ardenpy 0.4.1

AI Agent Warden - Keep your AI agents in check with policy enforcement and human oversight

ardenpy

Policy enforcement and human approval for AI agent tool calls.

Arden sits between your agent and its tools. Every call is checked against policies you configure in the dashboard — automatically allowed, blocked, or held for a human to approve.

Install

pip install ardenpy

Quick start

1. Get your API key from app.arden.sh. You'll get two keys:

• arden_test_... — development, hits api-test.arden.sh
• arden_live_... — production, hits api.arden.sh

2. Configure once

import ardenpy as arden
arden.configure(api_key="arden_live_...")

3. Call your tools

For LangChain and CrewAI — that's it. Arden auto-patches the framework at configure-time, so every tool call is intercepted without any wrapping:

# LangChain — use tools normally, Arden intercepts everything
arden.configure(api_key="arden_live_...", tool_name_prefix="support")

agent = create_react_agent(llm, tools, prompt)  # no wrapping needed
# Tool names in the dashboard: "support.search_web", "support.send_email", etc.

For custom agents with no framework, wrap functions explicitly:

def issue_refund(amount: float, customer_id: str) -> dict:
    return {"refund_id": "re_123", "amount": amount}

safe_refund = arden.guard_tool("stripe.issue_refund", issue_refund)

result = safe_refund(150.0, customer_id="cus_abc")
# Arden checks policy first — allow, block, or wait for human approval

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How it works

Every tool call goes through a policy check before executing:

Policy decision	What happens
allow	Function executes immediately
block	PolicyDeniedError raised, function never runs
requires_approval	Pauses until a human approves or denies on the dashboard

No policy configured? The call is allowed automatically and logged — you get a full audit trail from day one and can add policies incrementally.

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Approval modes

When a tool requires approval, you choose how your code waits:

wait (default) — blocks until a human acts, then executes or raises PolicyDeniedError.

async — returns a PendingApproval immediately, background thread polls and calls your callback.

webhook — returns PendingApproval immediately, no polling. Arden POSTs to your endpoint when an admin decides.

# wait (default)
safe_refund = arden.guard_tool("stripe.issue_refund", issue_refund)

# async
safe_refund = arden.guard_tool("stripe.issue_refund", issue_refund,
    approval_mode="async", on_approval=handle_approval, on_denial=handle_denial)

# webhook
safe_refund = arden.guard_tool("stripe.issue_refund", issue_refund,
    approval_mode="webhook", on_approval=on_approval, on_denial=on_denial)

For webhook setup (FastAPI, Flask, Django examples) see the Library Reference.

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Framework integrations

LangChain and CrewAI — zero wrapping required

Arden automatically patches LangChain and CrewAI's base tool class when configure() is called. Every tool instance — including ones created after configure — has its calls intercepted.

import ardenpy as arden

arden.configure(api_key="arden_live_...")
# All LangChain / CrewAI tool calls in this process are now intercepted.
# No protect_tools(), no guard_tool(), no boilerplate.

Tool names in the dashboard match each tool's .name attribute directly (e.g. "issue_refund"). The API key already scopes calls to your agent, so no prefix is needed.

Install the optional framework dependencies if you don't already have them:

pip install "ardenpy[langchain]"     # LangChain
pip install "ardenpy[crewai]"        # CrewAI

If you need per-tool approval mode overrides, protect_tools() is still available — see the Library Reference.

OpenAI Chat Completions

from ardenpy.integrations.openai import ArdenToolExecutor

executor = ArdenToolExecutor(tool_name_prefix="support")
executor.register("issue_refund", issue_refund_fn)
executor.register("send_email",   send_email_fn)

# In your loop:
result = executor.run(tc.function.name, json.loads(tc.function.arguments))

OpenAI Agents SDK

from ardenpy.integrations.openai import protect_function_tools

safe_tools = protect_function_tools([issue_refund, search], tool_name_prefix="support")
agent = Agent(name="SupportBot", tools=safe_tools)

pip install "ardenpy[openai-agents]"

See examples/ for runnable code for every integration.

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Error handling

try:
    result = safe_refund(150.0, customer_id="cus_abc")
except arden.PolicyDeniedError:
    # blocked by policy, or denied by a human
except arden.ApprovalTimeoutError:
    # nobody approved within max_poll_time (wait mode)
except arden.ArdenError:
    # API/configuration error

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Links

• Library Reference — full API docs
• Examples — runnable code
• Dashboard
• PyPI
• Support