What is MCP?
MCP (Model Context Protocol) is an open standard that lets AI assistants connect to external tools and data sources. The simplest way to think about it: MCPs are APIs for AI agents.
Just like REST APIs let applications talk to services, MCP lets AI assistants talk to tools — databases, monitoring systems, file systems, documentation, anything. Same concept, different consumer.
The Problem MCP Solves
Without MCP, every AI integration is custom-built. Want Claude to query Prometheus? Build a connector. Access Grafana dashboards? Another connector. Search documentation? Another one. Each integration is bespoke, fragile, and duplicated across every AI tool.
MCP flips this: build once, use everywhere. A Prometheus MCP server works with Claude Code, ChatGPT, VS Code Copilot, and any other MCP-compatible client. The server exposes capabilities; the client consumes them.
How It Works
MCP uses a client-server architecture:
graph LR
subgraph "AI Application"
Client[MCP Client]
end
subgraph "MCP Servers"
S1[Prometheus]
S2[Grafana]
S3[Filesystem]
end
Client -->|MCP Protocol| S1
Client -->|MCP Protocol| S2
Client -->|MCP Protocol| S3
Servers expose three types of capabilities:
| Type | What it does | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Tools | Functions the AI can execute | Run a PromQL query |
| Resources | Data the AI can read | Fetch a Grafana dashboard |
| Prompts | Templated workflows | PRD creation workflow |
Why It Matters
MCP became the industry standard fast. Anthropic created it in November 2024; by 2025, OpenAI and Google DeepMind adopted it. In late 2025, Anthropic donated MCP to the Linux Foundation’s Agentic AI Foundation.
The ecosystem now has thousands of community-built servers, official SDKs for all major languages, and 97M+ monthly downloads.
MCP Servers I Use
| Server | Purpose |
|---|---|
| dot-ai | Kubernetes operations, shared prompts, PRD workflows |
| Grafana | Dashboard queries, alerts, incidents |
| Prometheus | PromQL queries, metric exploration |
| Context7 | Up-to-date documentation for any library |
Learn More
“The Missing Link: How MCP Servers Supercharge Your AI Coding Assistant”
“MCP Servers Explained: Why Most Are Useless (And How to Fix It)”
Resources:
- MCP Specification — Official protocol docs
- MCP GitHub — SDKs and reference servers
- Awesome MCP Servers — Community server collection
- Anthropic MCP Announcement — Original introduction