Inside AI Agents / for engineers and architects

A supervised team on a shared blackboard

No agent calls another directly. Each writes its slice of one shared state and names who acts next. The graph turns that name into an edge. This is the internal form of agent coordination, and it is what keeps the system inspectable and extensible.

System Design The Agent Team How a Question Flows Models and Dynamic UI Trust and Responsibility
The agent team

Six specialists, one shared mind.

Splitting the work gives each agent a narrow brief: easier to prompt, cheaper to run on a right-sized model, simpler to test in isolation. Coordination lives in the state, not in a call graph between agents.

Supervisor reads state, decides next_agent Sanjanaonboarding, language Dr. Nilathe consultation Deep researcherexternal evidence Generative UIbuilds the payload UX scoresilent sentiment SHARED BLACKBOARD / AgentState messages · user_profile · consultation_history · research_topic raw_research_data · ux_score · ui_state · next_agent
Solid lines: the supervisor routes a turn to a node. Dashed teal: every node reads and writes the shared state, which the supervisor reads to route the next step.

The roster

Router

Supervisor

Reads the blackboard and sets the next agent. Holds no domain opinions; it only routes.

Persona

Sanjana

The receptionist. Collects identity, role and language, then hands off. Never advises.

Persona

Dr. Nila

The consultant. Adapts to sentiment and to student or parent. Requests research when a claim needs evidence.

Worker

Deep researcher

Gathers external evidence through the one research tool boundary, inline or as a background job.

Sensor

UX score

Silently scores engagement each turn so the consultant can adjust. Never speaks to the visitor.

Renderer

Generative UI

Turns a consultation turn into a typed component payload the frontend mounts.

Why a blackboard, not direct calls

Coordination in shared state keeps agents independent and the flow inspectable at every step. Adding an agent is giving it a region of state and a slot in the routing table. A formal agent-to-agent protocol solves external interop, a different problem, deliberately out of scope for version one.