/sse', async (req, res) => {
  const sessionId = req.headers['mcp-session-id'] as string | undefined;

  if (sessionId && transports[sessionId]) {
    // Existing Session: Reuse the transport from our in-memory map.
    // ...
  } else if (isInitializeRequest(req.body)) {
    // New Session: Create a new transport for the client.
    // ...
    // Store the new transport for future requests.
    transports[newSessionId] = transport;
  } else {
    // Invalid Request: Respond with an HTTP 400/404 error.
    // ...
  }

  // Delegate to the correct transport to handle the request.
  await transport.handleRequest(req, res, req.body);
});

Pattern 3: Protocol-Compliant Error Handling

The Principle: A robust server must clearly distinguish between a server failure and invalid user input. Throwing a generic Error is an anti-pattern because it results in a vague "Internal Server Error" for the client. The best practice is to throw a specific McpError with a standard ErrorCode.

The Implementation:

// src/server.ts - inside the 'calculate' tool

// ❌ ANTI-PATTERN: This hides the true cause of the error from the client.
// throw new Error('Division by zero is not allowed');

// ✅ BEST PRACTICE: Use McpError with a specific ErrorCode.
// This tells the client that the user's parameters were invalid, allowing
// the client application to display a helpful error message to the user.
if (op === 'divide' && b === 0) {
  throw new McpError(
    ErrorCode.InvalidParams, // The user's input was invalid.
    'Division by zero is not allowed.',
  );
}

Additional Hardening:

// Type-safe catch blocks treat errors as 'unknown' for maximum safety
...
} catch (error: unknown) {
    const errorMessage = error instanceof Error ? error.message : String(error);
    // Handle safely without assuming error type
}

Pattern 4: Production-Ready Graceful Shutdown

The Principle: A production server must never be killed abruptly. A graceful shutdown handler ensures that all active connections are properly closed, pending operations are finished, and resources are released before the process exits.

The Implementation:

// src/server.ts
const httpServer = app.listen(PORT /* ... */);

const shutdown = () => {
  // 1. Close all active client transports to notify clients.
  for (const sessionId in transports) {
    transports[sessionId]?.close();
  }

  // 2. Stop the HTTP server from accepting new connections.
  httpServer.close(() => {
    console.log('[Server] HTTP server closed.');
    process.exit(0);
  });

  // 3. Force exit after a timeout to prevent hanging.
  setTimeout(() => {
    process.exit(1);
  }, 5000);
};

process.on('SIGINT', shutdown); // Ctrl+C
process.on('SIGTERM', shutdown); // `docker stop`

🧪 Testing & Validation

Health & Metrics

A /health endpoint is included for monitoring and diagnostics.

# Check the server's health and active session count
curl http://localhost:1923/health

Expected Response:

{
  "status": "healthy",
  "activeSessions": 0,
  "transport": "streamableHttp",
  "uptime": 15.3,
  "memory": {
    /* ... memory usage details ... */
  }
}

Manual Request (curl)

Test the full connection lifecycle using curl.

# Terminal 1: Initialize a session and capture the Mcp-Session-Id header.
SESSION_ID=$(curl -si -X POST http://localhost:1923/sse \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"initialize","params":{}}' \
  | grep -i 'Mcp-Session-Id' | awk '{print $2}' | tr -d '\r')

echo "Acquired Session ID: $SESSION_ID"

# Terminal 2: Use the session ID to call a tool.
curl -X POST http://localhost:1923/sse \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Mcp-Session-Id: $SESSION_ID" \
  -d '{"jsonrpc": "2.0","id": 2,"method": "tools/call","params": {"name": "calculate","arguments": {"op": "divide", "a": 10, "b": 0}}}'

Expected Error Response (from the b: 0 invalid param):

{
  "jsonrpc": "2.0",
  "id": 2,
  "error": { "code": -32602, "message": "Division by zero is not allowed." }
}

Interactive Testing with MCP Inspector

Use the official inspector CLI to interactively explore and test all of the server's capabilities.

# This command connects the inspector to your running server.
npm run inspector

🏭 Deployment & Configuration

Configuration

The server is configured using environment variables:

Variable Description Default
PORT The port for the HTTP server to listen on. 1923
CORS_ORIGIN Allowed origin for CORS requests. Should be set to a specific domain in production. *
SAMPLE_TOOL_NAME (Educational) Demonstrates dynamic tool registration via environment variables. When set, adds a simple echo tool with the specified name that takes a value parameter and returns test string print: {value}. This pattern shows how MCP servers can be configured at runtime. None

Deployment

This server is designed for a single-node deployment.

  • State Management: Because session state is stored in the server's memory, all requests for a given session must be routed to the same server process.
  • Scaling: This architecture does not scale horizontally out-of-the-box. To run multiple instances, you would need a load balancer configured with "sticky sessions" (session affinity). For true horizontal scaling, see the "Stateful HTTP" reference implementation which uses Redis.
  • Deployment: It can be run as a standalone Node.js process or containerized using a Dockerfile.

🛡️ Error Handling Philosophy

This server demonstrates a robust error handling strategy that is critical for production MCP servers:

User Errors vs. Server Errors

A critical distinction is made between invalid user input and true server failures:

  • ErrorCode.InvalidParams: Thrown when the user provides bad data (e.g., dividing by zero). This tells the client "you made a mistake."
  • ErrorCode.InternalError: Thrown for unexpected server-side issues. This tells the client "we made a mistake."

Implementation Benefits

  • No Leaked Details: Errors are wrapped in McpError to prevent internal details like stack traces from being sent to the client.
  • Clear Client Communication: Clients receive specific error codes that enable them to provide helpful feedback to users.
  • Transport-Level Errors: The /sse endpoint returns specific HTTP 400/404 errors for session-related issues, separating them from tool execution failures.

Example in Action

When a user attempts division by zero, the server responds with:

{ "jsonrpc": "2.0", "error": { "code": -32602, "message": "Division by zero is not allowed." } }

This tells the client exactly what went wrong and allows for graceful error handling in the user interface.

Key Architectural Takeaways

  • The Singleton Pattern is Efficient: For single-node deployments, using one server instance with many lightweight transports is highly memory-efficient.
  • Decouple Logic from Transport: Keeping business logic (createCalculatorServer) separate from the web framework (Express) makes the code cleaner, more testable, and easier to maintain.
  • Errors are Part of the Protocol: Handling errors correctly with McpError is not just a detail—it is a core feature of a robust and reliable server that enables clients to build better user experiences.
  • Plan for Production: Features like graceful shutdowns and health checks are not afterthoughts; they are fundamental requirements for any service that needs to be reliable.

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Simple, educational SSE-based MCP server example demonstrating best practices for various protocols.

Topics

mcp sse server-sent-events model-context-protocol mcp-server mcp-sse

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