MCP Deep Dive

Why MCP Exists

Custom AI plugins fail at scale — MCP is the protocol that finally separates tool definition from model coupling.

Anatomy of an MCP Server

Peel back the MCP handshake, capabilities negotiation, transport lifecycle, and shutdown sequence to understand what you are actually deploying.

Tools, Resources, Prompts

MCP exposes three distinct primitives — knowing which one to reach for determines whether your integration is ergonomic or a liability.

Transport: stdio, SSE, HTTP

Picking the wrong MCP transport adds unnecessary latency, breaks streaming, or makes ops a nightmare — here is how to choose.

Auth and Identity

MCP servers that skip auth ship a capability any agent on the network can call — here is how token flow, scoping, and audit logging actually work.

Building Your First MCP for a SaaS

A concrete, end-to-end walkthrough of building a production-ready MCP server for a SaaS product — from capability design to deployed endpoint.

Wrapping a Legacy System

SOAP services, CLI tools, and COBOL batch jobs can all become first-class MCP capabilities — here is the adapter pattern that makes it work.

Testing and Contract Verification

Protocol-level tests, fixture replay, and schema contracts give you confidence that your MCP server behaves correctly before any agent ever calls it.

Observability and Tracing

Request IDs and distributed traces must cross the agent boundary — here is how to wire OpenTelemetry through your MCP server end to end.

Distribution: Registries and Discovery

Packaging, versioning, and helping other teams find your MCP server are the last mile that turns a working prototype into a shared platform capability.