ris-austria-mcp-server

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Overview

Austrian law from RIS, the government's official legal information system: federal, state, and municipal law, court decisions, official gazettes back to 1848, draft legislation, and ministerial decrees. Every document is labeled with its binding status. No API key required.

Tools

Tool	Description
ris_search_legislation	Search consolidated federal, state, and municipal law as in force on a date (default today), plus English translations of selected laws
ris_search_case_law	Search case law in one court or tribunal per call, across 17 court codes
ris_search_gazette	Browse the federal, state, district, and municipal gazettes, with federal history auto-routed back to 1848
ris_search_drafts	Search ministerial review drafts (Begutachtungsentwürfe) and government bills (Regierungsvorlagen)
ris_search_announcements	Search seven sectoral collections, from social-insurance notices to ministerial decrees and council-of-ministers minutes
ris_lookup_citation	Resolve one Austrian legal citation ("§ 6 DSG", "BGBl. I Nr. 165/1999", a Geschäftszahl or ECLI) to its document
ris_get_document	Fetch one document as markdown, HTML, or XML, or just its rendition URLs, with its binding status
ris_track_changes	List every document added, changed, or deleted in one application within a date window
ris_list_reference	Look up RIS vocabularies offline: applications, courts, states, ministries, gazette parts, citation formats, search syntax

Resources

Resource	Description
ris://document/{application}/{documentNumber}	Markdown text of one RIS document

The resource mirrors ris_get_document, so tool-only clients lose nothing.

Capability reference

ris_search_legislation _tool

• Search by query (full text) or title (title, short title, or abbreviation such as "DSG"). scope is federal (default) or a Bundesland, municipality switches a state scope to municipal law, and language: english searches the ~138 English translations
• in_force_as_of defaults to today in Austria and is echoed as appliedInForceAsOf; include_all_versions and the entered_force_* / left_force_* windows are mutually exclusive alternatives
• Records carry law_id (filter on it for every section of a law), section_label, abbreviation, keywords, in-force dates, eli, celex_references, and content_urls

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ris_search_case_law _tool

• court is required, one code per call. Filter by query, cited norm ("DSG §1"), case_number, decided_from/decided_to, and decision_type (headnote, full_text, or all, the default). Court-specific filters include court_name (justiz), state (lvwg/uvs), and collection_number (vfgh/vwgh/uvs); one sent to the wrong court fails as court_filter_mismatch
• Records carry case_numbers (a headnote lists every decision it covers), decision_date, ecli, norms_cited, and guiding_principle on headnotes
• court: normenliste returns indexed laws under norm_index instead of decisions

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ris_search_gazette _tool

• scope is federal (default), a Bundesland, district, or municipal. Filter by number, part, type, published_from/published_to, issuer, district_authority, or municipality; state scopes also take series and state_era
• Federal queries are served from one era (BgblAuth 2004+, BgblPdf 1945–2003, BgblAlt 1848–1940), echoed as servedApplication; a date range spanning two eras fails as cross_tier_range with the dates to split at
• Records carry binding (authentic, historical_record, consolidated_informational), authentic_pdf_url where one exists, alex_url (ÖNB scan) for 1848–1940, celex_references where applicable, and promulgation on federal entries from 1848–2003

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ris_search_drafts _tool

• stage is required: review_drafts (with in_review_on) or government_bills (2004+, with decided_from/decided_to); ministry accepts an abbreviation such as "BMF" or a full designation
• Records carry review_start and review_deadline or decided, abbreviation and keywords where RIS supplies them, plus materials[] (Erläuterungen, Textgegenüberstellung, Vorblatt/WFA, annexes) classified by type. Pass a materials[].url to ris_get_document to read one

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ris_search_announcements _tool

• collection is required: social_insurance, veterinary, court_rules, trade_exam_rules, health_structure_plans, ministerial_decrees, or council_minutes. A filter its collection doesn't accept fails as collection_filter_mismatch, including changed_since on social_insurance and veterinary. issuer expands ministry ("BMF") and social-insurance carrier ("ÖGK") abbreviations
• Records carry binding (authentic, administrative_directive, or preparatory), authentic_pdf_url, and document_url, the only browsable view of council minutes and decrees
• Each collection adds its own metadata where RIS supplies it, such as case_numbers, in_force_from/in_force_until, keywords, court_name, plan_state, and session_number

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ris_lookup_citation _tool

• One citation per call, classified as a norm ("§ 6 DSG"), gazette number ("BGBl. I Nr. 165/1999"), case number ("VfGH G 13/2025") or ECLI, or collection number ("VfSlg 19.632/2012"). kind forces a route, court and state narrow it, and in_force_as_of pins a norm's version (default today)
• Returns found, kind, and a record in the matching search tool's shape, with alternatives_count when several documents matched. A miss returns found: false with guidance instead of an error
• A norm resolves to the cited law ("§ 2 EStG" → EStG 1988 § 2, "AlVG 1977" → the AlVG, which RIS files without its year, "VwGVG 2014 §28" → VwGVG § 28, searched again without the year its title lacks), its sub-provisions and a trailing ";" set aside ("Art. 6 (1) B-VG" → B-VG Art 6), an ordinal-led abbreviation read like any other ("1. COVID-19-JuBG §1"), the version a law is cited in set aside ("ABGB idF BGBl I 2010/28 §988" → ABGB § 988 as in force on the requested date, never the amending act's gazette entry, the note saying the cited version was not applied), a long title read by its short form ("StaatsanwaltschaftsG - StAG §35" → StAG § 35), and a comma-joined entry ("DSG §1, §24") or one joining full norms with ". " ("ZPO §179. ZPO §275 Abs2") resolves its first provision and names the rest; an EU act RIS does not consolidate ("DSGVO Art32"), or one cited by its number ("RL 2006/123/EG", "VO (EG) 178/2002 Art3"), returns found: false with its EUR-Lex link, without a RIS request; "BGBl. Nr. 50/2025" without its part comes back ambiguous, naming parts I, II, and III

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ris_get_document _tool

• Address by document_number + application, or by a document_url from content_urls or a draft's materials[].url; format is markdown (default), html, xml, or urls_only
• Every result carries binding_status and authentic_pdf_url where one exists. Applications with no text rendition (district and municipal promulgations, court rules, council minutes, 1848–1940 gazettes) return a notice with the usable URL instead of failing
• Markdown over 40,000 bytes returns kind: outline; re-call with sections to fetch entries. html and xml over 40,000 bytes return kind: link with byte_size and content_urls, so read with markdown

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ris_track_changes _tool

• application (any of the 39 codes) plus changed_from/changed_to; include_deleted adds removals, which no other tool reports
• Records carry changed, published, and binding_status; deletions set deleted: true with deleted_at
• Law rows carry section_label, law_id, and in_force_from/in_force_until (no end date is not the same as in force now), and decision rows carry case_numbers and decision_date

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ris_list_reference _tool

• topic selects one of 17 static tables: applications, courts, states, decision types and kinds, issuing bodies, ministries, collections, stages, changed-since intervals, section types, gazette parts, law types, district authorities, justiz subject areas, search syntax, and citation formats
• Returns summary and entries (value, label, details) with no upstream call

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ris://document/{application}/{documentNumber} _resource

• text/markdown of one document, addressed by application + documentNumber from a search or lookup result; same content as ris_get_document with format: markdown
• Applications with no text rendition return a note pointing at the PDF or scan; oversized text returns the outline, so use the tool to fetch an entry

Features

Built on @cyanheads/mcp-ts-core: stdio and Streamable HTTP transports, pluggable auth (none / jwt / oauth), swappable storage (in-memory, filesystem, Supabase, Cloudflare KV/R2/D1), structured logging with optional OpenTelemetry tracing.

RIS-specific:

• All 39 OGD applications: consolidated law, federal, state, district, and municipal gazettes, 17 court and tribunal collections, the lawmaking pipeline, and sectoral announcements
• Citations resolve through exact filters (section plus title, gazette number, Geschäftszahl, Sammlungsnummer) rather than keyword search
• Dates are YYYY-MM-DD; search tools page with page and page_size (1–100, served as pages of 10 or 20; default 20); omit a text filter rather than sending it blank
• Court, application, state, and ministry codes come from ris_list_reference
• Tool descriptions are English; titles, field values, and RIS error messages stay German

Agent-friendly output:

• Every record carries a typed binding status (authentic, consolidated_informational, historical_record, decision, preparatory, administrative_directive, translation)
• Paged results report totalCount and truncated and echo what the server applied, such as appliedInForceAsOf and servedApplication
• Typed error reasons (court_filter_mismatch, cross_tier_range, invalid_query, document_not_found, …) and zero-hit notices name the next call

Getting started

Public Hosted Instance

A public instance is available at https://ris-austria.caseyjhand.com/mcp — no installation required. Point any MCP client at it via Streamable HTTP:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ris-austria-mcp-server": {
      "type": "streamable-http",
      "url": "https://ris-austria.caseyjhand.com/mcp"
    }
  }
}

Self-Hosted / Local

Add the server to your MCP client configuration with Bun:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ris-austria-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "bunx",
      "args": ["@cyanheads/ris-austria-mcp-server@latest"]
    }
  }
}

Or with npx (no Bun required):

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ris-austria-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "@cyanheads/ris-austria-mcp-server@latest"]
    }
  }
}

Or with Docker:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ris-austria-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "docker",
      "args": [
        "run", "-i", "--rm",
        "-e", "MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE=stdio",
        "ghcr.io/cyanheads/ris-austria-mcp-server:latest"
      ]
    }
  }
}

Add any configuration variables under an "env" key for bunx/npx, or as additional -e NAME=value arguments for Docker.

For Streamable HTTP, set the transport and start the server:

MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE=http MCP_HTTP_PORT=3010 bun run start:http
# Server listens at http://localhost:3010/mcp

Prerequisites

• Bun v1.4.0 or higher (or Node.js v24+).
• No API key: the RIS OGD API is keyless.

Installation

1. Clone the repository:

git clone https://github.com/cyanheads/ris-austria-mcp-server.git

2. Navigate into the directory:

cd ris-austria-mcp-server

3. Install dependencies and build:

bun install
bun run rebuild

4. Add to your MCP client configuration file:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "ris-austria-mcp-server": {
      "type": "stdio",
      "command": "node",
      "args": ["/absolute/path/to/ris-austria-mcp-server/dist/index.js"],
      "env": {
        "MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE": "stdio",
        "MCP_LOG_LEVEL": "info"
      }
    }
  }
}

Configuration

Variable	Description	Default
RIS_API_BASE_URL	RIS OGD REST API base URL.	https://data.bka.gv.at/ris/api/v2.6
RIS_CONTENT_BASE_URL	Document content host that rendition URLs are built on and documents are fetched from. https://www.ris.bka.gv.at answers automated clients with a bot-check page.	https://ogd.ris.bka.gv.at
RIS_CONTACT	Contact string appended to the User-Agent.	none
MCP_TRANSPORT_TYPE	Transport: stdio or http.	stdio
MCP_HTTP_PORT	HTTP server port.	3010
MCP_SESSION_MODE	HTTP session mode: stateless, stateful, or auto.	stateless
MCP_AUTH_MODE	Authentication: none, jwt, or oauth.	none
MCP_LOG_LEVEL	Log level (debug, info, warning, error, etc.).	info
OTEL_ENABLED	Enable OpenTelemetry.	false

See .env.example for the full list of optional overrides.

Running the server

Local development

• Build and run:

  # One-time build
  bun run rebuild
  
  # Run the built server
  bun run start:stdio
  # or
  bun run start:http
  

• Run checks and tests:

  bun run devcheck   # Lint, format, typecheck, security
  bun run test       # Vitest test suite
  bun run lint:mcp   # Validate MCP definitions against spec
  

Docker

docker build -t ris-austria-mcp-server .
docker run --rm -p 3010:3010 ris-austria-mcp-server

The Dockerfile defaults to HTTP transport, stateless session mode, and logs to /var/log/ris-austria-mcp-server. OpenTelemetry peer dependencies are installed by default; build with --build-arg OTEL_ENABLED=false to omit them.

Project structure

Directory	Purpose
src/index.ts	createApp() entry point — registers tools and resources.
src/config	Optional RIS endpoint and contact configuration, parsed with Zod.
src/mcp-server/tools	Tool definitions (*.tool.ts).
src/mcp-server/resources	Resource definitions (*.resource.ts).
src/services/ris	RIS request building, HTTP access, normalization, and static reference data.
docs/design.md	Design notes: tool surface, service spec, live-confirmed RIS API reference.
tests/	Unit and integration tests mirroring src/.
framework-skills/	Development skills synced from @cyanheads/mcp-ts-core.

Development guide

See CLAUDE.md / AGENTS.md for development guidelines and architectural rules. The short version:

• Handlers throw, framework catches — no try/catch in tool logic
• Use ctx.log for request-scoped logging, ctx.state for tenant-scoped storage
• Register new tools and resources via createApp() in src/index.ts
• Wrap the RIS API: validate raw → normalize to domain type → return output schema; never fabricate missing fields

Contributing

Issues are welcome. Run checks and tests before submitting:

bun run devcheck
bun run test

License

Apache-2.0 — see LICENSE for details.

RIS OGD data is CC BY 4.0 (attribution: RIS, Bundeskanzleramt Österreich). The underlying legal texts are copyright-free official works. Only the authentic, amtssignierte gazette wording is legally binding — consolidated RIS text is informational.