Connect external tools to Dori

Connect Firecrawl, custom HTTP servers, and local CLI tools to Dori with strict per-tool allowlists you control entirely.

For: technical users who want Dori to pull live web research or call external tools

If you want Dori to pull live web research or interface with external tools without manually copy-pasting data — this is for you.

Isolated AI assistants are limited by their static training data. When you need live web research, current market statistics, or custom internal data, you’re forced to switch windows, run searches manually, and copy-paste text back into the chat — a few minutes of tab-switching for every fact you need mid-conversation.

How external tools plug in

Dori connects to external Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers. You can add one-click presets like Firecrawl for web scraping, or point Dori at custom local CLI tools (stdio) and HTTP endpoints. Dori calls these external tools inside workflows while enforcing strict tool allowlists and risk controls.

What’s actually driving this, and what it costs

MCP transport, tool allowlist enforcement, and risk verification run locally on Dori’s background engine, at zero API cost. External MCP servers (such as Firecrawl) may have their own separate API key quotas or credit usage.

What you can do with external MCP servers

Live Web Research: Connect Firecrawl to search the web, scrape articles, and clean web pages into Markdown for instant research notes.
Custom Internal Tools: Connect an HTTP MCP endpoint from your company’s infrastructure to fetch internal metrics or database records.
Local CLI Packages: Run local stdio packages (e.g. via npx) to process files or format data.

See MCP servers for technical setup details.

Quick setup (one time, about two minutes)

Open MCP Settings

In Dori Desktop, navigate to Settings → Connections → MCP Servers.

Select a Preset or Add Server

Choose a preset (e.g. Firecrawl) and paste your API key, or select Custom HTTP / stdio for your own server.

Configure Tool Allowlist

Select exactly which tools Dori is allowed to call. Unchecked tools remain completely blocked.

Security & Permission Controls

Explicit Tool Allowlist: Connecting a server does not grant automatic permission to all its tools. You explicitly check which individual capabilities Dori can use.
Risk Overrides: High-risk tool executions require explicit human approval in your Inbox.
Audit Logging: Every external MCP tool call is recorded in the Audit Trail.

Go further

Want to use Dori from Claude Code or Cursor? See Use Dori elsewhere.
Inspect tool execution logs? See See exactly what Dori did and why.
Save research into project memory? See Turn web research into actionable knowledge.