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The hosted Nodal MCP endpoint serves your context repo — the Markdown + YAML your analyst curates — to your team’s agents. The Nodal admin also lets your analyst edit that context and open pull requests without leaving Nodal, so the app both reads and writes your analytics-context repo. The footprint is GitHub-only, scoped to the repos you pick, and revocable at any time — and Nodal still never touches your database.
Nodal never needs access to your database. Warehouse SQL still runs through your own read-only connector. See exactly what we access →
You can connect two ways. The onboarding flow defaults to the Nodal GitHub App.

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Install the Nodal GitHub App

From the Nodal admin:
  1. Open Settings → Connect repository and select GitHub.
  2. Click Install GitHub App. You’ll be redirected to GitHub’s installation screen.
  3. Choose the organization (or personal account) that owns your context repo.
  4. Under Repository access, select Only select repositories and pick your analytics-context repo. (Optional: also select your dbt project repo to enable the lineage connector.)
  5. Review the permissions and click Install. GitHub returns you to the Nodal admin with the connection confirmed.
You must have organization ownership or admin permissions on the repo to install the app. If you don’t, GitHub sends an install request to an org owner, who approves it once — after that the repo appears in Nodal.
Scope the app to only the repositories Nodal needs. You can add or remove repos later without reinstalling — see Manage repository access.

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Permissions

The Nodal GitHub App requests the minimum scopes for each repo. Your analytics-context repo gets read + write so Nodal can both serve your context and let your analyst edit it from the admin. Your dbt repo, if you connect it, stays strictly read-only. Analytics-context repo dbt repo (optional, lineage only) Write access is scoped to exactly one repo — your analytics-context repo — and it flows through pull requests, so every change is versioned in git and reviewable before merge (require review with branch protection if you want a second pair of eyes). Nodal cannot edit your dbt repo, cannot trigger deployments or workflows, and never touches your database.

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Manage repository access

The app installation is managed entirely from your GitHub org, so you stay in control:
  • Add or remove repos: in GitHub, go to Settings → GitHub Apps → Nodal → Configure and edit the selected repositories. Changes take effect immediately.
  • Review activity: GitHub logs every action the app takes under the app’s installation.
  • Revoke access: from the same Configure screen, click Uninstall. Nodal loses all access the moment you do — no token to hunt down or expire.

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Prefer a token instead?

If your org would rather manage the credential directly, you can skip the app and paste a fine-grained personal access token (PAT) instead:
  1. In GitHub, create a fine-grained personal access token scoped to your analytics-context repo with Contents: Read and write and Pull requests: Read and write — this enables editing and PRs from the Nodal admin. (Serving only, no editing from Nodal? Contents: Read-only is enough — you just won’t be able to edit context from the admin.)
  2. (Optional) Add your dbt repo to the same token with Contents: Read-only for lineage. Never grant write on the dbt repo — Nodal doesn’t use it.
  3. In the Nodal admin, choose Use a token instead and paste it.
The access footprint is identical to the app — GitHub-only, and write scoped to the context repo. The only difference is that you hold and rotate the token, whereas the GitHub App has no token to rotate. Most teams prefer the app.

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Troubleshooting

Confirm the repo is in the app’s selected repositories (GitHub → Settings → GitHub Apps → Nodal → Configure). If you installed on a personal account but the repo lives in an org — or vice versa — reinstall against the account that owns the repo.
You don’t have owner/admin rights on that GitHub org. An org owner needs to approve the pending install request once; then the repo appears in the Nodal admin.
The endpoint reads your repo; make sure your latest changes are pushed to the connected branch. If access looks broken, uninstall and reinstall the app from GitHub’s Configure screen to refresh the connection.

What Nodal can access

The full access footprint — and what Nodal can never touch.

Share with your team

The .mcp.json file to hand out once you’re connected.