Decoding the new AI lingo: Loops, harnesses, squads, hill climbing… oh my!
Marlene Mhangami, a guest on the GitHub podcast, together with the author, reviewed the AI terms that developers are learning, including loop engineering, Ralph loops, squads, harness engineering, hill climbing, etc. Loop engineering refers to designing repeatable systems around agents to replace single prompts; Ralph loops is a way of completing tasks through continuous iteration, which is efficient but resource-intensive. Squads and fleets describe teams composed of agents with different roles and groups of agents working concurrently. Harness refers to external systems (such as tools, permissions, context) that enable models to play a role in processes, and harness engineering involves designing to optimize these systems. Hill climbing refers to continuously improving agents and harnesss through evaluation feedback…