dsh-alibaba-mcp

dsh-alibaba-mcp

Third-party plugin for DeepSeek Harness. Not an official DeepSeek or Alibaba Cloud product. MIT licensed.

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Connects the local Alibaba Cloud Ops MCP server and registers the tools that process publishes. They show up as mcp__alibaba__*.

What it does

The agent can call the Alibaba Cloud Ops server through uv. The plugin does not ship a copy of the server and does not depend on a directory on this machine: it runs the alibaba-cloud-ops-mcp-server distribution from PyPI and hands the connection to @deepseek-ai/dsh-mcp-client.

Access keys are read from the DSH credential store and passed only on the child environment. They are not stored in cordis.patch.yml. The MCP client scrubs ambient names that look like keys, so a value left only in the parent process environment would not reach the child.

If neither key is set, the plugin still starts the server. The server then uses its own credential chain. Saving a credential reconnects.

How it works

1. Resolve accessKeyIdEnv and accessKeySecretEnv (defaults ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_ID and ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_SECRET) through ctx.credentials. The store wins over the process environment. Optional securityTokenEnv and regionEnv use the same path.
2. Refuse to spawn when only one of the key pair is set, or when a security token is set without the pair. Also refuse when two cropping switches are set at once: codeDeploy, visibleTools, and a modules value other than all are mutually exclusive.
3. Spawn command with --transport stdio and the selected server flags. The child cwd is cwd when set, otherwise the directory that contains command, or the current directory when command is a bare name resolved on PATH.
4. Mount one @deepseek-ai/dsh-mcp-client child. Tool names, schemas, and results come from the server. This package does not reimplement them.
5. When credentials/reference-updated fires for one of the four credential names, dispose that child and connect again.

Each tool call times out after 10 minutes. A dropped connection uses the MCP client's own reconnect policy.

Install

dsh plugin --profile web add dsh-alibaba-mcp

The package declares dsh.bundle.patch, so dsh plugin add writes the bundle into the profile. Restart DeepSeek Harness if the tools do not appear in the current session.

Prerequisites

The server is a Python distribution, so it is started through uv. Install it once:

# Windows
winget install --id=astral-sh.uv -e
# macOS / Linux
curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

The plugin checks for uv before it connects and reports the missing prerequisite instead of failing with a bare spawn error. It never installs anything by itself.

The Python version is pinned to 3.12 (python setting). This is not cosmetic: uv otherwise picks the newest interpreter it finds, and on CPython 3.14 the pydantic-core build fails, because its PyO3 bindings support at most 3.13. If that build error appears, the machine's default interpreter is too new — uv downloads a managed 3.12 on first use.

Create an AccessKey in the Alibaba Cloud console, then set these credentials in this plugin's settings, or export the same names in the environment that launches DeepSeek Harness:

• ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_ID
• ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_SECRET

ALIBABA_CLOUD_SECURITY_TOKEN and ALIBABA_CLOUD_REGION_ID are optional.

Configuration

Field	Default	Meaning
accessKeyIdEnv	ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_ID	Credential reference for the AccessKey ID. The value is not kept in this config.
accessKeySecretEnv	ALIBABA_CLOUD_ACCESS_KEY_SECRET	Credential reference for the AccessKey secret.
securityTokenEnv	ALIBABA_CLOUD_SECURITY_TOKEN	Optional STS token reference. Ignored when empty. A token without the key pair does not connect.
regionEnv	ALIBABA_CLOUD_REGION_ID	Optional region reference. Ignored when empty.
command	uv	Stdio launcher. The default runs the server through uv; a bare name is looked up on PATH. An absolute path is used as-is and checked before spawn.
python	3.12	Interpreter passed to uv as --python. Pinned because uv would otherwise pick the newest interpreter available, and CPython 3.14 breaks the pydantic-core build.
cwd	directory of command	Working directory of the child. Set this to a project root when using code deploy. Empty for a bare-name command.
serverName	alibaba	Namespace for tool names: mcp__<serverName>__<tool>. Must match [A-Za-z0-9_-]{1,32} and be unique among MCP clients in the same scope.
services	empty	Comma-separated service list passed as --services. Empty keeps the server default. Note that this does not reduce the tool surface: the server only uses it to register the common-API tools, so it can even add tools.
modules	core,api,deploy	Comma-separated module switch. The default asks only for tools that need no network at startup (34 tools, about 3s). all restores the server's full 40-tool surface. Any value becomes a --visible-tools whitelist. Modules: core, api, deploy, oss, oos, cms, local, ecs, vpc, rds. Exclusive with visibleTools and codeDeploy.
cloudEnv	domestic	domestic or international. international is passed as --env international.
extraConfig	empty	Passed as --extra-config when set. Do not put secrets here.
visibleTools	empty	Comma-separated whitelist passed as --visible-tools.
codeDeploy	false	Pass --code-deploy. Cannot be combined with visibleTools.
toolCallTimeoutMs	600000	Per-call timeout in milliseconds.

Example profile override. A later patch replaces the whole config object, so repeat every field you still want:

- id: alibaba-mcp
  config:
    serverName: alibaba
    python: '3.12'
    cloudEnv: domestic

The Cordis row id is alibaba-mcp. The package name is dsh-alibaba-mcp.

From 0.3.0 the plugin ships a client-side settings panel: open "Plugins → Alibaba Cloud Ops" in DSH, tick the modules you want, and saving writes the profile patch and reconnects the MCP, so the YAML edit is no longer required. The panel only offers the modules in the table above; when codeDeploy or visibleTools already trims the tool surface, it asks you to clear them first.

Startup cost

The server builds its tool surface at startup. Left alone it publishes 40 tools, and 11 of them are "dynamic API" tools whose schemas it fetches over HTTPS from api.aliyun.com. That is the slow part. --services does not help here: it only registers the common-API tools, so it can even grow the surface.

Since 0.2.0 the plugin asks for the network-free subset by default (modules: core,api,deploy), which is 34 tools in about 3 seconds. modules turns the surface into a --visible-tools whitelist. Measured with server 0.9.27 on this machine (initialize plus tools/list over stdio, warm disk cache):

modules	Tools	Startup
all (0.1.0 default)	40	14.30s
core,api,deploy (default)	34	3.09s
core,api	33	2.86s
core	29	3.11s
deploy	7	2.89s
api	4	2.96s
ecs	8	10.27s

core is oss,oos,cms,local. api adds PromptUnderstanding, ListAPIs, GetAPIInfo, and CommonAPICaller; the last one reaches every Alibaba Cloud API without a startup schema fetch. ecs, vpc, and rds are the dynamic modules, and each tool they add costs roughly a second at startup, so leave them off unless the agent needs those concrete tools.

If you mostly run OOS, OSS, CMS, or deployment work, modules: core,api,deploy gives you the full static surface plus generic API access in about 3 seconds instead of 14.

The plugin logs the real handshake time on every connect, so you can check the effect in its log rather than trusting this table.

Security

• Resolved keys are sent only to the child process, as environment variables.
• This plugin's own log lines do not print the keys. Client errors are redacted when they contain a resolved secret.
• Cloud tool arguments are sent to Alibaba Cloud by the upstream server.
• The upstream server can also list local directories and run a local shell. This plugin does not add those tools; it does not remove them either. Use visibleTools to narrow the set.
• The plugin does not read the credentials file directly and does not open a port.

See SECURITY.md.

Compatibility

Item	Value
dsh	>=0.2.1-rc.2 <0.3.0-0 || >=0.2.2-0 <0.3.0-0
Node	>=22.19.0
Verified on	dsh 0.2.2-rc.1
Server	alibaba-cloud-ops-mcp-server 0.9.27 from PyPI, started through uv
Requires	credentials, tools, the shipped @deepseek-ai/dsh-mcp-client, and uv on PATH

Display metadata is locale/en.json, locale/zh.json, and icon.svg. There is no Web UI and no build step.

Uninstall

dsh plugin --profile <name> remove dsh-alibaba-mcp

Removing the plugin stops the child process and unregisters its tools. It does not delete the AccessKey credentials. The server itself stays in uv's cache; uv removes it on its own terms.

Troubleshooting

No mcp__alibaba__* tools. uv is not on PATH, only one of the key pair is set, or another MCP client already reserved serverName alibaba. The plugin log says which case it hit and does not print the key.

PATH 上找不到 uv. Install uv and reopen DeepSeek Harness, so the new PATH is picked up: winget install --id=astral-sh.uv -e on Windows, curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh elsewhere.

Failed to build pydantic-core. The machine's default Python is newer than 3.13, and pydantic-core has no wheel for it. The plugin pins --python 3.12 for this reason; if the build still fails, uv could not fetch a managed 3.12, so check the network or set python to an interpreter that already exists on the machine.

The first connection is slow. uv downloads the server and its 74 dependencies on first use. Later starts reuse the cache.

The server starts but cloud calls fail. The credential chain inside the child has no usable key. Save both AccessKey credentials and wait for the reconnect.

serverName is already in use. Pick another serverName in config. That also changes the public tool names.

A call times out. OOS and deploy calls can be slow. The limit is 10 minutes per call (toolCallTimeoutMs).

Development

node --test test/*.test.js
node --check src/index.js && node --check src/launch.js

src/modules.js   module catalog and the modules -> --visible-tools resolver (unit-tested)
src/launch.js    pure argv and env builder (unit-tested, no network, no secrets in argv)
src/index.js     Cordis plugin: resolve credentials and mount dsh-mcp-client
locale/          display metadata (en, zh)
test/            node:test suites