AGENT MODELER NOTATION
A drawing where every element means something.
Agent Modeler Notation (AMN) is the visual modelling and specification language at the core of Agent Modeler. It describes the intended structure, authority, boundaries and behaviour of an agentic system.
AMN makes explicit what can otherwise remain scattered across prompts, configuration files, framework definitions and code.
MORE THAN BOXES AND ARROWS
The relationships carry meaning.
Each modelled relationship represents a distinct design decision. Delegating work is different from handing work off. Reporting to a person is different from stopping until that person decides. Defining a tool is different from granting an agent permission to use it.
Responsibility
Describe agents, subagents, people and systems, including what each one is responsible for.
Authority
Separate a tool's contract from the grant that authorizes a particular agent to use it.
Coordination
Distinguish delegation, handoffs, reporting, collaboration and decisions that require a person.
State and boundaries
Record stores, access, agent states, system inputs and outputs, and the people or systems the design depends on.
FROM MODEL TO SPECIFICATION
The model becomes a specification.
Agent Modeler turns an AMN model into a structured specification that can guide a human developer or a coding agent.
AMN travels with the export. The generated specification records the AMN version and carries the model in two forms: readable AMN sentences and a structured contract for implementation and later comparison. The drawing does not become a screenshot. Its declared elements, relationships, authority and boundaries remain part of the exported specification.
The export also carries a fingerprint of the design generation it came from. When the design changes, the fingerprint changes with it. This keeps implementations, traces and test evidence connected to the design they actually belong to.
DESIGNED FOR EXAMINATION
Ask precise questions before and after implementation.
Because AMN gives modelled elements and relationships defined meanings, Agent Modeler can examine the design and identify questions that later evidence can help answer.
- Does a delegation structure contain a cycle?
- Is a handoff loop bounded?
- Can an agent reach an irreversible tool without an appropriate approval or escalation path?
- Is a store written but never read?
- Does an observed sequence contradict an agent's declared state model?
Some questions can be checked directly from the model. Others become investigations that require implementation or execution evidence.
AMN supplies the reference. Evidence supplies the observation.
FROM INTENT TO EVIDENCE
One declared design across the engineering path.
Model
Describe the intended agent system visually.
Specify
Turn the drawing into an explicit, versioned specification.
Investigate
Design tests from the responsibilities, boundaries, states and relationships declared in the model.
Compare
Examine implementation and execution evidence against the matching design generation.
A NOTATION FOR AGENT SYSTEMS
Agentic does not mean ungoverned.
An agent may have agency within its role without having unlimited authority. AMN provides a way to describe where that authority begins, where it ends and when another agent or person must become involved.
The design becomes the reference.
AMN is a Marcozza-developed notation implemented by Agent Modeler. It is under active development and is not an industry standard or certification framework.