Files
deepseek-harness/packages/core/agent-loop
Tianyi Cui 7aabd2a3df Add in-process subagent backends: spawn (fresh) and fork (seeded)
The second PR of the subagent seam: the two in-process backends that run a
child agent on the same cordis context, reusing the agent factory's quiescent
AgentHandle teardown. Both register on ctx.subagents (PR1's named-provider
registry) and share one run driver.

- dsh-subagent-spawn: a FRESH child via ctx.agents.create — own session, the
  parent's model by default (overridable), zero inherited conversation. Also
  exports the shared in-process run driver (startInProcessRun): mint ids, stamp
  cwd/parentSession-lineage/depth, drive the one-shot (send → whenIdle), read
  the last assistant/message + turn/end reason, dispose to quiescence.
- dsh-subagent-fork: a child SEEDED with the parent's balanced completed-turn
  prefix (the log up to and including its last turn/end), so the child inherits
  context. The in-flight unbalanced turn is excluded — a raw seed would fail the
  invariants replay. Proven: a regression test goes red if the boundary seeds
  the open turn.
- Seam extension: CreateAgentOptions.seed, threaded through AgentLoop.createAgent
  → ctx.sessions.prepare({ seed }) (the primitive resume already used). This is
  the fork-lineage path the TODO(sub-agents) markers anticipated.
- Depth: a merge-extensible AgentOptions.subagentDepth (0 top-level, parent+1 for
  a child); the depthLimit capability refuses a spawn past request.maxDepth.

Tests: real-loop unit tests for both backends (mock MODEL only, real loop +
invariants), a multi-subagent test (one parent drives a fork AND a spawn child
then keeps working), and a with-key e2e (a real parent delegates via the
`subagent` tool to a real child that writes a file on disk — world-verified).
100% per-file coverage. The coding-agent demo wires the spawn backend + tool.

Snapshot coverage of nested agents is deferred to a stacked follow-up
(TODO(subagent-snapshots)): dsh-llm-replay is a single global positional cursor
that cannot route calls to a parent vs. a child on one context. Recorded in the
RFC's deferrals and a new AGENTS.md rule: designing a subsystem must design its
test infrastructure END TO END up front, verifying the snapshot/e2e harness can
express the new shape — a gap this plan hit.
2026-06-22 05:58:40 +08:00
..

dsh-agent-loop

THE concrete agent plugin: ReactLoopAgent and the loop driver. Implements the Agent interface and drives the session/turn/step lifecycle.

This is the only package in the harness that contains concrete loop logic. Everything else is an abstract service or a plugin against extension seams — new behavior goes into plugins, not here.

Service: AgentLoop (ctx key: agentLoop)

Public API

  • ctx.agentLoop.create(id: string, options?: AgentOptions): ReactLoopAgent — config-driven create: an agent on a fresh per-run session id ${id}-session-<uuid> (no cwd). Used for cordis.yml-configured agents. The per-run uuid avoids colliding with the on-disk log a prior run materialized once a durable persistence backend is loaded; each run is a new session (a deliberate demo simplification — a real resume-or-create policy is a TODO). Disposed with the calling fiber.

AgentLoop also implements the AgentFactory seam and registers itself via ctx.agents.setFactory(this), so plugins create/resume agents through ctx.agents (the interface):

  • ctx.agents.create({ agentId, sessionId, meta?, agentOptions? }): AgentHandle — programmatic create on a caller-supplied sessionId (e.g. an ACP-generated id), NOT ${id}-session. Returns an AgentHandle — the owner disposes it to tear down exactly this agent (stop loop + await quiescence + unregister + remove session).
  • ctx.agents.resume({ agentId, resumeSessionId, agentOptions? }): Promise<AgentHandle> — load a persisted session via ctx.sessionPersistence (session persistence) and resume an agent on it. The live session id is the resumed id; turn numbering and derived history continue from the loaded log. Requires a session-persistence backend (NOT hard-injected — non-persistent demos still work; resume rejects with a clear error when persistence is absent). Returns an AgentHandle.

The config-driven ctx.agentLoop.create() path keeps its agent owned by the loop fiber (it discards the handle) — only the programmatic factory callers (the ACP bridge) hold a handle and own per-agent teardown.

Injected services

agents, sessions, llm, tools, systemPrompt — all five interface services.

Configuration (schemastery)

interface Config {
  agents: Array<{
    id: string                 // required
    model?: string
    systemPrompt?: string
  }>
}

Agents listed in config are auto-created at startup.

Classes

  • ReactLoopAgent — the concrete Agent implementation. Owns the inbox (Inbox), the per-step AbortController, and the loop driver. Everything observable happens through session events and the agent/* event taxonomy.
  • Inbox — per-agent queued + steering FIFOs (enqueue, steer, drainQueued, drainSteering, waitForQueued).

Loop lifecycle (loop.ts)

One invocation of runLoop() drives one agent for its whole lifetime:

forever:
  wait for queued messages (idle)
  TURN (error-contained):
    drain queued → 'turn/start' → session('user/message')
    STEP loop:
      drain steering
      assembly = systemPrompt.assemble()
      request = waterfall agent/request
      stream llm.stream(request) → session('assistant/chunk')
      message = waterfall agent/step-result
      session('assistant/message')
      each tool-call: session('tool/call') → tools.execute() → session('tool/result')
      drain steering → session('steering/message')
      cont = waterfall agent/turn-continuation
      if !cont: break
    session('turn/end')
    await session/flush
    re-enqueue leftover steering as queued
  idle unless more queued

Error containment: a throwing plugin ends the turn, never the loop. Dispose mid-turn emits agent/status('disposed') and ends with reason disposed. A step that hits the model's output-token ceiling makes the turn end max-tokens (the rule: any max-tokens step in the turn surfaces as max-tokens; disposed/aborted/error still take precedence) — distinct from a clean completed stop.

Cancellation: agent.cancel() is the single public stop primitive — it clears the queued + steering FIFOs, aborts the in-flight step, and drives a turn-scoped marker the driver checks at every point a turn could start or continue (right after the idle wait, after the running flip, before each step, and at the continuation gate) so a turn about to start is dropped. A cancelled turn ends aborted; a queued-but-not-started prompt never runs and cannot be batched into the cancelled turn. The marker is reset once per loop iteration, so a cancel governs exactly one turn and never leaks onto a later prompt. (The loop still aborts its own per-step AbortController directly on disposal and from cancel(); that controller is loop-internal, not a public verb.)

What is NOT here

Everything that goes beyond "call the model, run the tools, repeat" belongs to plugins listening on the event taxonomy:

  • Hooks: agent/request, agent/step-result, tools/execute, agent/turn-continuation
  • Compaction: agent/request
  • Sandbox, permission, plan mode: tools/execute
  • Sub-agents: TODO seam on AgentLoop.create()
  • Persistence: session/event + session/flush
  • UI: agent/stream-chunk + agent/* events