Tools: Code Is All You Need

10 months ago

The author expresses skepticism about the effectiveness of MCP (Machine Control Protocol) in its current form, especially for agentic coding.
A comparison between GitHub MCP and the gh CLI tool shows the latter is more efficient in using context and achieving results.
MCP's reliance on inference makes it harder to use than writing code directly, according to the author's experience.
For automation, code generation is preferred over MCP because it allows for composition, verification, and validation.
The author shares a personal example of converting reStructuredText to Markdown using an LLM to generate code, which provided more trust and reliability.
Automating tasks with code is more scalable and reliable than using MCP, as it doesn't depend on inference for each execution.
The author suggests that MCP might be useful in specific scenarios but generally advocates for bypassing it in favor of code generation.
Future improvements could involve better abstractions for MCP and code generation, possibly integrating APIs for more efficient inference.
The potential for LLMs to generate code that non-programmers can understand and use is highlighted as an area for exploration.

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