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coyote/docs/testing/plans/11-sub-agent-spawning.md
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Test Plan: Sub-Agent Spawning

Feature description

Agents with can_spawn_agents=true can spawn child agents that run in parallel as background tokio tasks. Children communicate results back to the parent via collect/check. Escalation allows children to request user input through the parent.

Behaviors to test

Spawn

  • agent__spawn creates child agent in background (integration)
  • Child gets own RequestContext with incremented depth (integration)
  • Child gets own session, model, functions (integration)
  • Child gets shared root_escalation_queue (integration)
  • Child gets inbox for teammate messaging (integration)
  • Child MCP servers acquired if configured (integration)
  • Max concurrent agents enforced (Supervisor.register)
  • Max depth enforced (Supervisor.register)
  • Agent not found → error (integration)
  • can_spawn_agents=false → no spawn tools available (integration)

Collect/Check

  • agent__check returns PENDING or result (integration)
  • agent__collect blocks until done, returns output (integration)
  • Output summarization when exceeds threshold (integration)
  • Summarization uses configured model (integration)

Task queue

  • agent__task_create creates tasks with dependencies
  • agent__task_complete marks done, unblocks dependents
  • Auto-dispatch agent/prompt stored on task
  • agent__task_list shows all tasks with status

Escalation

  • Escalation submitted and retrievable
  • Pending summary contains correct fields
  • Reply reaches receiver via oneshot channel
  • Escalation timeout → fallback message (integration)

Teammate messaging

  • Deliver to inbox
  • Drain empties inbox
  • Drain ordering: shutdown > task_completed > text

Child agent lifecycle

  • run_child_agent loops (integration)
  • Child uses before/after_chat_completion (integration)
  • Child tool calls evaluated (integration)
  • Child exits cleanly (integration)

Context switching scenarios

  • Parent spawns child with MCP (integration)
  • Parent exits agent → all children cancelled (integration)
  • Multiple children share escalation queue correctly (integration)

Additional behaviors tested (not in original plan)

  • EscalationQueue: default, submit, take, take_nonexistent, has_pending
  • EscalationQueue: pending_summary with/without options, empty
  • EscalationQueue: reply via oneshot channel
  • new_escalation_id: prefix and uniqueness
  • Inbox: new/default empty, deliver+drain, drain empties, multiple deliveries
  • Inbox: clone preserves messages, clone is independent
  • Supervisor: new defaults, register count, take removes, take nonexistent
  • Supervisor: inbox accessor, list_agents, task_queue accessible
  • Supervisor: register allows at max_depth boundary
  • AgentExitStatus: equality/inequality
  • TaskQueue: fail sets status, get missing returns None
  • TaskQueue: dispatch_agent/prompt stored, claim blocked fails
  • TaskQueue: list sorted by id, default empty
  • TaskQueue: dependency on nonexistent errors, complete nonexistent
  • TaskNode: is_runnable when pending+unblocked, not when blocked

Old code reference

  • src/function/supervisor.rs — all handler functions
  • src/supervisor/ — Supervisor, EscalationQueue, Inbox, TaskQueue