idempotent-tools

Idempotency-key decorator for agent tool calls — local-only, zero-config, no network call in the hot path.

Agent frameworks (LangGraph, CrewAI, LangChain) retry or resume tool invocations after an interrupt, checkpoint replay, or failure. If the tool has a side effect (charging a card, sending an email, placing a trade, writing to an external API), that retry can fire it twice. There's no packaged library that owns this problem today — teams are hand-rolling the same "check a local store before running" decorator repeatedly (see e.g. crewAI issue #5802 and multiple independent write-ups of the same DIY pattern). idempotent-tools packages that pattern: a decorator that dedupes calls against a small local store, so a retried/resumed call returns the prior result instead of re-executing.

Some competing solutions in this space are cloud-hybrid products — a hosted API for the dedup check, with a metered/paid production tier. This library is not that: it's a single decorator backed by SQLite (or Redis if you already run one), MIT-licensed, with no account, token, or outbound network call required to use it. That also means it doesn't do everything a hosted service can (see Out of scope below) — it trades distributed cross-worker locking for simplicity and zero external dependency.

Install

pip install idempotent-tools
# or, with Redis backend support:
pip install "idempotent-tools[redis]"

For local development (editable install from a clone):

pip install -e .

Requires Python >= 3.9. No required dependencies for the default (SQLite) backend.

Quick start

from idempotent_tools import idempotent

@idempotent
def charge_card(order_id: str, amount: float) -> dict:
    ...  # side-effecting call

charge_card("order-42", 19.99)   # runs
charge_card("order-42", 19.99)   # returns the cached result, does not re-run

By default the idempotency key is a SHA-256 hash of the function name plus its JSON-serialized args/kwargs, stored in a zero-config SQLite file at ~/.idempotent_tools/store.db. You can also pass an explicit key at call time:

charge_card("order-42", 19.99, idempotency_key="charge-order-42")

or derive one from framework context (thread id, task id, step, etc.) via context= or key_fn= — see the integration examples below.

Execution semantics

Every call, the decorator looks up its key and does one of:

• Not seen (or a stored record has expired past ttl) -> function runs, result is stored as completed.
• Seen, status completed -> the stored JSON result is returned; the function does not run.
• Seen, status pending (another call with the same key is currently in flight) -> behavior is controlled by on_duplicate:
  • "raise" (default) -> raises DuplicateInFlightError immediately.
  • "block" -> polls (poll_interval, default 0.2s) until the in-flight call resolves, then returns its result. If it fails or times out (poll_timeout, default 30s -> raises TimeoutError), falls through and re-runs.
  • "retry" -> runs the function again immediately, without waiting, overwriting the stored result when it finishes.
• Seen, status failed (the previous attempt raised) -> treated as not-seen; the function runs again.

ttl (seconds, default None = never expires) makes a record older than the TTL treated as not-seen on the next call, regardless of its status.

Non-JSON-serializable arguments raise TypeError at call time when no idempotency_key= or key_fn= is supplied (there's no fallback serialization — see "Out of scope" below).

Storage backends

Both backends implement the same interface (get, acquire, complete, fail, list_records, clear) defined in idempotent_tools.backends.base.Backend, so you can pass either as backend= to @idempotent.

• SQLiteBackend (default): file-based, zero config, thread-safe (guarded by an internal lock; stress-tested under concurrent threads). Defaults to ~/.idempotent_tools/store.db; pass SQLiteBackend(db_path=...) to use a different file.
• RedisBackend (optional, only imported if redis is installed): pip install idempotent-tools[redis], then RedisBackend(url="redis://localhost:6379/0"). Note: its acquire is a read-then-write check, not a single atomic Redis operation — fine for single-process use, but it does not provide true cross-process/cross-worker locking (see "Out of scope").

Framework integration

idempotent_tools.integrations has two thin helper modules for deriving a context= value from framework state — they don't wrap the frameworks themselves, you still apply @idempotent directly to your tool function.

LangGraph

from langchain_core.tools import tool
from idempotent_tools import idempotent
from idempotent_tools.integrations.langgraph_shim import thread_step_context

@tool
@idempotent(context=lambda: thread_step_context(current_config(), step=current_step()))
def send_payment(order_id: str, amount: float) -> dict:
    ...

current_config() / current_step() are stand-ins for however your graph node exposes the current RunnableConfig and step number (closure variables, or LangGraph's own config accessor). Put @idempotent closer to the plain function than @tool, so it wraps the raw callable before LangChain adapts the calling convention.

CrewAI

from crewai.tools import tool
from idempotent_tools import idempotent
from idempotent_tools.integrations.crewai_shim import task_context

current_task = None  # set by a hook/callback before each tool invocation

@tool("send_email")
@idempotent(context=lambda: task_context(current_task))
def send_email(to: str, subject: str) -> dict:
    ...

def before_task_attempt(task):
    global current_task
    current_task = task

Wire before_task_attempt into a CrewAI Task/Agent callback so current_task reflects the task being (re)attempted. task_context keys off the task's id/key only (not its retry count), so repeated attempts of the same task map to the same idempotency key.

CLI

idempotent-tools inspect            # list all stored records
idempotent-tools inspect --key K    # show one record
idempotent-tools clear              # clear all records
idempotent-tools clear --key K      # clear one record
idempotent-tools --db path/to.db inspect   # point at a specific SQLite file

The CLI only operates on the SQLite backend/file; it has no Redis support.

Manual demo

python demo.py

Runs charge_card twice with the same key against a temp SQLite file and asserts it only actually executed once.

Tests

pip install -e ".[test]"
pytest

Out of scope for v1

• Distributed cross-worker locking/consensus. acquire() on both backends is not a single atomic compare-and-swap across processes/hosts; don't rely on it to prevent two independent workers racing on the same key at the exact same instant beyond what SQLite's own locking or Redis's per-command atomicity gives you.
• Non-JSON-serializable arguments/results. Auto-keying and result storage both go through json.dumps; pass objects, and you'll get a TypeError telling you to supply idempotency_key= or key_fn= instead.
• Dashboard/UI. Inspection is CLI-only (idempotent-tools inspect).