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App Overview

This document gives an overview of the app. It includes the important facts and the points to consider before you apply the app to your Nautobot environment.

Note

This documentation uses the terms "app" and "plugin" with the same meaning.

Description

AI Models makes Nautobot the source of truth for your AI estate. It holds two registries.

The app is a catalog. It does no inference and it calls no tool. Another app, a Job, or an external system reads these records and does the work.

There are four models, in two pairs:

  • AI Provider — one remote LLM endpoint. It points at a Nautobot External Integration, which holds the URL, the headers, the TLS settings, the timeout, and the Secrets Group. The app keeps no credential of its own.
  • AI Model — one model that a provider offers, with an enabled flag, a kind, and optional inference defaults.
  • MCP Server — one MCP server. It points at its own External Integration and holds what the server reported about itself on the last discovery run.
  • MCP Tool — one tool that a server advertises. It holds both advertised JSON Schemas, a fingerprint of its contract, and the two flags that a person owns: enabled and writable.

Audience (User Personas) - Who must use this App?

  • Network automation engineers who want one record, controlled by permissions, of what an automation platform can use: the LLM endpoints, the models, the MCP servers, and the MCP tools.
  • Platform administrators who must add, change, or retire an LLM endpoint without an edit to code or to an environment variable.
  • App developers who want to read a provider, a model, or a tool from the ORM in place of a hardcoded endpoint.
  • Reviewers who must see the claim of an MCP server about a tool beside the decision that a person made about it.

Authors and Maintainers

Nautobot Features Used

  • External Integrations — each provider refers to one. It gives the remote URL, the HTTP headers, the SSL verification, the CA file path, the timeout, and the extra configuration.
  • Secrets and Secrets Groups — the API key stays in a Nautobot Secret. The app reads it at the point of use.
  • Jobs — the app installs two Jobs: Discover AI Models and MCP Server Discovery.
  • Change logging, custom fields, relationships, notes, and saved views — the models come from OrganizationalModel and PrimaryModel.
  • Navigation — the app adds a shared top-level AI Tools tab. Another AI app adds its own groups to the same tab. See Extending the App.

Extras

  • Custom Fields — the app creates none. Each model accepts custom fields.
  • Jobs — Discover AI Models in the "AI Models" group, and MCP Server Discovery in the "MCP Models" group.
  • Tags — only MCP Server has them. The other three are catalog records with no tags and no dynamic groups.