> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.within.ai/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Analyze and build with the Within MCP > When to use Advisor and when to use the Within MCP, and how to analyze processes, build skills and build agents from your own AI client. The Within MCP connects your own AI client to your Work Brain (your Process Index), so you can analyze your processes and build skills and agents in the tools your team already uses. This page covers when to reach for it instead of Advisor, and how to work with it for each job. Three parts to keep straight: * **Advisor** creates inside Within. It answers questions across your Work Brain and generates reports, diagrams and skills from your process data. * **The Within MCP** retrieves from Within. It is a read-only connection that gives an AI client access to the process data you already have permission to see. * **Your AI client** acts outside Within. Once connected, it combines Within data with the other connectors it already has, and creates files in your own tools. MCP stands for Model Context Protocol, an open standard for connecting an AI client to a data source. Within publishes a server. Your client connects to it. ## Advisor or the MCP? > [!NOTE] > > **The rule:** use Advisor when the analysis, and what it produces, should stay in Within. Use the MCP when the work needs files or other systems your AI client is connected to, or has to happen inside your client. > **Use Advisor to** > > * **Find your biggest opportunities** across the Work Brain. It reasons across every process in scope and keeps the result in Within. > * **Produce a report, diagram or analysis** to share from Within. > * **Find out which skills are worth building.** It ranks candidates by how often the work happens, the active work time, its complexity and the total time it takes over a year. > **Use the MCP to** > > * **Check a process against another system.** Your client already has connectors for your ticketing, project and file tools. > * **Produce a file that draws on your other tools.** Your client creates it, combining Within data with its other connectors. > * **Build an agent**, in a coding agent. The Within ADK is served through the MCP. **To build a skill for one bounded task**, use either: Advisor when you want it to recommend and package the skill, or your client when the skill needs files or connectors it already has. See [Build a skill](#build-a-skill). **To change a process or reorganize your Work Brain**, use [AI Chat](/user-docs/support/using-ai-chat) in Within. The MCP is read-only. For the detail behind each, see [Strategic analysis with Advisor](/user-docs/define/strategic-analysis-with-advisor), [Advisor: analyze processes](/user-docs/define/advisor-analyze-processes) and [Build an agent](#build-an-agent). ### How they compare | | Advisor | Within MCP | | - | - | - | | **Where it runs** | Inside Within, in your browser | Inside your own AI client | | **What it reaches** | Your Work Brain: processes, source documents and recordings | The same Within data, plus your client's other connectors | | **What it produces** | Answers, analyses, insight reports, diagrams and skills | Data your client works with. Your client creates the files, in your tools | | **What it cannot do** | Reach the systems and tools outside Within | Create or change anything in Within | | **Setup** | No additional connection | A one-time connection in your client | ## Analyze with the MCP Your client can search, read, explore and analyze your Within data, but not change it. Analysis belongs in the MCP when it needs something Advisor can't reach: * **Data in another system.** Teams often ask Within to build native integrations with the ticketing and project tools they already run. The MCP is the working path today: check a documented process against the tickets, projects or files your client is connected to, and find where the work deviates from it. * **A current-state read before you build.** Before you design a skill or an agent, read the observed work: pain points, bottlenecks, the systems in use, and what already works well. * **Output that has to live in your tools.** A control matrix, a process export or an executive deck, built where your team will use it. For analysis across your whole Work Brain — where your biggest opportunities are, and where to deploy agents first — start in Advisor. Prompts for each kind of analysis are in [Example prompts](#example-prompts). ## Build a skill A skill is a package of files — instructions, context and guardrails — that teaches an AI client one bounded task, built from how your team actually does that work. You install it in the AI platform your team uses. You can build one in Advisor or in your client through the MCP. Both end in a package you install in your AI platform. They differ in where you build it and what it can draw on. ### In Advisor Use Advisor when you want it to find the opportunity as well as build the skill, and when the analysis should stay in Within. **1. Ask for recommendations first** Ask Advisor where a skill would save the most time, across a value stream or a set of processes. It ranks candidates by how often the work happens, the active work time, its complexity and the total time it takes over a year. **2. Approve the scope** Advisor proposes a name and scope for the skill and asks before it builds anything. Change the scope in plain language with **Suggest another way**, or approve it with **Proceed**. **3. Review the package** Preview each file in the conversation. Advisor also generates a diagram of the workflow before and after the skill. **4. Download and set it up** Download the package as a ZIP and set it up in your AI platform, for example as a project in Claude.