Topic x Role Relevance Matrix¶
Auto-generated from LEARNING_PATH.md and the dedicated role guides in career/roles/.
Legend: Must, Good, Optional, Not Relevant.
| Topic | Folder | Individual Role Guides | Agentic AI Engineer | AI Engineer | Generative AI Engineer | LLM Engineer | ML Engineer | MLOps / LLMOps Engineer | RAG Engineer |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AI Agents | agents | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Agent Evaluation & Observability | agents | Not Relevant | Must | Good | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Agent Memory Systems | agents | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Agentic Protocols & Frameworks | agents | Not Relevant | Must | Optional | Good | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Multi-Agent Architectures | agents | Not Relevant | Must | Good | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| AI Coding Agents | applications | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| AI Product Management Fundamentals | applications | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| AI UX Patterns | applications | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| API Design for AI Applications | applications | Not Relevant | Good | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Code Generation & AI-Assisted Development | applications | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Conversational AI & Dialogue Systems | applications | Not Relevant | Good | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Voice AI & Speech | applications | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| AI Regulation for Builders | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant |
| Adversarial ML & AI Security | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Ethics, Safety & Alignment | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| MCP Security & Tool Trust | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| OWASP Top 10 for LLM Applications | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Prompt Injection Deep Dive | ethics-and-safety | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| LLM Evaluation & Benchmarks | evaluation | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| LLM Evaluation Deep Dive | evaluation | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Retrieval Evaluation | evaluation | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| System Design for AI Interviews | evaluation | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant |
| Attention Mechanism | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Attention Mechanism Deep Dive | foundations | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Embeddings | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Modern LLM Architectures | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Scaling Laws & Pre-training | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| State Space Models | foundations | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Tokenization | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Transformers | foundations | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Distributed Inference & Serving Architecture | inference | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Good | Not Relevant |
| GPU & CUDA Programming for AI Engineers | inference | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Inference Optimization | inference | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant | Must | Good | Optional | Not Relevant |
| Hallucination Detection & Mitigation | llms | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant | Good | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good |
| LLM Landscape & Model Selection | llms | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Large Language Models (LLMs) | llms | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Reasoning Models & Test-Time Compute | llms | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Computer Vision Fundamentals for AI Builders | multimodal | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Diffusion Models | multimodal | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Multimodal AI | multimodal | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Deep Learning Fundamentals | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Linear Algebra for AI | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| NLP Fundamentals | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Neural Networks | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Probability & Statistics for AI | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Python for AI | prerequisites | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| AI System Design for GenAI Applications | production | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good |
| CI/CD for ML and LLM Systems | production | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Not Relevant |
| Classical ML for GenAI Builders | production | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must | Optional | Not Relevant |
| Cost Optimization for GenAI Systems | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Optional | Must | Optional |
| Data Flywheel Design | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Docker & Kubernetes for GenAI Deployment | production | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Not Relevant |
| Document Parsing & Extraction | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Guardrails & Content Filtering | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| LLM Routing & Model Selection | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| LLMOps & Production Deployment | production | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Must | Optional | Must | Must | Good |
| Latency & Throughput Engineering for AI Systems | production | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Good | Not Relevant |
| Model Serving for LLM Applications | production | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Must | Must | Optional |
| Monitoring & Observability for GenAI Systems | production | Not Relevant | Good | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Must | Must | Optional |
| Distributed Training & Training Infrastructure | research-frontiers | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Mechanistic Interpretability | research-frontiers | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Research Methodology & Paper Reading for AI | research-frontiers | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Generative AI | root | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Advanced Fine-Tuning for LLM Adaptation | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Good | Must | Must | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Context Engineering & Long Context | techniques | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Continual Learning & Lifelong AI | techniques | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Embedding Fine-Tuning | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Fine-Tuning LLMs | techniques | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Function Calling, Structured Output & Tool Use | techniques | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Graph RAG & Advanced Retrieval | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Good | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must |
| Knowledge Distillation & Model Compression | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Long-Context Engineering | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Model Merging | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Prompt Engineering | techniques | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Reinforcement Learning for LLM Alignment | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Good | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) | techniques | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must | Must |
| Structured Outputs & Constrained Generation | techniques | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| Synthetic Data & Data Engineering for LLMs | techniques | Not Relevant | Optional | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Optional |
| Cloud ML Services & Managed AI Platforms | tools-and-infra | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Not Relevant |
| Distributed Systems Fundamentals for AI | tools-and-infra | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Good | Good | Not Relevant |
| GenAI Tools & Infrastructure | tools-and-infra | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant |
| ML Experiment & Data Management | tools-and-infra | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must | Must | Not Relevant |
| Vector Databases | tools-and-infra | Not Relevant | Optional | Optional | Optional | Optional | Not Relevant | Not Relevant | Must |