3 Weeks
·Cohort-based Course
Drowning in AI trends? Learn the timeless principles behind LLM applications — and build with clarity, not chaos.
3 Weeks
·Cohort-based Course
Drowning in AI trends? Learn the timeless principles behind LLM applications — and build with clarity, not chaos.
Employers, Publishers
Course overview
You’ve built the demo. It works — sort of. But the second you try to shape it into something real, it breaks. You change the task, tweak the workflow, or ask for something custom... and you find that you're stuck. That’s not your fault — it’s what happens when you build on borrowed patterns without understanding the core ideas underneath. This course fixes that. You’ll learn how LLMs actually work — not just how to prompt them, but how to design, combine, and control them across apps, workflows, agents, and more. And you won’t just learn the theory — you’ll build with it. By the end, you’ll be able to take an idea and confidently shape it into the LLM-powered tool you actually want to create.
01
Engineers who want to cut through the noise, understand how LLMs really work, and build flexible, reliable applications with confidence.
02
PMs who want to harness LLMs for real product wins – and stop wasting time on hype, dead ends, and guessing what’s actually possible.
03
Team leads driving AI initiatives who need more than demos – they need to ship production-worthy AI apps that can continuously improve.
Master the Core Mechanics of LLMs
Understand how completion models really work, and how reinforcement learning shaped the capabilities we now use in chat and agents. Build the intuition that lets you wield LLMs intentionally — not just hope they behave.
Control LLM Behavior with Better Prompts
Learn the essential techniques behind zero-shot, few-shot, and advanced prompting strategies. You'll see how to steer models reliably, even in real-world, messy tasks.
Build RAG Systems That Truly Understand and Ground
RAG is the full chain from understanding user intent, crafting smart queries, pulling the best sources, and generating grounded, high-quality outputs. You'll learn how to design each step so your applications are accurate, reliable, and aligned with what users actually need.
Design Smart AI Agents
Build conversational agents and workflow-driven agents that stay on track and complete non-trivial tasks. Learn the design patterns that make agents useful, flexible, and powerful.
Evaluate, Test, and Continuously Improve Your Applications
Master the techniques for offline evaluation, online observability, and iterative improvement — so you’re not flying blind as your app scales.
Customize LLMs with Fine-Tuning and LoRA
When prompting isn't enough, customization is key. Learn when fine-tuning is worth it – and when it's not! Land how to use lightweight LoRA techniques to teach new behaviors or specialize your models.
Get Ready for the Future of AI
Stay ahead by understanding the next frontier: multimodal models, new interaction paradigms, and what’s coming next in AI development.
6 interactive live sessions
Lifetime access to course materials
In-depth lessons
Direct access to instructor
Projects to apply learnings
Guided feedback & reflection
Private community of peers
Course certificate upon completion
Maven Satisfaction Guarantee
This course is backed by Maven’s guarantee. You can receive a full refund within 14 days after the course ends, provided you meet the completion criteria in our refund policy.
Building LLM Applications - From Principles to Practice
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Hamel Husain
Arin Sime
Doug Turnbull
Jason Liu
Alberto Gonzalez
John Berryman is the founder of Arcturus Labs. His journey through AI and search technologies includes contributing to GitHub Copilot's early development, where he worked on the team that brought AI-assisted coding from concept to reality. Throughout his career, John has helped build search and recommendation systems that millions use daily – from GitHub's code search infrastructure to Eventbrite's discovery platform and the US Patent Office's next-generation search system. This blend of experience in both foundational search technologies and cutting-edge AI applications gives him unique insight into building practical, powerful LLM applications.
John shares his expertise through two books: Relevant Search, which reveals the art and science of building search applications, and Prompt Engineering for LLMs, which guides developers through the emerging practice of language model application development.
Join an upcoming cohort
Cohort 1
$910
Dates
Payment Deadline
4-6 hours per week
Thursdays
4:00pm - 5:30pm EST
Courses content covering everything in the syllabus above and providing the class with a homework assignment for the week.
Weekly Projects
2 - 4 hours per week
Take time build your own project based upon upon the content we cover that week in the course.
Tuesdays
4:00pm - 5:00pm EST
Show-and-tell for the progress with the project assignments, and Q&A related to the assignment and the course content.
Active hands-on learning
This course builds on live workshops and hands-on projects
Interactive and project-based
You’ll be interacting with other learners through breakout rooms and project teams
Learn with a cohort of peers
Join a community of like-minded people who want to learn and grow alongside you
Join an upcoming cohort
Cohort 1
$910
Dates
Payment Deadline