worldmonitor

World Monitor

Overview

World Monitor (koala73/worldmonitor, AGPL-3.0) is a situational-awareness dashboard: curated news feeds synthesized into briefs, a 3D globe and flat map with shared layers, a Country Instability Index, market, energy, maritime and aviation panels. The same data is available to programs through four surfaces that all speak to one backend:

Listing tools is public. One data tool, get_sources, works without credentials; every other data call needs an API key (wm_ plus 40 hex characters, from worldmonitor.app/pro) or an OAuth sign-in from an MCP client.

Instructions

CLI

npm install -g worldmonitor        # or run ad hoc: npx worldmonitor tools
worldmonitor tools                 # public: the live tool registry as JSON
worldmonitor list cyber            # public: REST operations of one service, from the OpenAPI spec

export WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY="wm_..."   # sent as the X-WorldMonitor-Key header
worldmonitor world                             # global situation brief
worldmonitor country IR                        # AI strategic brief, ISO 3166-1 alpha-2
worldmonitor risk DE                           # Country Instability Index and sanctions status
worldmonitor conflicts --country Sudan --limit 5
worldmonitor markets --asset_class crypto
worldmonitor news --topic cyber --alerts_only           # a bare --flag is sent as boolean true

Shortcuts exist for world, country, risk, markets, conflicts, cyber, news, disasters, sanctions, forecasts and maritime. Every other tool goes through call; any --key value that is not a CLI flag becomes a tool argument, and --args passes typed JSON:

worldmonitor call get_cyber_threats --min_severity high --limit 10
worldmonitor call get_market_data --args '{"symbols":["AAPL","MSFT"]}'
worldmonitor call describe_tool --tool_name get_country_risk     # full definition of one tool
worldmonitor get /api/cyber/v1/list-cyber-threats                # raw REST path

Flags: --api-key, --mcp-url, --base-url, --args, --timeout <ms> (default 30000), --raw, --compact. Exit codes: 0 success, 1 request or transport error (body on stderr), 2 usage error.

Shrinking responses

Every tool accepts a jmespath argument that projects the response on the server; the projected value comes back under structuredContent.projection. Cache-backed tools wrap their payload as { "cached_at", "stale", "data" } — stale: true means a contributing feed missed its freshness budget, so caveat the answer. List fields are capped at 30 items unless limit is set (0 removes the cap); summary: true returns counts and three samples.

worldmonitor risk DE --jmespath '{score: cii.combinedScore, trend: cii.trend, advisory: advisoryLevel, sanctioned: sanctionsActive}'

MCP server

# Claude Code — then run /mcp, pick worldmonitor, and sign in
claude mcp add --transport http worldmonitor https://worldmonitor.app/mcp

# With an API key instead of OAuth
claude mcp add --transport http worldmonitor https://worldmonitor.app/mcp \
  --header "X-WorldMonitor-Key: $WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY"

Claude Desktop and Cursor take {"mcpServers": {"worldmonitor": {"url": "https://worldmonitor.app/mcp"}}} in claude_desktop_config.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json and run the OAuth flow on first use. From a script, the server is plain JSON-RPC over HTTP:

curl -s https://worldmonitor.app/mcp \
  -H "X-WorldMonitor-Key: $WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY" \
  -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -H 'Accept: application/json, text/event-stream' \
  -d '{"jsonrpc":"2.0","id":1,"method":"tools/call","params":{"name":"get_country_risk","arguments":{"country_code":"DE"}}}'

The key goes in X-WorldMonitor-Key, never in Authorization: Bearer — that header is reserved for OAuth tokens and a key sent there returns 401 invalid_token.

Python SDK

# pip install worldmonitor-sdk   (the PyPI package named "worldmonitor" is an unrelated project)
from worldmonitor_sdk import Client, MCPError

client = Client()                       # reads WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY; or Client(api_key="wm_...")
tools = client.list_tools()["tools"]    # public
risk = client.country_risk("DE")
events = client.conflict_events(country="Sudan", limit=5)
quotes = client.call_tool("get_market_data", asset_class="crypto")

Helpers: world_brief, country_brief, country_risk, market_data, conflict_events, cyber_threats, news_intelligence, natural_disasters, sanctions_data, forecast_predictions, maritime_activity, plus call_tool, get("/api/...") and health(). A missing or invalid key raises MCPError with code -32001. The Ruby and Go clients mirror the same surface.

Running the dashboard yourself

git clone https://github.com/koala73/worldmonitor.git && cd worldmonitor
npm install
npm run dev            # http://localhost:3000 — set DEV_PORT in .env.local to change it
npm run dev:finance    # variants: dev:tech, dev:finance, dev:commodity, dev:happy, dev:energy

The dev server needs no environment variables; optional keys in .env.example unlock extra layers. For the full self-hosted stack (dashboard, relay, Redis), four secrets must exist before the containers start:

for name in RELAY_SHARED_SECRET REDIS_PASSWORD REDIS_TOKEN WM_SESSION_SECRET; do
  echo "$name=$(openssl rand -hex 32)" >> .env
done
docker compose up -d
./scripts/run-seeders.sh     # runs on the host, fills Redis from upstream sources

The dashboard is then at http://localhost:3000 (WM_PORT changes it). Data-source and LLM keys (GROQ_API_KEY, FINNHUB_API_KEY, NASA_FIRMS_API_KEY, or LLM_API_URL for an OpenAI-compatible endpoint such as Ollama) go in a gitignored docker-compose.override.yml. The self-hosted MCP endpoint is /api/mcp; it accepts keys listed in WORLDMONITOR_VALID_KEYS, and point the CLI at it with --mcp-url http://localhost:3000/api/mcp.

Examples

Example 1: Check that the API is reachable, then read a country's risk

User request: "Set up the World Monitor CLI and tell me how unstable Germany is right now."

Confirm connectivity with the one call that needs no key:

npx worldmonitor call get_sources --view summary \
  --jmespath 'summary.{providers:providerCount,outlets:outletCount,tiers:outletsByTier}' --compact

{"content":[{"type":"text","text":"{\"providers\":771,\"outlets\":519,\"tiers\":{\"1\":64,\"2\":240,\"3\":194,\"4\":21}}"}],"structuredContent":{"projection":{"providers":771,"outlets":519,"tiers":{"1":64,"2":240,"3":194,"4":21}}}}

Without a key, npx worldmonitor risk DE exits with status 1 and prints Authentication required. Use OAuth (/oauth/token) or pass your API key via X-WorldMonitor-Key header. Export WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY and run:

worldmonitor risk DE --jmespath '{score: cii.combinedScore, trend: cii.trend, advisory: advisoryLevel, sanctioned: sanctionsActive}'

The projection returns four fields: score is the Composite Instability Index on a 0–100 scale, trend its direction, advisory the travel advisory level and sanctioned a boolean. Report the score together with cii.computedAt when the user needs to know how fresh it is.

Example 2: Morning conflict digest for a watchlist, posted to Slack

User request: "Every morning, post the deadliest conflict events in Sudan, Myanmar and Ukraine to our #geo-risk channel."

# wm_digest.py — run from cron: 0 7 * * * /opt/geo/venv/bin/python /opt/geo/wm_digest.py
import json, os, urllib.request
from worldmonitor_sdk import Client, MCPError

WATCHLIST = ["Sudan", "Myanmar", "Ukraine"]
PROJECTION = ('{stale: stale, events: data."ucdp-events".events[]'
              '.{country: country, a: sideA, b: sideB, deaths: deathsBest}}')
client = Client()  # WORLDMONITOR_API_KEY

lines = []
for country in WATCHLIST:
    try:
        result = client.conflict_events(country=country, min_fatalities=5, limit=5, jmespath=PROJECTION)
    except MCPError as err:
        lines.append(f"{country}: lookup failed ({err.code})")
        continue
    view = result["structuredContent"]["projection"]
    flag = " (feed stale)" if view["stale"] else ""
    for e in view["events"] or []:
        lines.append(f"{e['country']}{flag}: {e['a']} vs {e['b']} — {e['deaths']} dead")

payload = json.dumps({"text": "\n".join(lines) or "No events above threshold."}).encode()
request = urllib.request.Request(os.environ["SLACK_WEBHOOK_URL"], data=payload,
                                 headers={"Content-Type": "application/json"})
urllib.request.urlopen(request, timeout=10)

Each run costs three tool calls. The Slack message has one line per event in the form Sudan: <side A> vs <side B> — <deaths> dead; a country with nothing above the threshold adds no lines.

Guidelines

• Budget the quota. Pro includes 50 MCP calls per UTC day; API Starter 1,000 requests per day at 60 per minute; API Business 10,000 per day at 300 per minute. On the API plans MCP and REST draw on the same allowance, and tools that fetch live data cost more than one unit (get_country_risk 2, get_country_brief 3); Pro counts one per call. Beyond the allowance the API answers 429 until 00:00 UTC. Cache results and use jmespath rather than re-calling.
• Anonymous limits. get_sources allows 10 calls per minute per IP without a key; discovery (tools/list) 60 per minute.
• Send a descriptive User-Agent to the REST API. Without a wm_ key, a request from curl, python-requests or a similar generic agent to an /api/* data path is rejected with 403 agent_request_blocked (/api/health and /api/version are exempt); the CLI and SDKs set their own agent string.
• Do not trust stale data silently. Check stale and cached_at; the public status is at https://api.worldmonitor.app/api/health?compact=1.
• Tool arguments change. The registry is live — read worldmonitor tools or describe_tool instead of assuming a parameter; for example get_cyber_threats takes min_severity as low, medium, high or critical, not a number.
• Keep keys server-side. Never ship a wm_ key in browser code, and never commit .env or docker-compose.override.yml.
• Self-hosting security. The stack refuses to start without the four secrets. Never set I_UNDERSTAND_THIS_DISABLES_AUTH=true on a host reachable from the internet, and keep the Redis REST proxy bound to 127.0.0.1.
• Licensing. The platform is AGPL-3.0: a modified instance offered over a network must publish its source. The CLI and SDKs are MIT. Hosted data has redistribution limits by plan — building a customer-facing product on it needs API Business.
• AI output is a starting point. Briefs and forecasts (get_country_brief, analyze_situation, generate_forecasts) are model-generated; cite the underlying sources the response lists before acting on them.
• When not to use it. For a private feed of your own RSS sources with custom classification, a small pipeline you own is simpler than self-hosting the full stack.