February 2026
Intermediate to advanced
285 pages
4h 17m
English
book
The MCP Standard: A Developer's Guide to Building Universal AI Tools with the Model Context Protocol
by Srinivasan Sekar
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Appendix B: Glossary of Terms
Agent/AI Agent
An autonomous system, powered by an LLM, that can reason, plan, and use tools to accomplish a goal without continuous human intervention.
Agentic RAG
An advanced form of Retrieval-Augmented Generation where an intelligent agent can dynamically choose between multiple retrieval tools (e.g., a vector database vs. a web search) to find the best information to answer a query, rather than using a single fixed retrieval method.
Authentication (AuthN)
The process of verifying the identity of a user or client. In MCP, this answers the question, “Who are you?” and typically involves verifying credentials before granting access to the system.
Authorization (AuthZ)
The process of determining what an authenticated user ...
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