Continued Adventures in Vibe Coding
Understanding Model Context Protocol
So I was monkeying around in Claude, as I frequently do, and I just wanted an outline for a presentation on Model Context Protocol. Don’t worry if you don’t know what MCP is, I’m still learning and I thought this would be a good way to start. I just wanted some notes for myself, but I didn’t realize I was in the ‘Artifacts’ tab of Claude so not only did it give me the info I wanted, it also coded the whole thing into a HTML/CSS slideshow so now it’s live on the web. So, if you’re a UX Designer and you’ve heard of MCP, you’re welcome to use this as your cheat sheet. This is also a neat trick if you need to quickly turn your research into a presentation and you’re not a fan of making slide decks.
If you’d like to read a good introductory article on how Claude uses Model Context Protocol, you can start here.
Claude Now Integrates with Canva
While we’re on the subject of Claude and MCP, if you’re a Canva user you can see this in action.
Anthropic's Claude can now create and edit designs with visual studio Canva from within an AI chat. This integration is powered by a Canva server that uses Anthropic's Model Context Protocol, or MCP. Claude can use Canvas's tools to generate a design or search for materials within a user's Canva workspace.
Featured Notebooks from NotebookLM
If you’re a regular reader of this newsletter, you know that I’m a big booster of Google’s NotebookLM. I’m telling my college aged sons that it’s ‘non-negotiable’. If you do any kind of research in your professional life, and your still on the fence, consider the new ‘Featured Notebooks’ that Google has created on a variety of subject matters. Check it out
We’ll All Be Design Engineers in a Year
Okay, maybe this headline is a little exaggerated, but Ted Goas makes an excellent point for all the UX Designers out there. I’ve been saying the s me thing to my students for the last year, AI tools will push many of towards a job that is closer to engineering.
It was like that scene from The Matrix where Neo learned kung fu in 15 seconds. That moment made something clear: AI makes it easier for anyone to turn an idea into something real. We don’t have to wait around for a professional. There’s no limit to who’s allowed to have ideas.
Design Patterns for AI Interfaces
Since this is a rapidly evolving field, I frequently have a hard time explaining what the interface ‘should’ look like when discuss designing AI experiences. Fortunately, Smashing Magazine has a great article explaining the the ‘WHY’ behind the latest patterns and trends.
One of the key recent shifts is a slow move away from traditional “chat-alike” AI interfaces. As Luke Wroblewski wrote, when agents can use multiple tools, call other agents and run in the background, users orchestrate AI work more — there’s a lot less chatting back and forth.
Designing with Prompts
If you’re a designer who hasn’t added prompting to your repertoire, you should read this first person account from Iasonas Georgiadis.
My advice to other designers is that you should familiarize yourself with these tools without the need to be an expert on them now, as they will continue to evolve. The product designer role is going to evolve into incorporating AI tools in our everyday working life, but everything is still experimental. It is an exciting opportunity, for sure. Is it worth it? I believe it is.
That’s it for today. Thank you so much for reading my newsletter and supporting my work, I’m having a great time! If you’re getting some value out of this, you can always forward it to your friends. Or, you can buy me a coffee.