Self-hosted

Self-hosted setup

Run your own Maskin instance and connect Claude — Code or Desktop — to it over MCP, so you can drive a workspace from inside Claude.

! This guide is for the self-hosted version of Maskin — connecting Claude to a Maskin instance you run yourself. Want us to host it instead? Book a meeting.

Prerequisites

Claude Code or Claude Desktop installed.
An Anthropic API key — Maskin runs Claude Code in sandboxes and uses this key.
A running Maskin instance (set one up below).

Run your Maskin server

Maskin self-hosts from a single docker-compose file. Clone the repo and start the stack:

git clone https://github.com/sindre-ai/maskin.git && cd maskin
docker-compose up

This brings up the full stack — PostgreSQL, SeaweedFS, and the Maskin server — serving at http://localhost:3000. On first run it bootstraps a dev actor, a workspace, and an API key (printed in the startup banner). For a real deployment, put it behind your own domain (referred to below as https://<your-maskin-host>) and review the configuration reference.

Step 1 — Sign in and create a workspace

Open your instance at http://localhost:3000 (or https://<your-maskin-host>) and sign in.
Create your first workspace when prompted.

Once you're in, you'll see the unified pipeline view: Insights → Bets → Tasks.

Step 2 — Paste your Anthropic API key

Open Settings → Integrations (or Settings → LLM keys).
Paste your Anthropic API key and Save.

Only the last four characters are shown after saving.

Step 3 — Get your Maskin API key and workspace ID

Open Settings → API keys, click Create key, and copy the ank_… value.
Open Settings → Workspace and copy the Workspace ID (a UUID).

Step 4 — Connect Claude to your Maskin MCP

Claude Code

claude mcp add maskin \
  --transport http \
  --url https://<your-maskin-host>/mcp \
  --header "Authorization: Bearer <YOUR_MASKIN_API_KEY>" \
  --header "X-Workspace-Id: <YOUR_WORKSPACE_ID>"

Then reload plugins:

/reload-plugins

Claude Desktop

Open Settings → Developer → Edit config and add the maskin server:

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "maskin": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://<your-maskin-host>/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer <YOUR_MASKIN_API_KEY>",
        "X-Workspace-Id": "<YOUR_WORKSPACE_ID>"
      }
    }
  }
}

Save and restart Claude Desktop.

Step 5 — Make your first MCP call

Ask Claude:

Use the maskin MCP to call get_started.

The get_started tool previews and applies a workspace template — development, growth, or custom — seeding your workspace with object types, statuses, custom fields, and an initial set of objects. See the full tool set in the MCP tools reference.

What's next

Invite teammates from Settings → Members.
Wire up integrations (Slack, GitHub, Linear, Gmail, PostHog) — see Integrations setup.
Tune your deployment with the configuration reference.
Learn how agents run → Agents & sessions.

Questions or issues? Open an issue on GitHub, or read the README for the data model and agent-session details.