platform_get_catalog

Discover what data this platform serves: every category and dataset, with coverage, cadence, licensing posture, freshness, and the MCP tools that serve each dataset.

When to use: call this first when unsure which category or tool answers a question, to inspect the human-readable universe and time-span description, or to check licensing posture. Sibling contrast: for data currency alone prefer platform_get_freshness; the catalog adds categories, coverage, posture, and tool routing on top of the same freshness snapshot.

Catalog scope: it lists datasets and the tools that serve them. Identity/search helpers are described in the server instructions, not catalogued as datasets. The platform tools themselves are first-class registry rows under the launch-bar-exempt platform category: platform_catalog (served by this tool) and platform_freshness (served by platform_get_freshness), so the catalog describes its own metadata surfaces.

What comes back: data.categories — the full fixed category list (key, display_name, status live|soon, description, exempt), always complete on every page; data.datasets — paginated dataset rows, each with dataset, display_name, category, source_tag, source_name, license, posture ("public"|"internal"), redistributable, coverage, cadence, freshness (status, stale, status_reason, last_refresh, latest_as_of), and tools (MCP tool name + one-line summary). meta.source is platform_catalog; meta.as_of is the freshness-check instant.

Bounds + paging: default limit 50, max 100; all current datasets fit one default page; page by passing pagination.next_cursor as cursor until has_more is false. Errors: bad_parameter (malformed limit/cursor), unavailable (database unreachable).

Example: platform_get_catalog(limit=50).