Blog post

Nutrient DWS MCP Server — Create and edit documents with natural language

Nick Winder Nick Winder
Illustration: Nutrient DWS MCP Server — Create and edit documents with natural language

After countless brainstorming sessions — sprinkled with midnight snacks and notebook scribbles — we’re thrilled to jump on board the MCP Server train with our own open source solution!

TL;DR

MCP + Nutrient DWS Processor API = document processing, editing, conversion, and signing capabilities using natural language — a powerful combination!

What is Nutrient DWS MCP Server?

Nutrient DWS MCP Server is an open source solution that allows you to process documents using natural language. By connecting Nutrient DWS MCP Server to your favorite MCP client (like Claude Desktop), you can:

  • Batch process documents using natural language. Just watch and wait… or make a coffee.

  • Avoid writing scripts or glue code to handle your document processing needs. Just ask in plain language.

  • Access document processing features that are often difficult to find or are buried inside expensive software.

Features overview

Feature Description
Document creation Merge PDFs, Office documents, and images
Editing Watermark, rotate, flatten, redact, and more
Format conversion PDF ⇄ DOCX, images, PDF/A support
Digital signing Add PAdES standards-compliant digital signatures using trusted certificates
Data extraction Extract text, tables, or structured content
Security Redaction presets, password protection, permission control
Advanced OCR Multi-language image and scan recognition
Optimization Compress files without quality loss

Getting started with Claude Desktop and Nutrient DWS MCP Server

  1. Get a Nutrient DWS API key: Sign up at nutrient.io/api.

  2. Download Claude Desktop: If you haven’t already, download Claude Desktop and sign in.

  3. Install Node.js: Install Node.js on the command line with a package manager like brew (brew install node).

  4. Configure Claude: Add your API key and set the directory you’d like to use as a sandbox in claude_desktop_config.json (~/Library/Application\ Support/Claude/claude_desktop_config.json on macOS).

{
	"mcpServers": {
		"nutrient-dws": {
			"command": "npx",
			"args": [
				"-y",
				"@nutrient-sdk/dws-mcp-server",
				"--sandbox",
				"/your/sandbox/directory"
			],
			"env": {
				"NUTRIENT_DWS_API_KEY": "YOUR_API_KEY_HERE"
			}
		}
	}
}
  1. Restart Claude Desktop.

  2. Add documents for processing: Use any file manager to copy the documents into the sandbox directory set in the claude_desktop_config.json file above.

  3. Process documents: Instruct Claude Sonnet 3.7 (e.g. “redact all PII from secret.pdf”, “sign the document contract.pdf”, “merge secret.pdf and contract.pdf together”).

All operations involve reading from and writing to files on disk. We strongly recommend using the sandboxed directory feature to enhance security and prevent data loss.

Nutrient DWS MCP Server has been tested with Claude Desktop. Other MCP clients may work, but results may vary. Additionally, it only works with macOS for now. Feel free to open an issue in the GitHub repository if you’re interested in Windows support.

Use cases

Are you still unsure what you’d use Nutrient DWS MCP Server for? Here are a few ideas.

Contract automation and signatures

  • Batch-sign or watermark contracts/NDAs with branding

  • Merge scanned documents, flatten layers for archiving

  • Auto-extract terms, amounts, or dates via OCR

Archival and compliance

  • Convert PDFs to PDF/A for legal storage

  • Redact PII with presets (emails, SSNs, credit cards)

  • Watermark and prep board decks for upload

Content extraction and management

  • Extract tables or text to CSV for analysis/import

  • OCR from camera scans (receipts, business cards, notes)

  • Automate optimization prior to archiving

To be honest, the possibilities are endless. The best way to see if it could work for you is to install Nutrient DWS MCP and ask Claude to do something with your documents.

FAQ

Why file-system-based? Direct binary transfers from the client aren’t yet supported in MCP (trust me I tried), so clients such as Claude cannot send a file directly to an MCP server like Nutrient’s. We felt the sandbox is the next best option, and it enables the batch processing use case, which is a bonus!

Why open source? Flexibility and community contributions! Adapt it to your workflows, send PRs, and propose new features.

Feedback and contributions

We welcome your feedback, stories, PRs, and bug reports. We’re sure there are many more use cases we haven’t thought of yet, so get your hands dirty with the code or submit an issue, and we’ll see where it takes us!

Author
Nick Winder
Nick Winder Core Engineer

When Nick started tinkering with guitar effects pedals, he didn’t realize it’d take him all the way to a career in software. He has worked on products that communicate with space, blast Metallica to packed stadiums, and enable millions to use documents through Nutrient, but in his personal life, he enjoys the simplicity of running in the mountains.

Explore related topics

Free trial Ready to get started?
Free trial