In short
A script that refuses bad output before it ships. The agent does not get to decide whether its work is good enough. The validator does.
A validator is a small program that checks output against rules and fails loudly when a rule is broken. A page with two images side by side. A post without a required section. A file that will not compile. The validator catches it and the agent must fix it before anything publishes.
Validators exist because agents are confident and sometimes wrong. A rule in prose gets interpreted. A rule in a validator gets enforced. Every validator we write started as a real failure: something shipped broken, we wrote the check, and it has not shipped broken since.
This is the mechanical half of quality. The other half is a person reading the output. We do both.
Example
What it looks like.
Running the check:$ validate post.mdERROR: two image components are adjacent (children get dropped on render)ERROR: excerpt is 171 characters; limit is 160Nothing publishes until it prints PASS.
Related
Read next.
- evaluationGrading the work. Measuring whether an agent's output meets the bar, so changes can be tested instead of hoped for.Read the definition
- doctrineThe set of written rules every agent in a company follows. Voice, safety, reporting, git. Written once, applied everywhere.Read the definition
- output contractThe rule that says what an agent may say when it is done: one line if something needs a human, nothing at all otherwise.Read the definition