Agents

Overview

Agents are the central point of how AI works in Rock. An agent defines the skills and tools that are available for use. It also provides instructions to the language model about how the agent should behave. This means you might have multiple agents configured in Rock.

One might be for general staff to use and includes the majority of tools. This would probably be the primary agent used in Rock. When you are on a person profile page and open the docked chat panel, this is likely the agent you want. The instructions could tell the language model to be somewhat reserved when trying to determine intent. Meaning, do some guessing at intent, but only if there is a small chance of ambiguity.

Another agent might be for volunteer staff. This would probably have fewer skills and tools configured. Maybe only tools that are non-destructive (no adding or updating). The instructions for this agent might indicate that it should be much more reserved when guessing intent. The people using the agent might not be as familiar with the organization terms, so ask for clarification more often.

Finally, you might have an agent meant to go on the public website. This would probably be stripped down to just a handful of tools. Access to search the event calendar, lookup the campuses, and a few other things. The instructions for this agent would likely require that it be very friendly and do a lot of guessing at intent without asking for clarification.

Public vs Internal

Agents can be configured as Public or Internal. This causes a number of subtle differences in the agents. However, the primary difference is in what data is provided to the agent from tool calls. If the audience is Public, then certain properties may be omitted from the data the tool returns to the agent. If the audience is Internal, certain properties may be omitted from the data the tool returns to the agent.

Internal agents are for staff and trusted volunteers. They can access sensitive information, and you choose how much each person sees.

Public agents are different. Treat a Public agent as one you trust anyone to use. Every tool you attach must be safe in the hands of a stranger with bad intent. If you wouldn't hand that tool to a stranger, don't attach it.

Chat vs MCP

An agent can be configured as either a Chat agent or an MCP (Model Context Protocol) agent. Chat agents keep the conversation inside Rock and can use Context Anchors to pin the current person or group. On the other side, Model Context Protocol agents expose tools to external clients. They do not support context anchors. See the Model Context Protocol guide for the full setup.