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mediumAI Engineering

What is the Model Context Protocol (MCP) and what problem does it solve?

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01

Understand the problem

A USB port for AI tools: one open protocol connecting any model client to any tool server.

mcpprotocoltoolsintegration
02

Attempt it yourself

Sketch your approach before reading the solution — that's what interviews test.

Nudge consolestandby

Stuck? Beam a request up — the console returns a conceptual nudge that guides your logic without spoiling the implementation.

03

Study the solution

MCP is an open protocol that standardizes how AI applications connect to external tools and data. An MCP server exposes tools, resources and prompts over a standard transport (stdio or HTTP); any MCP client (Claude Desktop/Code, IDEs, custom agents) can discover and call them. It solves the N-by-M integration problem —

Solution ready — 2 min read

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04

Read the code

Minimal MCP server (TypeScript SDK)
import { McpServer } from "@modelcontextprotocol/sdk/server/mcp.js";
import { StdioServerTransport } from "@modelcontextprotocol/sdk/server/stdio.js";
import { z } from "zod";

const server = new McpServer({ name: "orders", version: "1.0.0" });

server.tool(
  "search_orders",
  "Search orders by customer and status.",
  { customerId: z.string(), status: z.enum(["open", "shipped", "returned"]) },
  async ({ customerId, status }) => ({
    content: [{ type: "text", text: JSON.stringify(await findOrders(customerId, status)) }],
  }),
);

await server.connect(new StdioServerTransport());
// any MCP client (Claude Code, IDE, custom host) can now discover + call it
05

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