Docker parameters

This page is an outline. What is here is accurate, but it is not yet the whole story — each section ends with a note on what is still to be written. For anything it does not answer, DEPLOYMENT.md and USING-MCP.md in the repository are the complete references.

Two kinds of setting, and why it matters

This trips people up, so it is worth stating plainly.

Generation-time flags live in the config and decide what code is emitted. Changing one means regenerating. Examples: MCP_SERVER, MCP_HTTP_TOKEN, MCP_HTTPS, PROMETHEUS_SERVER, DAO_POOL, TARGET_JVM.

Runtime environment variables are read when the server starts and change how it behaves.

Setting a runtime variable does nothing if the server was generated without the matching flag — the code to read it was never written. That is the single commonest “I changed it and nothing happened”.

The console

Variable	Meaning
`MCPDBWIZARD_ORACLE_HOST` / `_PORT` / `_SID`	Where. A leading `/` on the SID selects the service-name form.
`MCPDBWIZARD_ORACLE_USER`	The account to connect as. Recorded upper-cased, because that is how Oracle stores owners.
`MCPDBWIZARD_ORACLE_OTHER_USER`	Optional second schema to list as well as your own. Empty for none.
`MCPDBWIZARD_ORACLE_USER_OBJECTS`	`false` lists only the other schema. Ignored unless a second schema is named.
`DB_PASS` / `DB_PASS_FILE`	The password, and the only Oracle secret. Set exactly one.
`MCPDBWIZARD_CONFIG_DIR`	Where configs, accounts and workspaces live. `/data` in the container.
`MCPDBWIZARD_RUNTIME_METRICS_PORT_RANGE`	Scrape ports for the generated servers, one each. Empty means no metrics port.
`ADMIN_USERNAME`	The console’s first admin account. Defaults to `admin`. This account cannot be deleted or demoted.
`ADMIN_INITIAL_PASSWORD`	Optional. Sets the first admin’s initial password instead of one being generated. You are still made to change it at first sign-in. Only read when the account is first created; setting it later does nothing.

There is no default password. If you do not set ADMIN_INITIAL_PASSWORD, the container generates one on first start and writes it to initial-admin-password in the config directory. The sign-in page names the path, and the file is deleted as soon as you choose your own password.

docker exec mcpdbwizard cat /data/initial-admin-password

Generated servers

Variable	Meaning
`MCP_HTTP_TOKEN`	The bearer secret. The config flag of the same name emits the check.
`MCP_METRICS_PORT` / `MCP_METRICS_HOST`	Prometheus listener. Unset means no listener. From 2.0.10 the console sets the bind address for servers it launches; set `MCP_METRICS_HOST` to override.
`MCP_RATE_LIMIT` / `MCP_RATE_BURST`	Calls per second, and the burst allowance. Off by default.
`MCP_MAX_REQUEST_BYTES`	Refuse an over-large request with 413. Off by default.
`DAO_QUERY_TIMEOUT_SECONDS`	Cap on any one statement. The control that actually protects the database.
`DAO_POOL_*`	Pool sizing — see Connection pooling.
`MCP_AUDIT_*`	The audit trail — see Setting up auditing.
`MCPDBWIZARD_LOG_BACKEND`	Overrides the generated `DAO_LOG_TYPE` at startup.

A mistyped value stops start-up rather than leaving a server silently unlimited, unaudited or unmetered. That is deliberate in every case where believing a control was on would be worse than a failure to boot.

To write. The full table with defaults and units; which are read by the console versus a generated server versus both; a worked example per deployment shape.