Training course – RAG & LLM Applications – AI Engineering & LLM Applications

RAG & LLM Applications for AI Engineers

Develop RAG and LLM applications: embeddings, vector databases, chunking, retrieval, evaluation, cost control and data protection.

Duration
6 hours, one session
Format
Online or on-site
Language
German or English
Participants
open dates or exclusive for your team
Certificate
Certificate of attendance

Overview

“RAG & LLM Applications for AI Engineers” is designed for roles such as Software developers integrating LLM features into products, AI engineers and machine learning engineers and Data scientists focusing on generative AI and shows step by step how to use RAG & LLM Applications productively, safely and transparently in AI Engineering & LLM Applications – from the fundamentals to advanced workflows.

Retrieval-augmented generation connects language models to your own knowledge: manuals, contracts, tickets, wikis or product data are made searchable and handed to the model as context at runtime. The result is assistants that give grounded answers with citations instead of hallucinating. In this compact course you build a complete RAG pipeline, from document preparation through embeddings and a vector database to answer generation, and you learn which levers actually determine quality.

Day two takes you from prototype to robust application. You compare chunking strategies, combine semantic and lexical search, apply reranking, metadata filters and query rewriting, and measure the effect with systematic evaluations. You also cover prompt caching, cost control, latency optimisation, document-level access control and privacy-compliant operation with an eye on GDPR and the EU AI Act. By the end you know when classic RAG is enough, when a large context window or agentic retrieval is the better option, and how to justify your architecture choices.

AI engineering is the discipline of turning language models into dependable products: chat assistants, document analysis, retrieval-augmented generation, agents with tool access and AI features inside existing applications. The code around the model is often more demanding than the model call itself, because prompt versioning, structured output, evaluation, cost control, latency, observability and protection against prompt injection decide success in production. AI coding assistants and agents accelerate exactly this work, from building evaluation pipelines and tool definitions to MCP servers and root-cause analysis in traces. In this course you learn to develop LLM applications systematically with AI support, make their quality measurable and run them securely, cost-effectively and in compliance with regulation.

The course is delivered live – either online in a virtual classroom or on-site in our training rooms in Munich, Salzburg, Berlin, Augsburg, Hanover, Bremen, Stuttgart and Kaiserslautern. We can also run it exclusively for your team.

Who is this course for?

  • Software developers integrating LLM features into products
  • AI engineers and machine learning engineers
  • Data scientists focusing on generative AI
  • Backend and platform teams providing AI infrastructure
  • Technical product owners for AI features

Typical challenges we address

  • Prototypes shine in demos but deliver inconsistent quality in production
  • Without systematic evaluation, changes to prompts and models are risky
  • Costs, latency and rate limits spiral as usage grows
  • New security risks from prompt injection, data leakage and over-privileged agents

What you will be able to do

  • You build a complete RAG pipeline from document preparation to answers with citations.
  • You choose embedding model, chunking strategy and vector database on solid grounds.
  • You improve retrieval quality with hybrid search, reranking and metadata filters.
  • You measure application quality with systematic evaluations and detect regressions.
  • Build RAG applications, agents and LLM features with AI coding tools systematically and to production standard.
  • Make the quality of LLM applications measurable and manageable with automated evaluations.
  • Run LLM applications securely and cost-effectively, with observability, prompt injection defences and clear permissions.

Course outline

Module 1 Foundations of RAG and LLM applications
  • Anatomy of a RAG pipeline: ingestion, indexing, retrieval, generation
  • Understanding embeddings: semantic similarity, dimensions, model selection
  • Weighing RAG against fine-tuning and long context windows
  • Structured outputs, citations and dealing with hallucinations
Module 2 Document preparation and chunking
  • Reliably extracting PDFs, Office documents, HTML and tables
  • Chunking strategies: fixed size, structure-aware, semantic, with overlap
  • Enriching metadata and generating contextual summaries per chunk
  • Incremental updates and deletion of documents in the index
Module 3 Vector databases and retrieval strategies
  • Comparing vector databases and extensions such as pgvector, Qdrant, Weaviate or OpenSearch
  • Hybrid search combining vector and full-text search with BM25
  • Reranking, metadata filtering and query rewriting
  • Agentic retrieval: letting the model decide on search steps and tools
Module 4 Evaluation and quality assurance
  • Building and maintaining test sets from real user questions
  • Retrieval metrics such as recall and precision, and answer metrics such as faithfulness
  • Using and calibrating LLM-as-a-judge sensibly
  • Regression testing when chunking, model or prompt changes
Module 5 Operations, cost and data protection
  • Prompt caching, batch processing and model choice to cut costs
  • Optimising latency and streaming responses
  • Document-level permissions, tenant isolation and protection against prompt injection
  • Data protection: data residency, processing agreements, deletion policies, GDPR and the EU AI Act
Module 6 Practice lab: AI Engineering & LLM Applications
  • Building RAG pipelines
  • Automating evaluation
  • Developing agents and tools
  • Securing structured output
  • Observability and cost
  • Defending against prompt injection
Module 7 Data protection, quality & transfer to daily work
  • LLM applications often process personal and confidential data: you learn to assess EU AI Act requirements on transparency and risk classes, design GDPR-compliant data flows with processing agreements and deletion policies, manage API keys securely and respect the licence terms of models and datasets.
  • Ground rules for safe AI use in your team
  • Checking results: facts, sources, tests and the four-eyes principle
  • Personal action plan for the next 30 days
  • Open questions, outlook and resources for further learning

Practical scenarios from your field

Building RAG pipelines

Implement ingestion, chunking, embeddings, vector search, hybrid retrieval and reranking, and generate answers with citations while honouring the access rights of source documents at retrieval time.

Automating evaluation

Create test sets with expected answers, define metrics for relevance, faithfulness and format, calibrate LLM-as-a-judge scoring and run evaluations in CI on every prompt or model change.

Developing agents and tools

Design tool definitions and MCP servers, implement agent loops with planning, tool calls and stop conditions, and build in permissions and human approval for consequential actions.

Securing structured output

Define JSON schemas for model responses, validate output, implement retry strategies on failure and make extraction tasks such as invoice or contract data robust. Faulty responses never reach downstream systems.

Observability and cost

Capture traces, token usage, latency and error rates, analyse problematic conversations and cut costs through caching, model routing and context reduction. Budgets and alerts per feature prevent surprises.

Defending against prompt injection

Test attack scenarios via manipulated documents, web pages or tool results, filter inputs and outputs, limit agent permissions and make red-teaming tests a fixed part of the pipeline.

Possible hands-on projects

Knowledge assistant with sources

A RAG chat over internal documents with citations, feedback buttons and an evaluation page that tracks answer quality across test questions.

Evaluation harness

A command-line tool that runs prompt variants against a test set, scores the results and clearly shows differences between versions.

Document extractor

A service that accepts PDFs, extracts structured data against a JSON schema, validates it and flags uncertain cases for manual review.

Prerequisites

Solid programming skills in Python (or TypeScript as an alternative), basic knowledge of databases and REST APIs, and some experience with LLM APIs. You have solid programming skills, ideally in Python or TypeScript, and experience with APIs; prior exposure to LLM APIs helps but is not required.

Technical requirements

A laptop with Python, Git, Docker and a code editor, plus API access to at least one LLM and embedding provider. Credentials for the exercises can be provided if needed.

Data protection & compliance

LLM applications often process personal and confidential data: you learn to assess EU AI Act requirements on transparency and risk classes, design GDPR-compliant data flows with processing agreements and deletion policies, manage API keys securely and respect the licence terms of models and datasets.

Dates & locations

For every location we suggest a date roughly four weeks ahead. Your preferred date is always possible.

  • Munich Fri, 11 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Salzburg Thu, 10 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Berlin Wed, 16 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Augsburg Fri, 11 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Hanover Mon, 14 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Bremen Wed, 16 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Stuttgart Thu, 10 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Kaiserslautern Wed, 16 December 2026 6 hrs Request
  • Online Mon, 14 December 2026 6 hrs Request

Frequently asked questions

When is RAG better than fine-tuning?

RAG is the right choice when a model needs access to current, extensive or frequently changing knowledge and should cite its sources. Fine-tuning mainly changes style, format or specialised behaviour. In many projects RAG is the faster, cheaper and more controllable route, sometimes complemented by fine-tuning for niche tasks.

Which vector database should we use?

That depends on data volume, existing infrastructure, filtering needs and operating model. If you already run PostgreSQL, pgvector often takes you a long way, while specialised systems shine with large datasets and hybrid search. In the course you compare several options hands-on and derive criteria for your own decision.

How can RAG be run in a GDPR-compliant way?

Key factors are choosing providers with suitable data residency and a data processing agreement, enforcing document-level permissions, having a deletion policy for the index and logs, and minimising personal data. For highly sensitive data, self-hosted models are also an option. We work through these choices using realistic architectures.

How does AI engineering differ from classic machine learning?

In classic machine learning you train your own models on your own data. In AI engineering you usually work with pre-trained language models via APIs or self-hosted models and focus on context, retrieval, tools, evaluation and operations. Statistics and training know-how matter less, while software engineering skills matter all the more. That is precisely where this course comes in.

How do we know whether our LLM application is good enough?

With an evaluation set of realistic questions and expected results, a mix of rule-based checks, LLM-as-a-judge and human spot checks, plus monitoring in production. The key is running evaluations automatically on every change. In the course you build such a setup and learn to calibrate judge models.

How much does “RAG & LLM Applications for AI Engineers” cost?

The course costs a flat €949 plus VAT per participant – whether online or on-site. This includes 6 hours of live training with a trainer, course materials, a lab environment and a certificate of attendance.

Can I suggest my own date?

Yes. For every location we suggest a date roughly four weeks ahead. In the request form you can always describe your preferred date or period in free text – we check availability and get back to you within one working day.

Is the course online or on-site?

Both are possible: live online in a virtual classroom or on-site in Munich, Salzburg, Berlin, Augsburg, Hanover, Bremen, Stuttgart and Kaiserslautern. We can also run the course exclusively for your team.

Can the course be tailored to our team?

Yes. Tailor-made courses cost approx. €4,500 more, depending on the topic and by arrangement. We agree content, examples and exercises with you in advance.

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