rosetta

MCP server that gives AI assistants searchable access to the complete MikroTik RouterOS documentation — 317 pages, 4,860 properties, 40,000-entry command tree, hardware specs for 144 products, 518 YouTube video transcripts, and direct links to help.mikrotik.com.

If you need MikroTik docs, you likely have a MikroTik. Install rosetta once as a container on your router using RouterOS /app, and any AI assistant on the network can use it. Or run it locally on your workstation. No AI required — rosetta includes a terminal browser for searching the database directly.

SQL-as-RAG

Instead of vector embeddings, rosetta uses SQLite FTS5 full-text search as the retrieval layer — SQL-as-RAG. For structured technical docs, BM25 ranking with porter stemming beats vector similarity: terms like dhcp-snooping and /ip/firewall/filter are exact tokens, not fuzzy embeddings. No API keys, no vector database — just a single SQLite file that searches in milliseconds.

What's Inside

Documentation covers RouterOS v7 only, aligned with the long-term release (~7.22) at export time.

Install on MikroTik (/app)

RouterOS 7.22+ includes the /app feature for running containers directly on the router. This is the simplest way to deploy rosetta — install once, and any AI assistant on your network can connect to the MCP endpoint URL shown in the router UI.

Requirements: RouterOS 7.22+, x86 or ARM64 architecture (CCR, RB5009, hAP ax series, CHR, etc.), container package installed, device-mode enabled.

1. Enable containers (two reboots required)

If you haven't already enabled the container package and device-mode:

# Install the container package (router reboots automatically)
/system/package/update/check-for-updates duration=10s
/system/package/enable container
# Apply changes restarts the router

After reboot:

# Enable container device-mode (requires physical power cycle or button press — follow the on-screen prompt)
/system/device-mode/update mode=advanced container=yes

See MikroTik's Container documentation for full prerequisites and troubleshooting.

2. Add the rosetta app

/app/add use-https=yes disabled=no yaml="name: rosetta
descr: \"RouterOS Docs for AI assistants - use URL as MCP server\"
page: https://tikoci.github.io/p/rosetta
category: development
icon: https://tikoci.github.io/p/rosetta.svg
default-credentials: \"none - just use 'ui-url' as the MCP server in your AI assistant\"
url-path: /mcp
auto-update: true
services:
  rosetta:
    image: ghcr.io/tikoci/rosetta:latest
    container_name: mcp-server
    ports:
      - 9803:8080/tcp:web
"

That's it. RouterOS downloads the container image, configures networking and firewall redirects, and starts the MCP server. The auto-update: true setting pulls the latest image on each boot.

3. Get the MCP endpoint URL

The URL to use with your AI assistant is shown as UI URL in WebFig (App → rosetta), or from the CLI:

:put [/app/get rosetta ui-url]

This URL includes the /mcp path and is ready to paste into any MCP client that supports HTTP transport. With use-https=yes, the URL uses HTTPS with a MikroTik-managed *.routingthecloud.net certificate.

4. Configure your AI assistant

Point any HTTP-capable MCP client at the URL from the previous step:

{ "url": "https://app-rosetta.XXX.routingthecloud.net/mcp" }

CHR note: Cloud Hosted Router in free or trial mode does not include the /ip/cloud service needed for HTTPS certificates. Set use-https=no on the /app — the URL will use HTTP instead. The UI URL always reflects the correct protocol.

HTTP option: On any platform, you may choose use-https=no if you prefer HTTP or are on an isolated network.

Browse the database from the router: If rosetta is running as a /app, you can use /container/shell to access the TUI browser directly:

/container/shell app-rosetta
# /app/rosetta browse

Install Locally (with Bun)

Run rosetta on your workstation using Bun. The MCP server runs over stdio — no network configuration needed. The database downloads automatically on first launch (~50 MB compressed).

Quick setup

bunx @tikoci/rosetta --setup

This downloads the database and prints config snippets for all supported MCP clients. Copy-paste the config for your client and you're done.

Need to force a database reload later? Use:

bunx @tikoci/rosetta --refresh

Configure your MCP client

Open the Command Palette (Cmd+Shift+P / Ctrl+Shift+P), choose "MCP: Add Server…", select "Command (stdio)", enter bunx as the command, and @tikoci/rosetta as the argument.

Or add to User Settings JSON (Cmd+Shift+P → "Preferences: Open User Settings (JSON)"):

"mcp": {
  "servers": {
    "rosetta": {
      "command": "bunx",
      "args": ["@tikoci/rosetta"]
    }
  }
}

claude mcp add rosetta -- bunx @tikoci/rosetta

Edit your Claude Desktop config file:

• macOS: ~/Library/Application Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json
• Windows: %APPDATA%\Claude\claude_desktop_config.json

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "rosetta": {
      "command": "bunx",
      "args": ["@tikoci/rosetta"]
    }
  }
}

PATH note: Claude Desktop on macOS doesn't always inherit your shell PATH. If bunx isn't found, use the full path (typically ~/.bun/bin/bunx). Run bunx @tikoci/rosetta --setup to print the full-path config.

Restart Claude Desktop after editing.

Open Settings → MCP and add a new server:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "rosetta": {
      "command": "bunx",
      "args": ["@tikoci/rosetta"]
    }
  }
}

codex mcp add rosetta -- bunx @tikoci/rosetta

Note: ChatGPT Apps require a remote HTTPS MCP endpoint. Use the MikroTik /app install or another container platform for a hosted endpoint, or Codex CLI for local stdio.

Inside a copilot session, type /mcp add:

• Server Name: routeros-rosetta
• Server Type: 2 (STDIO)
• Command: bunx @tikoci/rosetta

Install Bun (if you don't have it):

# macOS / Linux
curl -fsSL https://bun.sh/install | bash

# Windows
powershell -c "irm bun.sh/install.ps1 | iex"

Auto-update: bunx checks the npm registry each session and uses the latest published version automatically. The database in ~/.rosetta/ros-help.db persists across updates.

Browse Without AI

Rosetta includes a terminal-based "card catalog" browser — no AI assistant or MCP client required. It searches the same database the MCP tools use, with a keyboard-driven REPL modeled after a 1980s library terminal.

bunx @tikoci/rosetta browse

Type a search query to find documentation pages, then select a numbered result to drill in. Beyond page search, the browser covers every data source in the database:

Type help for the full command list. URLs are clickable in terminals that support OSC 8 hyperlinks (iTerm2, Windows Terminal, GNOME Terminal, etc.).

The browser is also useful as a test harness — it interacts with the data the same way an AI agent would through MCP, so gaps or rough edges visible here often point to MCP tool improvements too.

From a router: If rosetta is installed as a /app, access the browser via /container/shell app-rosetta then /app/rosetta browse.

Try It

Ask your AI assistant questions like:

• "What are the DHCP server properties in RouterOS?"
• "How do I set up a bridge VLAN?"
• "Is the /container command available in RouterOS 7.12?"
• "Show me warnings about hardware offloading"
• "Which MikroTik routers have L3HW offload, and more than 8 ports of 48V PoE? Include cost."
• "Compare the RB5009 and CCR2004 IPSec throughput at 1518-byte packets."
• "My BGP routes stopped working after upgrading from 7.15 to 7.22 — what changed in the routing commands?"

MCP Tools

The server exposes 13 tools designed to work together — agents start with routeros_search and drill into specific data as needed:

Each tool description includes workflow arrows (→ next_tool) and empty-result hints so agents chain tools effectively.

The server also exposes MCP Resources for bulk data and supplemental content — CSV datasets (rosetta://datasets/...), schema documentation (rosetta://schema...), and agent skill guides (rosetta://skills/{name}) from tikoci/routeros-skills. Skills are community-created, human-reviewed guides served with provenance attribution. See MANUAL.md for details.

RTFM for Details

For additional install options, HTTP transport configuration, data source details, and the database schema, see MANUAL.md.

Contributing

See CONTRIBUTING.md for building from source, running tests, development setup, and the release process.

License

MIT