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4. What technologies are used to build Agentic Agents?

Building an Agentic Agent involves orchestrating several complementary technologies — including large language models, memory systems, planning engines, tool integration layers, and event-driven execution frameworks. These components work together to simulate autonomy, memory, adaptability, and purpose-driven behavior.

⚙️ Core Technology Stack Overview

  • LLM (Large Language Model): The reasoning engine — processes natural language, generates responses, plans actions, and performs inference.
  • Memory System: Stores past experiences, goals, interactions, and facts using vector databases or custom memory layers.
  • Planner/Controller: Generates action plans based on goals; breaks them down into steps (sometimes hierarchically).
  • Tool Integration Layer: Enables interaction with external APIs, scripts, environments, and databases.
  • Event Loop or Agent Runtime: Keeps the agent “alive” across sessions, manages timing, schedules tasks, and supports reactivity.

🧠 Core Language Model Options

  • OpenAI GPT-4 / GPT-4o – Popular, robust reasoning and tool-use capabilities (via function calling).
  • Anthropic Claude – Excellent for reflective reasoning and long-context tasks.
  • Google Gemini – Great for multimodal and grounded tasks.
  • Mistral / Mixtral – Lightweight open-source alternatives with agent use cases.
  • LLaMA 3 / Orca / Zephyr – Open models often used for fine-tuning agent behaviors.

🧩 Memory Layer Technologies

  • Vector DBs: Pinecone, Weaviate, Chroma, Qdrant — store and retrieve embeddings of past interactions.
  • Structured Memory: Use JSON, YAML, or SQL for storing state, goals, timelines, and history.
  • Hybrid Systems: Combine vector and relational storage to track semantic and factual knowledge.

🔧 Tool Use & Function Interfaces

  • LangChain Tooling: Wraps functions, APIs, and I/O operations as callable tools by the agent.
  • OpenAI Function Calling: Natively supports JSON-based tool schemas.
  • Serverless MCP (Model Context Protocol): Emerging standard for agent-safe tool access via microservices.
  • Browser/Terminal Agents: Use Puppeteer, Playwright, or subprocess runners for web or CLI automation.

🧠 Planning and Control Strategies

  • ReAct (Reason + Act): Chain-of-thought prompting with action execution in loops.
  • BabyAGI: Loop-based task execution with memory and recursive goal creation.
  • Task Decomposition: Agents that break large goals into smaller plans (e.g., hierarchical planners).
  • Self-Reflective Agents: Use prompts like “Was this effective?” or “Should I revise my plan?”

🏗️ Frameworks and Libraries

  • LangChain: Framework for LLM agents with memory, tool use, and chains.
  • CrewAI: Agent collaboration and role-based tasking system.
  • OpenAgents: Meta’s multi-agent coordination and execution framework.
  • Semantic Kernel (Microsoft): .NET/JS/Java toolkit for agent memory and skills.
  • AutoGen (Microsoft): Multi-agent orchestration library based on collaborative AI.

🗃️ Storage & State Persistence

  • JSON/YAML: Lightweight persistent store for single-agent state.
  • PostgreSQL/SQLite: For structured plans, identities, and agent memories.
  • Redis: Fast key-value caching and state tracking for live agents.

🔐 Agent Safety & Governance Tools

  • Guardrails.ai / Rebuff.ai: Set boundaries for prompt output and function calls.
  • Prompt Injection Defense: Regex filters, role segmentation, and authorization gates.
  • Telemetry Dashboards: Monitor agent actions, tool use, and memory reads.

🚀 Full Example Stack (Simple Agent)

  • LLM: GPT-4 via OpenAI API
  • Memory: Chroma vector DB + JSON plan tracker
  • Planning: ReAct-style CoT reasoning
  • Tool Use: LangChain Python tools (search, file, email)
  • Orchestration: CrewAI with scheduled loops

📘 Summary

Agentic agents are powered by a layered tech stack that integrates language understanding, memory, planning, tooling, and scheduling. While the LLM is at the heart of it all, the supporting infrastructure — memory systems, function interfaces, and control logic — is what makes these agents capable of persistent, autonomous, and intelligent behavior.