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Requirements

Before you begin, you must have the following:
  • A Cursor plan. To see if you have a plan, sign in to your Cursor Dashboard. Sign up for Cursor.
  • The Cursor CLI installed on your local development machine. To see if it is, from your terminal, run agent -v or agent --version. Install the Cursor CLI.
  • Node.js installed on your local development machine. To see if it is, in your terminal, run node -v or node --version. Install Node.js.

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Install the Transform MCP server

You should be able to instruct the Cursor CLI to install the Transform MCP server by asking the Cursor CLI the following:
Install the Unstructured Transform MCP server by using these instructions: 
https://docs.unstructured.io/transform/install/cursor-cli.mdx
If this does not work, to install the Transform MCP server manually, complete the following steps.If you are able to successfully connect, skip ahead to parse your source files.
  1. Open the Cursor CLI’s mcp.json settings file in a text editor. This file is typically located at:
    • For macOS and Linux: ~/.cursor/mcp.json
    • For Windows: %APPDATA%\Cursor\mcp.json
  2. Add the following entry to the mcpServers object: 
    {
  "mcpServers": {
    "transform": {
      "command": "npx",
      "args": ["-y", "mcp-remote", "https://mcp.transform.unstructured.io"]
    }
  }
}
  3. Save and close the mcp.json file.
  4. From your terminal, authenticate with the Transform MCP server: 
    npx -y mcp-remote https://mcp.transform.unstructured.io
    A web browser tab will appear, prompting you to authenticate with Transform. Follow the on-screen directions to finish authenticating.
  5. After you authenticate, back in your terminal, press Ctrl + C to exit and return to your terminal prompt.
  6. Start a Cursor CLI session by running the agent command.
  7. The Transform MCP server is ready for you to start using.

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Parse your source files

Parsing requests have the following limits:
  • Each file must be of a supported file type.
  • Each file must be 50 MB or less in size.
  • Each request must have 10 files or fewer.
  • Only 5 requests can be running at a time.
The Transform MCP server is designed to notify the Cursor CLI about these limits. Because of this, the Cursor CLI should notify you whenever it encounters a file that exceeds 50 MB in size. Also, the Cursor CLI should formulate strategies to send requests that are 10 files or fewer and not cause more than 5 requests to be running at a time.
  1. After you install the Transform MCP server and start a Cursor CLI session, from your terminal, switch to the folder on your local machine that stores the files you want Transform to parse.
  2. Enter the following prompt: 
    Use the Unstructured Transform MCP server to parse the files in this project.

Provide the results as JSON files, one JSON file per source file.
    As needed, adapt the phrase in this project in the preceding prompt to indicate a more specific project folder. Also, as needed, guide the Cursor CLI as to where to write Transform’s output into the project. Transform parses your input files and delivers its results to you as a set of output files, one output file per input file.

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Next steps

  • Control Transform file parsing output: Control how the Unstructured Transform MCP server instructs Transform to partition, enrich, chunk, and embed the data based on your files.
  • Control Transform generated sample code: Control how the Unstructured Transform MCP server generates sample curl or Python code that demonstrates how to use Transform to partition, enrich, chunk, and embed the data based on your files.

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Questions? Need help?