aec-agent-core

The shared core of LLM agents that review and produce architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) documents. It holds what an agent runs below its chat page: the model connections, the vision calls and the file tools beside them, the figure helper with its plotting box, the agent's guards, limits and kept work, Word and Excel in and out, the run record and its checks, and the switches. It has no user interface of its own.

Two applications are built on it:

• GeotechStaffEngineer (pip install geotech-staff-engineer), the geotechnical engineering agent, which pins this package exactly;
• Document Review (pip install aec-document-review), a document review application, which pins this package exactly.

Status

1.0.1 (2026-11-10). Fixes from a deployment review of Document Review (GeotechStaffEngineer's BACKLOG, TA-36): a control character in text no longer loses a Word or Excel file, and Excel text that opens with "=" is written as text; a file name that climbs out of the working folder is not found; the primary agent's model-call budget is noted on the turn, so a host does not start another pass with a new one; a document-tools setting that is not a number falls back to its default.

1.0.0, the first release. The app split's step 11 moved the code in, in three merges (BACKLOG INF-32; plan module_work/APP_SPLIT_PLAN.md in GeotechStaffEngineer's repository):

• (a) model connections and vision calls: engine_config, palantir_sdk_engine, tinyapps_engine (the Prompter connection), http_trace, deep.databricks_bridge, deep.pacing, deep.vision_engine, deep.inline_images, vision_tools, vision_view, image_view, vision_probe, inline_store, turn_question, error_text, _fileio;
• (b) the figure helper: deep.figure_helper, the plotting box (plot_box), the chart stack behind plot_data (charts) with its worked examples, drawing_wait, progress_notes, arg_checks, method_call;
• (c) everything else both agents run: the guards and records (deep.keep_work, deep.limits, deep.tool_guards, deep.scratch_guard, deep.busy_retry, deep.delivered_log, deep.result_map, deep.strict_args, deep.warm_imports, deep.calculate_tool with safe_expr, deep.held_records, runtime_check, review_flags); Word and Excel (docx_renderer, xlsx_writer, office_text); the run record and its checks (activity_log, run_mirror, cited_pages, cited_documents, coverage); the document tools' binding to planlens.review (document_tools, with measure_tool, scale_labels, dxf_notes); the tools' assembly (deep.vision_kit); the assembly both pages' agents share (deep.assembly: the guards round every helper, the general-purpose helper, the summarizer, one compile step); and the review suite's framework (review_eval: the runner, the checks, the Task type and task selection, document lookup).

The core imports nothing of either application. Where it needs something only an application knows, it asks for a hook (aec_agent_core.hooks), which the application fills:

The chart lines plot_data and the plotting box can draw are handed in by a registration, aec_agent_core.charts.register_reference_charts. Unfilled, each place says what it does without the hook.

A deployment can add its own instructions to every agent and helper (deep.instructions, applied by deep.assembly for both applications). GEOTECH_INSTRUCTIONS names a folder: all.md goes to every agent and helper, then one <role>.md per role (main for the main agent, else the helper's name). Each role's text goes last in its prompt, under protected rules it cannot switch off, at most 4,000 characters a role. The setting is read from the environment only; unset, the prompts are unchanged.

aec_agent_core.install_aliases lets a module keep answering to its old import path after it moved here, as the same module object (so an import or a test patch by either name reaches the one copy of the code); GeotechStaffEngineer keeps its old names this way until the split's step 16.

1.0.0 is the first real release (the split's step 12, on PyPI since 2026-11-10, published before the applications that pin it). GeotechStaffEngineer's CI installs the core from its own repository (pip install -e packages/aec-agent-core), so every change is tested with the core beside it. Its "core-only" CI job installs this package with planlens and nothing geotech, imports every module, runs these tests and builds the document review page on it.

Install

pip install aec-agent-core
pip install "aec-agent-core[anthropic]" # with Claude through LangChain

Python 3.11 or later. An application installs it for you: each pins the core it was tested with.

Licence

MIT, as GeotechStaffEngineer. See LICENSE.