Configuration

How to configure Toolbox’s tools.yaml file.

The primary way to configure Toolbox is through the tools.yaml file. If you have multiple files, you can tell toolbox which to load with the --config tools.yaml flag.

Using Environment Variables

To avoid hardcoding certain secret fields like passwords, usernames, API keys etc., you could use environment variables instead with the format ${ENV_NAME}.

  user: ${USER_NAME}
  password: ${PASSWORD}

A default value can be specified like ${ENV_NAME:default}.

  port: ${DB_PORT:3306}

Sources

The source kind of your tools.yaml defines what data source your Toolbox should have access to. Most tools will have at least one source to execute against.

kind: source
name: my-pg-source
type: postgres
host: 127.0.0.1
port: 5432
database: toolbox_db
user: ${USER_NAME}
password: ${PASSWORD}

For more details on configuring different types of sources, see the Sources.

Tools

The tool kind of your tools.yaml defines the actions your agent can take: what type of tool it is, which source(s) it affects, what parameters it uses, etc.

kind: tool
name: search-hotels-by-name
type: postgres-sql
source: my-pg-source
description: Search for hotels based on name.
parameters:
  - name: name
    type: string
    description: The name of the hotel.
statement: SELECT * FROM hotels WHERE name ILIKE '%' || $1 || '%';

For more details on configuring different types of tools, see the Tools.

Toolsets

The toolset kind of your tools.yaml allows you to define groups of tools that you want to be able to load together. This can be useful for defining different sets for different agents or different applications.

kind: toolset
name: my_first_toolset
tools:
  - my_first_tool
  - my_second_tool
---
kind: toolset
name: my_second_toolset
tools:
  - my_second_tool
  - my_third_tool

Prompts

The prompt kind of your tools.yaml defines the templates containing structured messages and instructions for interacting with language models.

kind: prompt
name: code_review
description: "Asks the LLM to analyze code quality and suggest improvements."
messages:
  - content: "Please review the following code for quality, correctness, and potential improvements: \n\n{{.code}}"
arguments:
  - name: "code"
    description: "The code to review"

For more details on configuring different types of prompts, see the Prompts.


Explore Configuration Modules


Authentication

AuthServices represent services that handle authentication and authorization.

Prebuilt Configs

This page lists all the prebuilt configs available.

Sources

Sources represent your different data sources that a tool can interact with.

Toolbox with MCP Authorization

How to set up and configure Toolbox with MCP Authorization.

Tools

Tools define actions an agent can take – such as reading and writing to a source.

Toolsets

Toolsets allow you to define logical groups of tools to load together for specific agents or applications.

EmbeddingModels

EmbeddingModels represent services that transform text into vector embeddings for semantic search.

Prompts

Prompts allow servers to provide structured messages and instructions for interacting with language models.

Toolbox UI

How to effectively use Toolbox UI.

Agent Skills

How to generate agent skills from a toolset.

Pre- and Post- Processing

Intercept and modify interactions between the agent and its tools either before or after a tool is executed.




Last modified March 26, 2026: chore(main): release 0.31.0 (#2814) (c6b811c)