Understanding Real-Time Monitoring

The Hacker News MCP Server gives you direct access to live data from Hacker News, making it ideal for tracking trending topics as they emerge. Real-time monitoring helps you stay ahead of tech discussions, identify breaking news, and catch important conversations before they become widespread.

Setting Up Your Monitoring Workflow

Start by connecting to the Hacker News server through your AI assistant. Once connected, you can request current story feeds without any additional configuration. The server automatically retrieves the latest data each time you make a request.

Accessing Live Story Feeds

To monitor trending topics, focus on three key feeds:

Top Stories — These represent what the community has voted to the front page. Request top stories to see what's currently capturing attention across the tech world.

New Stories — Fresh submissions appear here first. Monitoring new stories lets you spot emerging trends before they gain widespread traction.

Best Stories — These have demonstrated sustained value over time. They're useful for identifying discussions with lasting relevance.

Simply ask your AI assistant to "show me the top stories on Hacker News" or "what are the newest submissions" to access these feeds.

Creating Monitoring Queries

Structure your requests based on what you want to track. For general monitoring, periodically check top stories. For specific interests, combine story retrieval with keyword filtering by asking questions like "find top stories about AI" or "show recent discussions about database technology."

Diving Deeper into Discussions

When a story catches your attention, retrieve its comment thread to understand community sentiment. Comments often reveal technical insights, concerns, or enthusiasm that aren't apparent from the story title alone. Request comments by asking to "show comments on this story" or "what are people saying about this topic."

Effective Monitoring Strategies

Check feeds at regular intervals that match your needs. For breaking news monitoring, check every 15-30 minutes. For general awareness, once or twice daily suffices.

Track specific users who frequently contribute valuable insights in your domain by requesting their profiles and recent activity. This creates a curated signal among the noise.

Pay attention to stories with high engagement (many comments and upvotes) as these indicate topics generating significant community interest.

Making It Actionable

Real-time monitoring only provides value when you act on the information. Use the server to quickly gather data, then analyze patterns, engage with discussions, or incorporate findings into your decision-making processes.