Four contract dimensions
The framework separates task, authority, work package, and acceptance context so delegated agent work can be reviewed precisely.
Draft v0.1
Delegation Contract Specification
A compact vocabulary for describing what software agents are allowed to do, how much autonomy they have, and where human acceptance enters the workflow.
Open draft specification proposal. Not a formal standard.
delegation_contract.yaml
v0.1
- entry
- issue | prompt | ticket
- authority
- L2, L3, L4
- package
- branch + tests + PR
- acceptance
- human merge gate
Functions x levels profile
Delegated coding runs can be described across acquisition, analysis, decision selection, and implementation.
Designed for review
The goal is not to rank tools. It is to make agent-produced software work easier to scope, inspect, accept, or reject.
What this site contains
Delegation Contract is a draft specification for describing work handed to software agents. It defines how teams describe task entry, agent authority, work package, and acceptance context.
“Coding agent” now describes everything from local autocomplete to cloud agents that open pull requests. A delegation contract says what was delegated, what the agent could execute, what artifact it must return, and where a human must approve the result.
Current artifacts
The v0.1 draft spells out the main delegation fields and the automation profile used in the companion paper. The template page offers short examples for issues, pull requests, or internal runbooks.
This site is deliberately small. It serves as a stable reference point for a paper draft and for implementation experiments. The vocabulary is not yet a formal standard.
Current status
This is an open draft proposal maintained by Vincent Schmalbach. It is not affiliated with a standards body, vendor, or product category owner. The draft may change as the paper and implementation examples are revised.