--- title: Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP -... description: This talk was recorded at NDC Manchester in Manchester, England. #ndcmanchester #ndcconferences #developer #softwaredeveloper Attend the next NDC... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester | daily.dev og:description: This talk was recorded at NDC Manchester in Manchester, England. #ndcmanchester #ndcconferences #developer #softwaredeveloper Attend the next NDC... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/vpUNgfo4D.png og:image:alt: Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester **[NDC Conferences](https://daily.dev/sources/ndc)** · 11 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary This talk was recorded at NDC Manchester in Manchester, England. #ndcmanchester #ndcconferences #developer #softwaredeveloper Attend the next NDC conference near you: https://ndcconferences.com https://ndcmanchester.com/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel and learn every day: / @NDC Follow our Social Media! https://www.facebook.com/ndcconferences https://twitter.com/NDC_Conferences https://www.instagram.com/ndc_conferences/ #devops The majority of Model Context Protocol (MCP) use right now is directly through end user applications like Claude Desktop or Cursor. However, pretty much any Large language Model, from small open models, to the APIs of the frontier models can be prompted to call tools and retrieve external resources, including those exposed using the Model Context Protocol (MCP). Doing this effectively in your projects is key to the development of agentic software. This talk will explore how different models respond to different types of tool use prompting, along with the benefits and pitfalls prompting to generate tool calls in different data formats. We will look at some real examples of interacting with MCP servers, and at the prompts used by some popular agentic frameworks and tools. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: --- Tags: [#ai](https://daily.dev/tags/ai), [#devops](https://daily.dev/tags/devops) [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d"},"datePublished":"2026-01-29T16:15:24.213Z","dateModified":"2026-01-29T18:02:25.535Z","description":"This talk was recorded at NDC Manchester in Manchester, England. \n#ndcmanchester #ndcconferences #developer #softwaredeveloper \n\nAttend the next NDC...","image":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/YtM_c5X4Ed0/sddefault.jpg","thumbnailUrl":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/YtM_c5X4Ed0/sddefault.jpg","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"NDC Conferences","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"NDC Conferences","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--SiIyojEj--/f_auto/v1748760369/logos/ndc","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/ndc"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/prompting-llms-to-use-tools-and-resources-with-mcp---richard-brough---ndc-manchester-vpungfo4d","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"ai,devops","timeRequired":"PT11M","video":{"@type":"VideoObject","name":"Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester","description":"This talk was recorded at NDC Manchester in Manchester, England. \n#ndcmanchester #ndcconferences #developer #softwaredeveloper \n\nAttend the next NDC...","thumbnailUrl":"https://i.ytimg.com/vi/YtM_c5X4Ed0/sddefault.jpg","uploadDate":"2026-01-29T16:15:24.213Z","duration":"PT11M","url":"https://api.daily.dev/r/vpUNgfo4D","embedUrl":"https://www.youtube.com/embed/YtM_c5X4Ed0"}} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"NDC Conferences","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/ndc"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Prompting LLMs to use Tools and Resources with MCP - Richard Brough - NDC Manchester"}]} ```