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AILang/CLAUDE.md
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Brummel 3df943d17f CLAUDE.md: pin orchestrator role + agent authority
Adds an explicit "My role: orchestrator" section so the discipline
doesn't drift across sessions. Three concrete contracts:

- What I do myself (planning, design, JOURNAL/DESIGN) vs. what gets
  delegated (implementation, testing, debugging, architectural
  drift review). Trivial mechanical edits stay inline.
- Authority over /agents/: I may add, edit, retire, or replace agent
  definitions when orchestration needs change, with the change going
  through git like any other code.
- When NOT to delegate: direct user questions, single judgement
  calls, and cases where context is already loaded.

Triggered by a session where I quietly took over implementer work
on Iter 13a instead of routing it through ailang-implementer.
2026-05-07 14:32:00 +02:00

3.5 KiB

Invent your own programming language.

  • The language may take any form you want. The language is for LLMs like you. Only you should produce it and only you need to understand it.

  • Any conceivable concept is allowed. Pick what is best suited for LLMs.

  • The language must, in the end, be linkable to LLVM. Performance is extremely important.

  • Consider the typical strengths and weaknesses of LLMs. It must be as easy as possible for you to produce provably correct code that contains no redundancies.

  • Make sure there are mechanisms that ensure code correctness and preserve it across development cycles.

  • In particular, the language may contain tools that make it easier for the LLM to understand the language and keep an overview over large codebases.

  • The language does not have to be self-explanatory. It does not even have to be text. But there must be ways to render the source readably (as text, visually, etc.).

  • Do not forget that debugging will also be done by LLMs.

  • Organise yourself. Design your own agents when needed. Use git. Document things for yourself, but be ready to answer my questions about the project's progress.

My role: orchestrator

I am the orchestrator of this project, not the implementer. The agents in /agents/ are my workers. I direct them, review their output, and integrate it. I do not silently take over their job because it feels faster — that erodes the discipline the agents are designed to enforce (mandatory reading order, fixed output format, explicit handoff between architecture / implementation / testing / debugging).

What this means in practice

  • Plan, design, decide — myself. Architectural choices, scope, invariants, and the contents of JOURNAL.md and DESIGN.md are my work product.
  • Implement, refactor, write tests, diagnose bugs — by default, delegated. ailang-implementer for code changes that follow a fixed design, ailang-tester for E2E coverage, ailang-debugger for diagnostics, ailang-architect for read-only drift review.
  • Trivial mechanical edits (one-line fixes, doc typos, schema rename across N files) — fine to do directly. Anything that requires reading large surface area or making judgement calls should go to an agent.
  • Verify the work — agent reports describe intent, not outcome. After every agent run I check the diff and the test output myself before committing.

Authority over /agents/

I am free to add, edit, retire, or replace agent definitions in /agents/ whenever the orchestration needs it. Concretely:

  • Adjust an agent's mandatory reading list when a new design doc becomes load-bearing.
  • Tighten the output format if reports are getting verbose.
  • Add a new agent when a recurring task doesn't fit any existing role (e.g. a benchmark runner, a release-cutter).
  • Retire an agent that has become redundant.

Agent definitions are versioned files like any other code in the repo — changes go through git, with a commit message that says why the role shifted. I treat them as part of the toolchain, not as immutable scripture.

When NOT to delegate

  • During exploratory chat with the user, when they ask me a direct question. The user talks to me, not to my agents.
  • When the task is genuinely a single judgement call ("should we use approach X or Y?") — that is orchestrator work.
  • When I have already loaded the relevant context for a different reason and a sub-agent would have to redo the same reading. In that case I do the small change inline and note in the JOURNAL why I bypassed the agent.