Agent-Side Search Patterns

Purpose

Documents recommended patterns for agent-side query expansion and reranking, which are caller responsibilities rather than engine features. These patterns are communicated via MCP tool descriptions.

Requirements

Requirement: Query expansion guidance in tool description

The kb_search MCP tool description SHALL include guidance on query expansion as a recommended pattern for complex queries.

Scenario: Tool description includes expansion pattern

WHEN an agent reads the kb_search tool description
THEN the description SHALL include guidance such as: "For complex queries, consider expanding into 2-3 variant phrasings and calling this tool multiple times, then deduplicating results by chunk_id"

Requirement: Reranking guidance in tool description

The kb_search MCP tool description SHALL include guidance on agent-side reranking as a recommended pattern for improving precision.

Scenario: Tool description includes reranking pattern

WHEN an agent reads the kb_search tool description
THEN the description SHALL include guidance such as: "For precision, rerank the returned results using your own judgement based on relevance to the original question"

Requirement: No engine-side LLM dependency

The engine SHALL NOT require or use any external LLM API for search operations. Query expansion and reranking SHALL remain entirely agent-side concerns.

Scenario: Engine has no LLM dependency

WHEN the engine is deployed without any ANTHROPIC_API_KEY or similar LLM API configuration
THEN all search operations SHALL function fully, with no degraded results or missing features

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