Root Cause Pattern — MCP recommendations

Pattern: Root Cause
Component: mcps.md
Version: 1.1 | Updated: 2026-07-29

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Purpose

Least-privilege MCP servers for the Root Cause pattern. Keep mcpServers: {} until a human enables stubs after MCP when and how.

Recommended MCPs

MCP	Why for this pattern
GitHub	Timeline commits/PRs
Sentry	Error chronology
Datadog	Optional — metric inflection

When to enable for Root Cause

GitHub/Sentry/Datadog reconstruct the timeline after containment. RCA MCPs stay read-only; documentation is a human-owned artifact.

Enable rules (this pattern)

1. Root-cause MCP is chronology — not automatic ticket closure
2. Never commit tokens; map secrets outside git
3. Record allowlist + data class in MODEL_POLICY / SoA before write tools
4. Do not enable write tools that can alter historical incident records

Anti-patterns

• Closing the RCA because MCP “summarized” the outage
• Editing production monitors mid-RCA and losing the pre-fix signal
• Skipping follow-up owners because the fingerprint volume returned to baseline

Checklist

• Root Cause MCPs mapped to env secrets outside git
• Unused servers remain disabled after the root cause gate
• Injection / tool PEP reviewed if tools can act