Knowledge, memory, skills, and tools
Give agents the right reference material, durable facts, working methods, and capabilities without mixing their purposes.
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Agents perform better when context and capability are organized by purpose. Delegate separates knowledge, memory, skills, and tools so each can be updated, scoped, and reviewed independently.
Use the selected agent's Knowledge and Tools pages to compare these layers with its current configuration.
Knowledge is reference material
Knowledge sources are indexed material an agent can search when relevant. Use them for policies, product documentation, research collections, handbooks, or other bodies of information that should remain attributable to a source.
Knowledge is best when the source has a clear owner and update path. Replacing an outdated source is safer than copying its contents into many agent prompts. An agent still needs instructions about when to consult it and how to handle conflicts or missing evidence.
Memory is a small set of durable facts
Memory retains concise facts that should influence future runs: a stakeholder's stable preference, an agreed convention, or a lesson that repeatedly prevents an error. It is not a dumping ground for transcripts or an alternative to a project record.
Keep memory specific, current, and inspectable. Put project decisions in the project or wiki, source material in knowledge, and task details on the card.
Skills are repeatable methods
A skill teaches a procedure: how to investigate a bug, prepare a meeting brief, reconcile a dataset, or review a contract. Skills can activate always, when relevant, or remain disabled. They may also require certain tool bundles or operating conditions.
Judge a skill by the behavior and outcome it produces, not by the length of its instructions. A useful skill states when it applies, the important sequence, quality checks, boundaries, and what to return.
Tools are capabilities
Tools let an agent do something beyond conversation: read a service, query data, modify a file, browse, or call a controlled HTTP endpoint. Bundles group capabilities that belong together. Custom HTTP tools connect an approved destination and operation.
Tool access is subject to permissions, network policy, secrets, and approvals. An agent may propose a tool or capability it needs, but that proposal does not silently grant access. A person with the right authority reviews the boundary.
Use all four deliberately
Imagine an agent that prepares a weekly customer-health report:
- Knowledge holds the account definitions and scoring policy.
- Memory holds the agreed preference to flag renewals inside 45 days.
- A skill defines the weekly review and verification procedure.
- Tools read the customer system and create the report artifact.
The card supplies this week's outcome and exceptions. The agent's persona supplies its durable professional judgment. Keeping these layers distinct makes the system easier to trust and maintain.