Usage Examples

This document provides practical examples of how to use the database tools provided by the MCP Database Server with Claude Desktop.

Example Prompts for Claude

Here are examples of tasks you can ask Claude to perform using the MCP Database Server tools.

Basic Database Operations

Listing Tables

What tables are in the database?

Describing a Table

Show me the structure of the Products table.

Reading Data

Show me all records from the Customers table.

Find all products with a price greater than 50.

Writing Data

Insert a new product with the name "New Widget", price 29.99, and category "Accessories".

Update the price of all products in the "Electronics" category to increase by 10%.

Delete all orders that are more than 5 years old.

Schema Management

Creating a Table

Create a new table called "Feedback" with columns for ID (auto-increment primary key), 
CustomerID (integer), Rating (integer 1-5), and Comment (text).

Altering a Table

Add a "DateCreated" datetime column to the Products table.

Rename the "Phone" column in the Customers table to "ContactNumber".

Dropping a Table

Delete the temporary_logs table if it exists.

Advanced Queries

Complex Joins

Show me a list of customers along with their total order amounts,
sorted from highest to lowest total amount.

Exporting Data

Export all customer data as CSV.

Export the sales summary by month as JSON.

SQL Syntax Examples

SQLite Examples

-- Creating a table in SQLite
CREATE TABLE Products (
  id INTEGER PRIMARY KEY AUTOINCREMENT,
  name TEXT NOT NULL,
  price REAL,
  category TEXT
);

-- Querying with LIMIT and OFFSET
SELECT * FROM Products LIMIT 10 OFFSET 20;

-- Date formatting
SELECT date('now') as today;
SELECT strftime('%Y-%m-%d', date_column) as formatted_date FROM Orders;

-- String concatenation
SELECT first_name || ' ' || last_name as full_name FROM Customers;

SQL Server Examples

-- Creating a table in SQL Server
CREATE TABLE Products (
  id INT IDENTITY(1,1) PRIMARY KEY,
  name NVARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
  price DECIMAL(10,2),
  category NVARCHAR(50)
);

-- Querying with OFFSET-FETCH (SQL Server equivalent of LIMIT)
SELECT * FROM Products ORDER BY id OFFSET 20 ROWS FETCH NEXT 10 ROWS ONLY;

-- Date formatting
SELECT FORMAT(GETDATE(), 'yyyy-MM-dd') as today;
SELECT CONVERT(VARCHAR(10), date_column, 120) as formatted_date FROM Orders;

-- String concatenation
SELECT first_name + ' ' + last_name as full_name FROM Customers;

PostgreSQL Examples

-- Creating a table in PostgreSQL
CREATE TABLE Products (
  id SERIAL PRIMARY KEY,
  name VARCHAR(100) NOT NULL,
  price DECIMAL(10,2),
  category VARCHAR(50)
);

-- Querying with LIMIT and OFFSET
SELECT * FROM Products LIMIT 10 OFFSET 20;

-- Date formatting
SELECT TO_CHAR(CURRENT_DATE, 'YYYY-MM-DD') as today;
SELECT TO_CHAR(date_column, 'YYYY-MM-DD') as formatted_date FROM Orders;

-- String concatenation
SELECT first_name || ' ' || last_name as full_name FROM Customers;

Working with Claude

Tips for Using the MCP Database Server

1. Be specific about database type: If you have multiple database configurations, tell Claude which one you want to use.

2. Security awareness: Avoid exposing sensitive database credentials in your conversations.

3. SQL syntax differences: Remember that SQL syntax might differ between database types.

4. Error handling: If Claude encounters an error, it will tell you what went wrong so you can correct your query.

5. Complex operations: For complex operations, consider breaking them down into smaller steps.

Example Claude Conversations

Exploring a Database

User: "I need to explore my database. What tables do I have?"

Claude: Uses list_tables to show available tables

User: "Tell me about the Customers table structure."

Claude: Uses describe_table to show the schema of the Customers table

User: "Show me the first 5 records from the Customers table."

Claude: Uses read_query to execute a SELECT query

Data Analysis

User: "Find customers who haven't placed an order in the last 6 months."

Claude: Uses read_query with a more complex query involving dates and joins

User: "Create a summary of sales by product category."

Claude: Uses read_query with GROUP BY to aggregate sales data

Database Modifications

User: "I need to add an 'active' column to the Users table with a default value of true."

Claude: Uses alter_table to modify the schema

User: "Update all products in the 'Discontinued' category to set their 'active' status to false."

Claude: Uses write_query to perform an UPDATE operation