AI Engineering/Phase 13/Lesson 12

Roots and Elicitation — Scoping and Mid-Flight User Input

Hard-coded paths break the moment a user opens a different project. Pre-filled tool arguments break when the user under-specifies. Roots scope the server to a user-controlled set of URIs; elicitation pauses mid-tool-call to ask the user for structured input via a form or URL. Two client primitives, two fixes for common MCP failure modes. SEP-1036 (URL-mode elicitation, 2025-11-25) is experimental through H1 2026 — check SDK versions before depending on it.

Build 45 min Python (stdlib, roots + elicitation demo)

Prerequisites: Phase 13 · 07 (MCP server)

#Learning Objectives

Declare roots and respond to notifications/roots/list_changed.
Restrict server file operations to URIs inside the declared root set.
Use elicitation/create to ask the user for a confirmation or structured input mid-tool-call.
Choose between form-mode and URL-mode elicitation (the latter is experimental; drift-risk noted).

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The text and code of this lesson are based on AI Engineering from Scratch by Rohit Ghumare, MIT licensed.