Defining agents

Everything you author is an Agent. A simple LLM agent, a tool-using agent, and a multi-agent orchestration are all the same Agent class with different options.

All snippets import from @io-orkes/conductor-javascript/agents and assume a runtime:

import { Agent, AgentRuntime, tool } from '@io-orkes/conductor-javascript/agents';
const runtime = new AgentRuntime();

Defining an agent

const agent = new Agent({
  name: 'greeter',                 // required; must match /^[a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9_-]*$/
  model: 'anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6',     // provider/model string
  instructions: 'Keep answers short.',
  temperature: 0.7,
  maxTurns: 25,                    // default 25
  maxTokens: 2048,
  timeoutSeconds: 0,               // 0 = server default
});

There is also a functional form, agent(fn, options), where fn is the dynamic-instructions callable (see below):

import { agent } from '@io-orkes/conductor-javascript/agents';

const a = agent(() => 'You are a helpful assistant.', {
  name: 'helper',
  model: 'anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6',
});

Instructions

Instructions can be a plain string, a callable, or a server-managed prompt template.

// Static
new Agent({ name: 'a', model, instructions: 'You are concise.' });

// Dynamic (callable) — evaluated to a string when the agent is serialized
new Agent({ name: 'a', model, instructions: () => `Today is ${new Date().toDateString()}.` });

// Server-managed prompt template (referenced by name + version)
import { PromptTemplate } from '@io-orkes/conductor-javascript/agents';
new Agent({
  name: 'a',
  model,
  instructions: new PromptTemplate('support_greeting', { brand: 'Acme' }, 1),
});

An omitted model is valid only for inherited-model designs (a sub-agent that takes its model from its parent) or external-agent designs (external: true).

Agent-from-method (@AgentDec / agentsFrom)

Define agents as decorated methods on a class and extract them:

import { AgentDec, agentsFrom } from '@io-orkes/conductor-javascript/agents';

class MyAgents {
  @AgentDec({ name: 'summarizer', model: 'anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6', instructions: 'Summarize text.' })
  summarize() {}

  @AgentDec({ name: 'classifier', model: 'anthropic/claude-sonnet-4-6', instructions: 'Classify text.' })
  classify() {}
}

const [summarizer, classifier] = agentsFrom(new MyAgents());   // Agent[]

@AgentDec/@Tool are TypeScript experimental decorators — set "experimentalDecorators": true in your tsconfig.json.

Common failures

• A model error normally means the provider credential or model is missing on the server, not merely in the local process.
• A name that doesn't match ^[a-zA-Z][a-zA-Z0-9_-]*$ is rejected at serialization time.

Next steps

Use tools for capabilities, multi-agent for composition, and runtime modes for deployment. See the Agent definition reference for the full options table.