Actuent vs OSCAR
A side-by-side look at the Actuent and OSCAR MCP servers: transport, auth, tools, quality signals, and the config to install either one in Claude, Cursor, Windsurf or VS Code.
Verdict: choose Actuent for developer tools work over a hosted endpoint; choose OSCAR for developer tools as a local process. You can also run both side by side in one mcpServers block.
Which MCP server should you choose?
Choose Actuent when
- You need dedicated capabilities in the Developer Tools domain.
- You prefer a remote HTTP/SSE transport.
- Its auth model fits you: other.
- You want tools like
actuent_search, actuent_account, actuent_actions.
Choose OSCAR when
- You need dedicated capabilities in the Developer Tools domain.
- You prefer a local stdio subprocess transport.
- Its auth model fits you: No auth required.
- You want tools like
status, list_projects, read_project.
Feature & specification comparison
Rows where the two servers differ are marked.
| Spec | ||
|---|---|---|
| Category | Developer Tools | Developer Tools |
| Quality signal | 75/100 · Great | 68/100 · Great |
| Install command | Confirmed | Confirmed |
| Transport | Remote HTTP/SSE | Local subprocess (stdio) |
| Auth | other | No auth required |
| Pricing | Freemium | Free |
| Required env vars | None listed | None listed |
| Verified owner | Verified | Community listing |
| GitHub stars | — | 192 |
| Directory activity | 5 views 0 installs 1 upvotes | 0 views 0 installs 0 upvotes |
| Tools | 13 | 11 |
| Full listing | View Actuent | View OSCAR |
Tools & capabilities
Actuent tools 13
actuent_searchUse this for anything current or real-world the user asks about: places, opening hours, prices, products and shops, events, what a company or website offers, comparisons ('X vs Y'), or checking a fact on a site. Search Actuent for any topic, keyword, domain or page, in any language — plain questions work too ('where can I buy running shoes in London?'). Returns ranked LAWP (structured JSON for websites, in English), each with a snippet, a match score (0-100) and why it matched; for shopping searches, products with prices; for local searches, businesses in that city (or OpenStreetMap places); for event searches, upcoming events. May include did_you_mean, related searches, an answer (sentences from a site's own pages, for questions like 'does basecamp have a free plan'), a comparison (for 'notion vs obsidian'), for Pro a short summary answer with numbered sources (for question searches), and a message to pass on to the user. Prices in searches ('shoes under 500 dkk in copenhagen') find products from shops in that market. When you give the user a link to a site or product, use its visit_url. Also: • kind "similar" + domain: sites like a given one ("alternatives to mailchimp.com"). • kind "trending": the most searched sites and queries on Actuent right now. • kind "news" + query: the latest news articles on a topic, with sources, links and dates.actuent_accountThe user's own Actuent data. Pro. With kind "preferences", only when the user asks you to remember (or forget) something: their preferences (vegan, wheelchair, jazz…), home city or currency are then used on their later searches whenever you don't pass your own. • Get the search history for this API key — every query made through Actuent. Pro only. • The user's site accounts connected to Actuent (for actions like 'reorder my last order'). action: list (default), connect (returns a link for the user to sign in to the site once), or disconnect. Pro only.actuent_actionsWhat an AI agent can do on a site, and doing it. domain alone: list the site's actions. domain + action_id (+ input): perform one (book, contact, sign up…; confirm with the user first when it costs money or sends something). domain + status_url: check an action that returned pending (Pro). • Get all available actions for a specific site. Returns what an AI agent can actually do on that site. • g. book, contact, sign up). Sites that publish LAWP action endpoints are called directly and the site's response is returned; for other sites it returns where the user can complete it (executed: false). • Check a long-running action that returned pending, using its status_url. Pro only.actuent_aboutEverything Actuent knows about one named thing (a band or artist, company, brand, venue, landmark or place), joined up in one record: what it is, genres, country, official website, a short Wikipedia summary, its site in Actuent's index, its upcoming events (e.g. a band's concerts) and its products with prices (e.g. a shoe brand). For "tell me about Cat Power and when she's playing", "what is Hoka and what do their shoes cost". Add a word when a name is ambiguous ("Patagonia clothing").actuent_get_pageRead a web page or a whole site. Give url to read one page live; domain alone for a short summary of a site; domain (or url) plus question to answer a question from the site's own pages. • "). Returns the page as structured data: clean text, products with price and stock (on Shopify shops also each size or colour with a cart link that opens the cart with it), events, the business with opening hours and whether it's open now, recipe, FAQ, article details and the page's main links. txt. • Get a single plain English paragraph summarising any website. Faster than actuent_search when you just need the gist, not the full LAWP. • g. '). Returns the matching pages and sentences in the site's own words, plus related actions.actuent_compareCompare two or more sites side by side using their LAWP data, or two or more products (URLs from actuent_search products): price, stock, price history and cheaper shops.actuent_nearbyPlaces near the user or in a city, with opening hours and whether they're open right now: cafés, restaurants, bars, shops, pharmacies, gyms and more. For questions like "coffee near me", "is anything open now?", "where can I eat tonight in Brooklyn?", "bars open late", "dog-friendly café in Copenhagen" or a chain's branches ("what time does Trader Joe's close in Brooklyn?": query the chain's name, each branch has today's hours and closes_at). Also returns businesses from Actuent's index with details from their own websites (rating, services with prices, booking). Also: • kind "service": a specific service or menu item with its price at local businesses, from their own websites (max_price, currency).actuent_planPlan a timed itinerary of places to go: e.g. "plan my evening", "dinner then drinks in Nørrebro", "brunch and a museum on Sunday". Chooses restaurants, bars, cafés and sights that are open when you'd arrive and close to each other, with walking times. For finding or listing events ("what's on today", "find events") actuent_events is the tool. Also: • kind "trip" (or days): a 1–4 day city trip — where to stay and a timed plan for each day.actuent_cartPut products (URLs from actuent_search products) in a basket: returns one link per shop that opens the shop's checkout with the items in it, so the user just reviews and pays. Nothing is bought.actuent_eventsFind events and what's on: concerts, comedy, theatre, club nights, festivals, markets, exhibitions, classes, walks and other events today, tonight, this weekend or on any date, in a city. For questions like "find events in cph today", "what's on in cph today?", "anything fun tonight?", "concerts in New York this weekend", "things to do in London on Saturday" or "when is Ray LaMontagne playing?". Returns current listings from venues' own websites (listings change daily): name, time, venue, price, ticket link and, for concerts, the genre. Each event has tickets_url, add_to_calendar (a calendar file) and add_to_google_calendar links, and directions: to put an event in the user's calendar, give them the link to tap (you can't add it yourself), no need to search again. A genre in the query finds concerts of that kind ("jazz in copenhagen this weekend", "techno tonight"). Use when: "tonight" for what's on tonight.actuent_watchWatch something for the user and email them (optionally a webhook) when it changes. Pro. Set kind; action list shows what's watched, remove stops one. • Watch a product (from actuent_search products) and get an email, and optionally a webhook, when its price drops or when it's back in stock. Also lists or removes watches. Pro only. • Watch any web page and get an email (and optionally a webhook) when it changes, or when certain words appear or disappear: "tell me when tickets for Cat Power go on sale" (phrase 'tickets on sale', appears), "tell me when this is back in stock" ('sold out', disappears), "let me know when this page changes". Checked daily. Also list and remove watches. • g. 'vegan café copenhagen' or 'ai note taking app'. Checked daily.actuent_feedbackWhen the user says an Actuent answer was wrong, outdated or missing something ("that place closed", "those times are wrong", "it missed the obvious one"), report it here so it gets fixed: which tool, the question, what was wrong and what the right answer would be. Takes a second; tell the user it was passed on.- +1 more on the listing page
OSCAR tools 11
statusOSCAR's version, its ports (HTTP, the fixed OSC listening port, the socket bridge), whether editing is locked, the MIDI driver's condition, and how many projects and published interfaces there are. Start here.list_projectsEvery project OSCAR holds, with its id and its title, as File > Open project or template lists them. A project is what a person edits; it reaches phones only once it is published (list_published).read_projectEvery widget in one project, published or not, with its full settings as the editor holds them: addresses, ports, channels, MIDI mappings, DMX targets. Also says where the project is published, if it is. A setting nobody touched reads as its default. What phones see is the published copy, which may be older: read_published reads that one.list_publishedEvery published interface: its name, the project it was published from, the path it is served at, who can open it (access: "network", or "off" for one no device can open, whose schedules and bridges still run), and how many widgets it holds. Published interfaces are running -- phones and tablets may be on them, and the rig hears them.read_publishedEvery widget on one published interface, with its full settings as phones have them: addresses, ports, channels, MIDI mappings, DMX targets. For answering why something does or does not respond.installation_mapOne picture of the whole installation: this computer's network addresses and ports, its MIDI ports and USB interfaces (a USB DMX interface among them), and everything the published interfaces talk to and listen for -- each OSC destination with the addresses sent to it, each MIDI port with its channels and controllers, each DMX output with its universe and channels -- with the control and interface behind every one. notices lists what does not add up: a MIDI port or USB interface that is not there, OSC followed while OSCAR cannot listen, two controls on the same DMX channels. It is worked out from settings and sends nothing onto the network: it says where OSCAR sends, not whether anything is there to hear it.midi_portsThe MIDI inputs and outputs this machine has right now, and the driver's condition.recent_activityThe network log's recent rows: what OSCAR's server actually received and sent, oldest first, repeats within a moment gathered into one row with a count n. Each row has what (OSC address, MIDI control, DMX universe and channels) and value (what the latest carried). Incoming rows: device (the sender's address, or the MIDI port), surfaces (published interfaces that follow it), canvas (the editor's canvas followed it); with neither, nothing follows it. Outgoing rows: to (where it went), origin (whose move: canvas, local, internet, schedule, bridge), surface (the published interface) and widget. dropped, on either, says why it was refused. The first place to look when something moves that should not, or does not move when it should.describe_widgetsEvery widget OSCAR has -- tag, attributes, defaults, and each setting with its type, options and meaning -- plus how an interface is written as HTML. Read this before building one.validate_draftRun an interface written as HTML through the widgets' own validators: unknown settings, values their panels would refuse, missing or repeated ids. Returns the complaints to correct. Nothing is saved.create_draftValidate an interface and, if it is clean, save it as a draft: it appears in OSCAR under File > Open project or template, with a Draft badge. It is a file for a person to review: nothing is published, nothing is sent, and no project is changed. An existing draft of the same name is only replaced when overwrite is true.
Ready-to-paste client configs
Paste either block (or both) into your client config, e.g. claude_desktop_config.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json. We only show a config when the install command is confirmed.
Actuent
{
"mcpServers": {
"actuent": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"-y",
"actuent"
]
}
}
}
OSCAR
{
"mcpServers": {
"oscar": {
"command": "npx",
"args": [
"-y",
"createwithoscar"
]
}
}
}
Frequently asked questions
Actuent is categorized under Developer Tools and uses a remote HTTP/SSE transport. OSCAR belongs to Developer Tools and uses a local stdio subprocess. Pick Actuent for developer tools work and OSCAR for developer tools.
Copy the mcpServers block from the config section on this page into your client's config (for example claude_desktop_config.json or ~/.cursor/mcp.json), then fully restart the client.
Actuent is listed as freemium — a free tier with paid plans. Auth: other. OSCAR is listed as free. Auth: no auth required. If a server needs environment variables such as API keys, define them under the env key in your client's MCP config.
Yes. MCP clients support multiple servers: add actuent and oscar as separate keys in the same mcpServers object, and your assistant will call tools from either one.
On AllMCPs, Actuent has a quality signal of 75/100 (Great) with 5 views, 0 installs and 0 GitHub stars. OSCAR has 68/100 (Great) with 0 views, 0 installs and 192 GitHub stars.