gridbase

gridbase

gridbase is a workbench for Airtable. It walks a base the way a person would: first the list of bases a token can reach, then the tables inside one base and the fields and views each table declares, then the records themselves — listed, filtered by formula, searched by text, or fetched one at a time. The same surface writes back: records can be created, updated, and deleted, tables and fields can be created and renamed, and comments can be attached to records and read again. One binary serves a command-line interface and a stdio MCP server.

An Airtable personal access token is required. Put it in the AIRTABLE_API_KEY environment variable; it is sent to the API as an Authorization: Bearer header and never appears in output. When the variable is missing, every call fails with an error that names it, before any request is made. The token needs the schema.bases:read and data.records:read scopes at minimum, plus the matching write scopes for the write tools.

Install

npx @reneturcios/gridbase bases

Or run the container image:

docker run -i -e AIRTABLE_API_KEY ghcr.io/cloudcorprecords/gridbase

The container defaults to the MCP server (see below). Pass CLI arguments to use it as a CLI instead.

CLI

export AIRTABLE_API_KEY="pat..."

gridbase bases
gridbase tables appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX --detail full
gridbase describe appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
gridbase records appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX --max 25 --filter "{Status}='Open'"
gridbase search appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX "quarterly report"
gridbase get appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX recXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
gridbase create appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX '{"Name":"New task","Status":"Open"}'
gridbase update appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX '[{"id":"recXXXXXXXXXXXXXX","fields":{"Status":"Done"}}]'
gridbase delete appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX recXXXXXXXXXXXXXX
gridbase create-table appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX Reports '[{"name":"Title","type":"singleLineText"}]'
gridbase comment appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX recXXXXXXXXXXXXXX "Looks good"
gridbase comments appXXXXXXXXXXXXXX tblXXXXXXXXXXXXXX recXXXXXXXXXXXXXX --page-size 10

gridbase --version

Each command prints the upstream JSON payload. Exit codes: 0 on success, 1 when a call fails (including a missing AIRTABLE_API_KEY or an API error), 2 for usage errors.

MCP server

One bin serves both faces. The mcp subcommand starts a stdio MCP server:

npx -y @reneturcios/gridbase mcp

MCP client configuration:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "gridbase": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@reneturcios/gridbase", "mcp"],
      "env": { "AIRTABLE_API_KEY": "pat..." }
    }
  }
}

Tools

Tool	Input	What it returns
list_bases	(none)	Every accessible base with its ID, name, and permission level.
list_tables	baseId (required), detailLevel (optional)	Tables in the base, trimmed to the requested detail level.
describe_table	baseId, tableId (required), detailLevel (optional)	One table's fields and views.
list_records	baseId, tableId (required), maxRecords, filterByFormula (optional)	Records from the table.
search_records	baseId, tableId, searchTerm (required), fieldIds, maxRecords (optional)	Records whose field values contain the term.
get_record	baseId, tableId, recordId (required)	The single record.
create_record	baseId, tableId, fields (required)	The created record.
update_records	baseId, tableId, records (required)	The updated records.
delete_records	baseId, tableId, recordIds (required)	Deletion receipts for each record.
create_table	baseId, name, fields (required), description (optional)	The created table.
update_table	baseId, tableId (required), name, description (optional)	The updated table.
create_field	baseId, tableId, name, type (required), description, options (optional)	The created field.
update_field	baseId, tableId, fieldId (required), name, description (optional)	The updated field.
create_comment	baseId, tableId, recordId, text (required), parentCommentId (optional)	The created comment.
list_comments	baseId, tableId, recordId (required), pageSize, offset (optional)	The record's comments, newest first.

Airtable offers no text-search endpoint, so search_records lists the table (bounded by maxRecords) and keeps the records whose field values contain the term, restricted to fieldIds when supplied. Schema reads trim the meta payload themselves: tableIdentifiersOnly keeps table IDs and names, identifiersOnly also reduces fields and views to IDs and names, and full (the default) returns everything.

Development

npm install
npm run build   # tsc -> dist/
npm test        # node test runner over test/*.test.ts, no network (fake fetch fixtures)
npm run dev     # run the CLI from source via tsx

License

MIT — see LICENSE.