| name | arbor-agent-search |
| description | Related-work and novelty annotation phase for Arbor. Use after a node has been experimentally validated, especially before merge decisions, to emulate SearchIdeaContext/SearchIdeaContextParallel/SearchStatus, validated-node gating, background SearchAgent behavior, and structured prior-art summaries. |
Arbor Search Agent
Use this for post-experiment related-work annotation. It is not for internal
codebase search; use normal file tools for that.
Eligibility Gate
By default, only search nodes that are validated and effective:
- node status is
done or merged;
- node has a numeric score;
- score improves over current
trunk_score, or over baseline_score if trunk
is unavailable.
Skip pending, running, unscored, and below-trunk nodes. This keeps novelty cost
tied to merge candidates.
When To Search
- After
RunExecutor returns a node with score > trunk_score.
- Before
GitMergeBranch when novelty or related work affects the decision.
- After parallel executor results, annotate all sibling winners with
SearchIdeaContextParallel.
Do not search trivial parameter tweaks, pure scale-ups, or internal codebase
questions.
SearchAgent Task
The SearchAgent is a novelty scout. It does not implement, critique, or change
the idea. It surveys prior work and writes a Markdown annotation to
node.related_work.
Use 2-3 query angles:
- technique class;
- application domain;
- key mechanism.
For ML/NLP literature, use English academic queries with words such as
paper, arxiv, or survey; include one original-language query when useful.
Hard Caps
- At most 2 search rounds.
- Visit up to 5 pages total.
- Keep the result short enough for a researcher to judge novelty quickly.
Final JSON Schema
When running an isolated SearchAgent, ask it to emit only:
{
"summary": "2-4 sentences describing prior work.",
"related_papers": [
{
"title": "Paper title",
"url": "https://...",
"one_line_relevance": "Why this is relevant."
}
],
"novelty_assessment": "novel | partial-overlap | prior-art-exists",
"overlap_risks": "What specifically overlaps, or 'none'."
}
Render it into:
### Summary
...
### Related Papers
- [Title](url) - relevance
### Novelty
novel | partial-overlap | prior-art-exists - justification
### Overlap Risks
...
Background Behavior
Native Arbor usually runs SearchAgent in the background:
SearchIdeaContext returns a dispatch message immediately.- The coordinator continues IDEATE/DISPATCH work.
- The result lands on
node.related_work later.
SearchStatus reports in-flight searches.- Shutdown waits for pending searches to flush.
When emulating in a host that lacks background tasks, run search synchronously
and update related_work before merging.
Failure Handling
Failures are non-blocking. Write a marker such as:
[search-failed: <reason>]
Treat it as no information, not evidence of novelty.
