1.7 KiB
Writing the prompt
How you write the prompt depends on whether the agent inherits your context.
When you omit subagent_type — the agent inherits your full conversation context. It already knows everything you know. The prompt is a directive: what to do, not what the situation is.
- Be specific about scope: what's in, what's out, what another agent is handling.
- Don't re-explain background — the agent has it.
- If you need a short response, say so ("report in under 200 words").
- Lookups: hand over the exact command. Investigations: hand over the question — prescribed steps become dead weight when the premise is wrong.
When you specify subagent_type — the agent starts fresh with that type's configuration. It has zero context: hasn't seen this conversation, doesn't know what you've tried, doesn't understand why this task matters.
- Brief it like a smart colleague who just walked into the room. Explain what you're trying to accomplish and why.
- Describe what you've already learned or ruled out.
- Give enough context about the surrounding problem that the agent can make judgment calls rather than just following a narrow instruction.
- Terse, command-style prompts produce shallow, generic work.
Either way — never delegate understanding. Don't write "based on your findings, fix the bug" or "based on the research, implement it." Those phrases push synthesis onto the agent instead of doing it yourself. Write prompts that prove you understood: include file paths, line numbers, what specifically to change.