Week 24 Master Guide
Week 24: Month 6 Capstone, Master Portfolio & The Senior AI Engineer Interview Gauntlet
Week 24 Daily Breakdown (7 Days)
Day 1
Day 1: Capstone 6 Fine-Tuned Open Model Engine Architecture
1 code file(s) • 3 Q&ADay 2
Day 2: Master Portfolio Repository & Multi-Capstone Synthesis
1 code file(s) • 3 Q&ADay 3
Day 3: Mock Interview #1 — Python, SQL & Data Structures for AI Engineers
1 code file(s) • 3 Q&ADay 4
Day 4: Mock Interview #2 — ML, Deep Learning & Fine-Tuning Math
1 code file(s) • 3 Q&ADay 5
Day 5: Mock Interview #3 — RAG, Vector DBs, Agents, MCP & Evaluation Systems
1 code file(s) • 3 Q&ADay 6
Day 6: Mock Interview #4 — End-to-End Production AI System Design
1 code file(s) • 2 Q&ADay 7
Day 7: Final Graduation, Portfolio Sign-Off & Senior Career Launch Playbook
1 code file(s) • 1 Q&AWeek 24: Month 6 Capstone, Master Portfolio & The Senior AI Engineer Interview Gauntlet
Welcome to Week 24—the culmination of your 6-month, 24-week journey from zero to a production-grade, Principal AI Engineer! You have traversed:
- Month 1 (Weeks 1–4): Terminal, Git, Advanced Python, SQL Internals, AsyncIO, and the SRE Runbook Copilot CLI.
- Month 2 (Weeks 5–8): Deep Learning Math, Attention Mechanics, Tokenization, Prompt Engineering, LLM-as-a-Judge, and the Automated LLM Evaluation & Regression Suite.
- Month 3 (Weeks 9–12): Embeddings, Vector Databases, Chunking Strategies, Dense vs Sparse BM25, Cross-Encoder Rerankers, and the Enterprise Hybrid RAG Engine.
- Month 4 (Weeks 13–16): ReAct Loops, LangGraph State Machines, PydanticAI, Model Context Protocol (
FastMCP), Multi-Agent Teams, Guardrails, and the Agentic MCP Infrastructure Server. - Month 5 (Weeks 17–20): High-Concurrency FastAPI, Server-Sent Events (SSE), Redis Chat Memory, OpenTelemetry, Langfuse, Semantic Caching, LiteLLM Cascades, Docker, Next.js Web Chatbot, and the Production FastAPI MLOps Microservice.
- Month 6 (Weeks 21–24): LoRA Matrix Math, QLoRA NF4 Quantization, DPO Preference Alignment, vLLM PagedAttention, GGUF/Ollama Serving, the Public Educational Web Platform, and Capstone 6: Fine-Tuned Open Model Serving & Benchmark Engine!
1. Master Portfolio Matrix (All 6 Capstone Projects)
Architecture Flow Diagram
Month 1: SRE Runbook Copilot CLI<br/>(AsyncIO, Pydantic v2, Token Cost Auditor)
Month 2: Automated LLM Evaluation Suite<br/>(LLM-as-a-Judge, G-Eval, Regression CI/CD)
Month 3: Enterprise Hybrid RAG Engine<br/>(BM25 + ChromaDB + Cross-Encoder Reranker)
Month 4: Agentic MCP Server<br/>(LangGraph State Machine, FastMCP, Prompt Injection Defense)
Month 5: Production FastAPI Microservice<br/>(SSE Streaming, Redis Memory, OpenTelemetry, Semantic Cache)
Month 6: Fine-Tuned Open Model Serving Engine<br/>(LoRA Adapter, vLLM PagedAttention, 4x Cost Reduction)
2. Week 24 Structure: Capstone 6 & The 4 Mock Interview Gauntlets
| Day | Topic | Artifacts & Code |
|---|---|---|
| Day 1 | Capstone 6: Fine-Tuned Open Model Serving Engine Architecture | capstones/month06_finetuned_open_model_engine/ (train_lora.py, serving.py, evaluate.py) |
| Day 2 | Master Portfolio Repository & Multi-Capstone Synthesis | day02_master_portfolio_repository_and_multi_capstone_synthesis/ |
| Day 3 | Mock Interview #1: Python, SQL, Concurrency & Data Structures | day03_mock_interview_python_sql_and_data_structures_for_ai/interview_questions.md |
| Day 4 | Mock Interview #2: ML, Deep Learning, Transformers & Fine-Tuning Math | day04_mock_interview_ml_deep_learning_and_finetuning_math/interview_questions.md |
| Day 5 | Mock Interview #3: RAG, Vector Databases, Agents, MCP & Evals | day05_mock_interview_rag_agents_mcp_and_eval_systems/interview_questions.md |
| Day 6 | Mock Interview #4: End-to-End Production AI System Design | day06_mock_interview_end_to_end_production_ai_system_design/interview_questions.md |
| Day 7 | Final Graduation, Portfolio Sign-Off & Career Launch Playbook | day07_final_graduation_portfolio_signoff_and_career_launch/README.md |