CSE Roadmap

Common tier · about 4 hours · 6 parts

Part 2 of 6 · 2 min read

Definitions and setup

Covers: Definitions; The monitoring loop.

Definitions

Success criteria, verifier, claim

  • Success criteria: conditions that define when the goal is met, written so they can be checked mechanically (tests pass, a field is present, a number is within a range) or by a rubric.
  • Verifier: a check that is independent of the agent's own judgement: a test suite, a validator, a second model with a rubric, or a person.
  • Claim: the agent saying that the task is done.

Budget, stall, drift, loop

  • Budget: a hard limit on steps, tokens, money or time.
  • Stall: a period with no measurable progress.
  • Loop: the agent repeats the same action or message without effect.
  • Drift: the agent works on something other than the goal.

Progress ledger, replan, escalation

  • Progress ledger: an explicit, per-step record of whether the request is satisfied, whether progress is being made, and what happens next (as in Magentic-One).
  • Replan: giving a stalled agent new instructions or a new plan.
  • Escalation: stopping and handing the task to a person (or a more capable system) with what has been tried.

The monitoring loop

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goal is a contract: success criteria, limits, and who checks themGoal specificationcheckable success criteriabudget: steps, cost, timestop and escalation rulesAgent stepreason, call a toolmay claim 'done'Monitor (progress ledger)new subgoal done? repeating? off topic?steps without progress, replans usedspend against budgetdecideContinueprogress is being madeReplanstalled: new instructions, once or twiceVerify and stopclaim of done, checked by tests or a checkerEscalatestalled after replans, or over budgetThree ways to stop: a budget (steps, cost, time), the agent saying it is done, or an outside signal (a person, an API).A claim of done is a hypothesis, so something that is not the agent should check it. A budget is a limit, not a goal.An impossible task needs an escalation path; otherwise it runs until the budget ends.Termination patterns: budget-based, semantic, external signals.
Goal specification, agent step, monitor, and four decisions: continue, replan, verify and stop, escalate.

In the simulation the monitor does three things after every step: it checks whether a new subgoal was completed; if the agent claims to be done, it asks the verifier; and if there has been no progress for stall_k steps it replans, and after more than two replans in a row without progress it escalates. The replan counter resets when progress resumes.