The CData MCP Server for API defines each connection to API as a named configuration that Claude can use when sending natural language queries.

You create and manage these configurations using the MCP Configuration Tool. The tool automatically handles formatting, storage, and registration with Claude Desktop.

Understanding Connection Configurations

Each connection configuration is stored in a .mcp file. This file includes the details needed to initialize the connector when Claude starts a session.

• On Windows, configuration files are stored in "~/AppData/Roaming/CData/API Data Provider/".
• On macOS, configuration files are stored in "~/Library/Application Support/CData/API Data Provider/".

The .mcp file is a text file that contains a list of connection properties and a timestamp. For example:

#Tue May 20 15:48:40 EDT 2025
AuthScheme=Basic
User=myUser
Password=myPassword
Security Token=myToken

The configuration tool handles these settings automatically. Each saved configuration enables Claude to launch a dedicated MCP Server instance with the correct connector and options. Manual file editing is not required.

The CData MCP Server for API can be used to connect to a variety of data sources from within your application.

Connecting to Profiles

The server can be used to connect to a variety of data sources, called Profiles, from within your application. An API profile is a collection of schemas modeling data from an application or online service as tables, views or stored procedures. API Profile files have the file exension ".apip" and can be download from the CData website.

To establish a connection using a Profile, set the Profile property to the path of the API profile file, and ProfileSettings to a connection string containing the credentials to the data-source. The most common forms of authentication are supported, including HTTP basic, HTTP digest, NTLM, and OAuth. For more information on the required connection properties, please refer to the documentation of each profile.