[Proposal] New Module: hawkbit-mcp-server (Model Context Protocol Integration)

[Romulohenriquesc]

Abstract: I propose adding a new module hawkbit-mcp-server to the project. This module implements the Model Context Protocol (MCP), allowing LLMs (like Claude, OpenAI, Gemini) and AI agents to natively interact with the Eclipse Hawkbit Management API.

Motivation: As AI agents become more prevalent in DevOps and IoT operations, there is a need for a standardized way to expose Hawkbit's capabilities to these models. The MCP standard provides this interface. This enables use cases such as:

• "Update all targets in the 'Warehouse' tag with the latest firmware."
• "Show me why the rollout Bug/target table perfomance #105 is stuck."
• "Create a new distribution set and assign it to compatible target types."
• Extract more strategic or specific information about the targets or about the rollouts/actions.

Proposed Architecture: The module is built using Spring AI (spring-ai-starter-mcp-server) and leverages the existing hawkbit-sdk-mgmt.

I'm implementing a Proof of Concept (POC) in a personal public repository, and the initial tests were very promising, but of course, it still needs refinement to increase efficiency by consuming fewer tokens, as well as standardization, documentation, and security.
https://github.com/Romulohenriquesc/hawkbit-mcp-server

If you prefer, I could create a preliminary demo PR, but my repository is public for anyone to test.

[avgustinmm]

Hi @Romulohenriquesc, @HawkbitCommunity,
in our commercial hawkBit based service Bosch IoT Rollouts we are already researching how to add / implement proper MCP server .
It , however, is an enterprise feature and I'm not sure (it's not decided yet) if it will be contributed to the Eclipse hawkBit open source project.
Of course, we are welcoming, community support for implementing MCP server in Eclipse hawkBit open source project and could support it (at least with reviews and maintenance).
Regarding the proposal:

• we also think that probably Spring AI is the best choice in the context of the hawkBit
• I think it should be a separate spring application communicating with the hawkBit management server (or monolith) via hawkBit Managemet API (e.g. via hakkbit-sdk-mgmt library) - as you are propsing
• this server should authenticate to the hawkBit management server via basic or oauth authentication (scoped to user and tenant) in order to has user scoped 'view' of the system.
  Regarding the use cases this server should support - I suppose this issue / proposal is a good place to collect ideas