1:1 Mentoring with Big Tech AI Engineers
RAG & MCP

4.1 — MCP Architecture & Components

Host-Client-Server: The Three-Role Pattern

Role What It Is Examples
Host The LLM application the user interacts with. Contains one or more MCP clients Claude Desktop, VS Code, Cursor, your custom app
Client A connector within the host that maintains a 1:1 stateful session with a single MCP server One client per connected MCP server. Handles capability negotiation
Server A service that exposes tools, resources, and prompts. Wraps databases, APIs, file systems Your CRM server, your Jira server, a DB query server

What MCP Handles vs. What You Handle

Continue Reading

This topic continues with more in-depth content, code examples, and diagrams. Sign up free to unlock the full guide with all 87 sections.

Sign Up Free to Unlock

Free access · No credit card required

More in RAG & MCP

RAG Architecture

Preview

Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) architecture explained: ingestion pipeline, vector search, prompt augmentation, and production patterns.

Document Processing

Preview

Document processing for RAG pipelines: PDF parsing, OCR, table extraction, and multi-modal document understanding.

Chunking Strategies

Preview

Text chunking strategies for RAG: fixed-size, semantic, recursive, and document-aware chunking with performance comparisons.

Embedding & Indexing

Preview

Embedding models and vector indexing for RAG: choosing embeddings, HNSW vs IVF, dimensionality, and index optimization.

Get full access to all 87 sections with code examples, diagrams, and interactive animations.

Sign Up Free