---
id: agent-instructions
title: Agent instructions
summary: Rules coding agents should follow when using Teammately public docs as source context.
kind: reference
product_area: reference
status: stable
updated: 2026-08-23
canonical: /docs/agent-instructions
---

# Agent instructions

Use this page as the behavioral policy for agents operating with Teammately docs. For route selection and context packaging, read [Agent context index](/docs/agent-context).

## Task intent

Answer Teammately product and docs questions safely without inventing unsupported product claims. The agent should preserve source confidence, cite stable pages, and ask for confirmation when a claim depends on draft, inferred, or missing evidence.

## Required context

- Read [/docs/llms.txt](/docs/llms.txt) first for the recommended context loading strategy.
- Use [Agent context index](/docs/agent-context) to choose the smallest relevant context pack.
- Use page-local markdown or llms routes for exact wording.
- Use the manifest or page API when source confidence, source refs, related IDs, or metadata matter.
- In an MCP client, search first and fetch the cited page or block before relying on exact wording.

## Allowed assumptions

- Code-backed pages can support object, state, and workflow claims when source_refs are present.
- Doctrine-backed pages can support positioning, lifecycle, category language, and public narrative.
- Docs-backed pages can support claims about routes, llms files, manifests, search, context APIs, and validation behavior.
- Stable public pages supersede older draft or removed pages.

## Forbidden assumptions

- Do not present draft schema pages as public schemas.
- Do not infer public APIs, SDKs, API keys, auth behavior, rate limits, billing, compliance, tenant isolation, deployment modes, support guarantees, customer names, model-provider integrations, or production monitoring behavior.
- Do not treat AI-assisted suggestions as approved policies, rubrics, or review context unless a stable page says a human approved them.
- Do not collapse Teammately into eval dashboards, observability, annotation, prompt testing, generic LLMOps, or a replacement for adjacent tools.
- Do not use internal source file names as public UI promises unless the public docs already state the behavior.

## How to answer safely

1. Identify whether the user is asking for positioning, operating steps, object behavior, recovery, or implementation context.
2. Load the smallest matching context pack or query-scoped context.
3. Check source confidence before making claims.
4. Prefer stable page citations over broad corpus summaries.
5. If search returns an AI Overview, verify its block references with `fetch`; treat the overview as routing assistance rather than independent authority.
6. State uncertainty when a claim is inferred, draft-only, or outside the docs.
7. Ask for human confirmation before advising changes that depend on permissions, compliance, deployment, billing, customer-facing APIs, or unsupported integrations.

## When to ask for human confirmation

- The user asks whether an inferred or draft schema is a public contract.
- The answer would require exact UI labels not present in stable docs or source refs.
- The user asks about admin, auth, security, compliance, deployment, billing, or support commitments.
- Related evidence conflicts across docs, product code, and doctrine.
- The requested action could change review context, approval state, or benchmark interpretation without accountable human review.

## Related human docs

{% related-card-grid title="Related human docs" %}
- [Product boundaries](/docs/introduction/product-boundaries)
- [Human approval boundaries](/docs/governance/human-approval-boundaries)
- [What AI Features Can and Cannot Do](/docs/governance/what-ai-features-can-and-cannot-do)
{% /related-card-grid %}

## Related reference docs

{% related-card-grid title="Related reference docs" %}
- [Agent context index](/docs/agent-context)
- [Reference index](/docs/reference)
- [Object model](/docs/object-model)
{% /related-card-grid %}

## Safe operating boundaries

Agents may help readers find pages, summarize stable docs, compare source-confidence labels, and draft operational next steps. Agents should not approve policies, approve rubrics, assign reviewers, declare a candidate ready for rollout, or convert draft/inferred material into public product commitments.

Search mode is diagnostic metadata, not a confidence label. Lexical fallback remains usable when semantic embeddings are unavailable; source confidence still comes from the fetched page metadata and prose.

## Source confidence

Docs-backed: this page is a behavior policy for using the docs system safely. The docs loaders, context routes, and MCP tools establish the available retrieval surfaces, cited block references, and read-only tool boundaries.