Alastair McClelland
Father, Husband and Software Engineer.
Recent Posts
All posts →An Alternative to MCP: Python CLI-Based Agent Skills
2026-03-02 — Building custom Python CLI tools with Click and uvx as a more stable alternative to MCP servers for AI agent tooling.
From Infrastructure as Code to Software as Specs
2026-02-23 — As AI-generated code becomes cheap and regenerable, specifications and contracts become the assets worth protecting, not implementation details.
Making AI Development a Team Sport
2026-02-09 — AI development is currently a solo activity, but needs workflows where multiple people can see, contribute to, and learn from agent interactions.
Every idea can now be explored
2026-02-02 — AI coding agents have collapsed the validation cycle from weeks to hours, making it feasible to explore every idea and filter efficiently.
MCP Tools vs Skills with Scripts - Why Simpler Might Be Better
2026-01-26 — MCP tools have been patchy in practice, while skills wrapping mature CLI tools provide a more stable platform for AI agents.
Skills, Tools, Specs and Workflows - Which One is Which
2026-01-19 — Clarifying the distinctions between tools, skills, specs, and workflows to build more reliable AI agent systems.
The AI Journey So Far - From Traditional to Async Agent Teams
2026-01-12 — Tracing the evolution from manual coding through Copilot and AI agents to the next bottleneck - the need for async agent teams that can work independently.