MCP Servers Explained: Why stdio and Streamable HTTP Beat Deprecated SSE

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The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is an open standard that lets AI model hosts like Claude Desktop and Cursor connect to external tools and data through small, controlled server processes. An MCP server wraps APIs, files, or internal services behind a stable interface, acting as a policy layer for auth, rate limits, and access control rather than giving models direct database or shell access. Developers can build a minimal MCP server in Python using the FastMCP library, which uses decorators to define typed tools and resources without writing raw JSON-RPC handlers. MCP supports three transports, but the HTTP+SSE approach has been deprecated as of early 2025, leaving stdio for local use and Streamable HTTP for remote deployments as the two relevant options. Key pitfalls include omitting type annotations and docstrings on tool functions, both of which degrade how well the model understands and invokes available tools.

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