Agent harness capabilities

We think of deepagents as an “agent harness”. It is the same core tool calling loop as other agent frameworks, but with built-in tools and capabilities.

This page lists out the components that make up the agent harness.

File system access

The harness provides six tools for file system operations, making files first-class citizens in the agent’s environment:

Tool	Description
ls	List files in a directory with metadata (size, modified time)
read_file	Read file contents with line numbers, supports offset/limit for large files
write_file	Create new files
edit_file	Perform exact string replacements in files (with global replace mode)
glob	Find files matching patterns (e.g., **/*.py)
grep	Search file contents with multiple output modes (files only, content with context, or counts)

Large tool result eviction

The harness automatically dumps large tool results to the file system when they exceed a token threshold, preventing context window saturation.

How it works:

• Monitors tool call results for size (default threshold: 20,000 tokens)
• When exceeded, writes the result to a file instead
• Replaces the tool result with a concise reference to the file
• Agent can later read the file if needed

Pluggable storage backends

The harness abstracts file system operations behind a protocol, allowing different storage strategies for different use cases.

Available backends:

1. StateBackend - Ephemeral in-memory storage

   • Files live in the agent’s state (checkpointed with conversation)
   • Persists within a thread but not across threads
   • Useful for temporary working files

2. FilesystemBackend - Real filesystem access

   • Read/write from actual disk
   • Supports virtual mode (sandboxed to a root directory)
   • Integrates with system tools (ripgrep for grep)
   • Security features: path validation, size limits, symlink prevention

3. StoreBackend - Persistent cross-conversation storage

   • Uses LangGraph’s BaseStore for durability
   • Namespaced per assistant_id
   • Files persist across conversations
   • Useful for long-term memory or knowledge bases

4. CompositeBackend - Route different paths to different backends

   • Example: / → StateBackend, /memories/ → StoreBackend
   • Longest-prefix matching for routing
   • Enables hybrid storage strategies

Task delegation (subagents)

The harness allows the main agent to create ephemeral “subagents” for isolated multi-step tasks.

Why it’s useful:

• Context isolation - Subagent’s work doesn’t clutter main agent’s context
• Parallel execution - Multiple subagents can run concurrently
• Specialization - Subagents can have different tools/configurations
• Token efficiency - Large subtask context is compressed into a single result

How it works:

• Main agent has a task tool
• When invoked, creates a fresh agent instance with its own context
• Subagent executes autonomously until completion
• Returns a single final report to the main agent
• Subagents are stateless (can’t send multiple messages back)

Default subagent:

• “general-purpose” subagent automatically available
• Has filesystem tools by default
• Can be customized with additional tools/middleware

Custom subagents:

• Define specialized subagents with specific tools
• Example: code-reviewer, web-researcher, test-runner
• Configure via subagents parameter

Conversation history summarization

The harness automatically compresses old conversation history when token usage becomes excessive.

Configuration:

• Triggers at 170,000 tokens
• Keeps the most recent 6 messages intact
• Older messages are summarized by the model

Why it’s useful:

• Enables very long conversations without hitting context limits
• Preserves recent context while compressing ancient history
• Transparent to the agent (appears as a special system message)

Dangling tool call repair

The harness fixes message history when tool calls are interrupted or cancelled before receiving results.

The problem:

• Agent requests tool call: “Please run X”
• Tool call is interrupted (user cancels, error, etc.)
• Agent sees tool_call in AIMessage but no corresponding ToolMessage
• This creates an invalid message sequence

The solution:

• Detects AIMessages with tool_calls that have no results
• Creates synthetic ToolMessage responses indicating the call was cancelled
• Repairs the message history before agent execution

Why it’s useful:

• Prevents agent confusion from incomplete message chains
• Gracefully handles interruptions and errors
• Maintains conversation coherence

To-do list tracking

The harness provides a write_todos tool that agents can use to maintain a structured task list.

Features:

• Track multiple tasks with statuses (pending, in_progress, completed)
• Persisted in agent state
• Helps agent organize complex multi-step work
• Useful for long-running tasks and planning

Human-in-the-Loop

The harness pauses agent execution at specified tool calls to allow human approval/modification.

Configuration:

• Map tool names to interrupt configurations
• Example: {"edit_file": True} - pause before every edit
• Can provide approval messages or modify tool inputs

Why it’s useful:

• Safety gates for destructive operations
• User verification before expensive API calls
• Interactive debugging and guidance

Prompt caching (Anthropic)

The harness enables Anthropic’s prompt caching feature to reduce redundant token processing.

How it works:

• Caches portions of the prompt that repeat across turns
• Significantly reduces latency and cost for long system prompts
• Automatically skips for non-Anthropic models

Why it’s useful:

• System prompts (especially with filesystem docs) can be 5k+ tokens
• These repeat every turn without caching
• Caching provides ~10x speedup and cost reduction

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