Anthropic · CCAR-F
Tool design and tool_choice
CCAR-F · Lesson 6 of 18 · 43:37
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In this lesson
Prepare for the Claude Certified Architect – Foundations exam, on the exam guide version 1.0, effective July 2026. In this lesson: tool descriptions as the main selection mechanism, overlap and renaming, splitting generic tools, keyword traps in system prompts, how many tools each agent should get, constrained and cross-role tools, and the tool_choice options auto, any, a forced tool, and none, with the limits of the newest models. Includes three original practice questions.
Preview the topics
- Kestrel’s agent often calls get_product when customers ask whether an item is in stock, instead of get_inventory. Both tools have one-line descriptions. What is the most effective first step?
- Kestrel’s synthesis agent has a web search tool, and it keeps running new searches, instead of combining the findings it receives. What should change?
- Kestrel’s pipeline has three extraction tools, one per document type, and Claude sometimes answers in plain text. The document type is unknown in advance. Which tool_choice fits, on a model that supports it?