Prompt Engineering for LLMs: The Art and Science of Building Large Language Model–Based Applications

by John Berryman, Albert Ziegler

Large language models (LLMs) are revolutionizing the world, promising to automate tasks and solve complex problems. A new generation of software applications are using these models as building blocks to unlock new potential in almost every domain, but reliably accessing these capabilities requires new skills. This book will teach you the art and science of prompt engineering-the key to unlocking the true potential of LLMs.






Industry experts John Berryman and Albert Ziegler share how to communicate effectively with AI, transforming your ideas into a language model-friendly format. By learning both the philosophical foundation and practical techniques, you'll be equipped with the knowledge and confidence to build the next generation of LLM-powered applications.



Understand LLM architecture and learn how to best interact with itDesign a complete prompt-crafting strategy for an applicationGather, triage, and present context elements to make an efficient promptMaster specific prompt-crafting techniques like few-shot learning, chain-of-thought prompting, and RAG

Genres: Artificial Intelligence, Technology, Programming

467 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 4, 2024

About the author

John Allyn Berryman (originally John Allyn Smith) was an American poet, born in McAlester, Oklahoma. He was a major figure in American poetry in the second half of the 20th century and often considered one of the founders of the Confessional school of poetry. He was the author of The Dream Songs, which are playful, witty, and morbid. Berryman committed suicide in 1972.

A pamphlet entitled Poems was published in 1942 and his first proper book, The Dispossessed, appeared six years later. Of his youthful self he said, 'I didn't want to be like Yeats; I wanted to be Yeats.' His first major work, in which he began to develop his own unique style of writing, was Homage to Mistress Bradstreet, which appeared in Partisan Review in 1953 and was published as a book in 1956. Another pamphle.

His thought made pockets & the plane buckt, followed. It was the collection called Dream Songs that earned him the most admiration. The first volume, entitled 77 Dream Songs, was published in 1964 and won the Pulitzer Prize for poetry. The second volume, entitled His Toy, His Dream, His Rest, appeared in 1968.

The two volumes were combined as The Dream Songs in 1969. By that time Berryman, though not a "popular" poet, was well established as an important force in the literary world, and he was widely read among his contemporaries. In 1970 he published the drastically different Love & Fame. It received many negative reviews, along with a little praise, most notably from Saul Bellow and John Bailey. Despite its negative reception, its colloquial style and sexual forthrightness have influenced many younger poets, especially from Britain and Ireland. Delusions Etc., his bleak final collection, which he prepared for printing but did not live to see appear, continues in a similar vein. Another book of poems, Henry's Fate, culled from Berryman's manuscripts, appeared posthumously, as did a book of essays, The Freedom of the Poet, and some drafts of a novel, Recovery.

The poems that form Dream Songs involve a character who is by turns the narrator and the person addressed by a narrator. Because readers assumed that these voices were the poet speaking directly of himself, Berryman's poetry was considered part of the Confessional poetry movement. Berryman, however, scorned the idea that he was a Confessional poet.

Reviews

[Vaidotas Zemlys-Balevičius · Rating 5 out of 5]

A good book on prompt engineering. When the field evolves quickly writing a good book is hard, because you never know what will get out of date when the book will be published. The authors concentrate on the fundamentals, i.e. LLM is a completion engine, and provide useful advice how to navigate prompt engineering. As I was a part of a project building LLM app in the last year or so I can vouch for the usefulness of advice. Naturally the things will evolve, but I think the usefulness of this book will stay. It is one of these rare books which teach you how to fish, instead of just giving the fish.

[Dani · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book on prompt engineering. Well written and accessible to people who aren’t deep software developers, however the book is targeted towards writing applications that leverage LLMs. That said, there are takeaways for people who manage the development of these applications as well as those who are playing around with LLMs for fun.

[Armands Ķirītis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Great explanation of how LLMs are built and how to prompt the models. It is clear that prompt engineering is the future of both analysis and development in software engineering and this book nicely explains the process on all possible levels.

[Lucille Nguyen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Delivers a practical overview of building LLM Applications with special focus on OpenAI systems. Has useful information on how to best get language models to act in more aligned ways. Very realistic about the capacities and limitations of models.

[Gene Ishchuk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good, extremely useful.
I have been working with LLMs for a while now, but I have no idea how the predictions work with ChatML and many other things.

[Tom · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not as I expected

[Johnny · Rating 1 out of 5]

The book about prompt engineering that contains nothing about prompt engineering. Instead, the second part of the title is the clue, it is about building LLM based applications. Unfortunately, it does this in such an abstract an general way, that it also lacks practicality.

Instead, read Prompt Engineering for Generative AI: Future-Proof Inputs for Reliable AI Outputs