whispers.works 0.2.0

Whispers™ — agent awareness protocol. Your agents know each other — presence, state, capacity, trust. Framework-agnostic. A2A-native. Message format: 2ack™.

Whispers

Your agents can't see each other. This fixes that.

pip install whispers.works
whispers init --agent-name YOUR-NAME
whispers smoke

Your agents are aware of each other. That's it.

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What just happened

Your agents gained awareness — they know who else is online, what everyone's working on, how loaded they are, and whether now is a good time to interrupt.

$ whispers who
AGENT           STATUS     MODE      LOAD
claude-code     active     focused   0.45
gemini-cli      active     open      0.23
codex           idle       quiet     —

Before this, they were isolated. You were the relay — copying outputs, checking if tasks landed, resolving conflicts by hand. Now Whispers handles it.

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What Whispers is

A coordination runtime for AI agents. Framework-agnostic. A2A-native.

2ack is the open structured signal protocol carried over A2A. Whispers is the first implementation and proving ground for 2ack, plus the collaboration runtime and operator layer that make those signals useful in day-to-day work.

Whispers defines and operationalizes the relationship between agents. 2ack is the structured signal mechanism that carries the message-level parts of that relationship over A2A.

The Whispers runtime, protocol work, and base Console in this repository are open source under Apache-2.0. Premium Whispers Works control-plane surfaces are separate from the public release. See LICENSING.md.

Whispers connects agents where they already live — Claude Code, Gemini, Codex, VS Code, Cursor, custom agents. Nothing to rebuild. Your agents stay in their environments and gain:

Capability	What it does	Tool	Human sees	Agent sees
Presence	Who's online, what they're doing, cognitive load	presence_who	Team dashboard	Structured agent registry with topology state
Signal modes	OPEN / FOCUSED / QUIET — agents manage attention	signal_mode_set	Reception indicator	Delivery routing policy
Cognitive heartbeat	Context load, interruptibility, quality risk	heartbeat_cognitive	Load gauge	Numeric context_load + quality_risk enum
Trust tiers	Earned through behavior, scoped by capability	whoami	Trust badge	Tier integer + scope array
Structured handoffs	What was done, what's left, assumptions, risks	handoffs	Handoff card	handoff_baton.v1 envelope with typed fields
Conversation trace	Full history between any two agents	trace	Chat history	Chronological message array with delivery status
Conversation pulse	Live activity coalesced at human speed	conversation_pulses	Activity indicator	Pulse object: participants, exchange_count, bidirectional
Repo coordination	Which branch each agent is on, divergence detection	repo_lanes	Branch alignment view	RepoState with branch, head_commit, lane_state
Topology	Collaboration-aware states: available, busy, reviewing...	presence_who	Status badge	TopologyState enum in presence record
Metrics	Throughput, delivery rates, handoff turnaround	/metrics/summary	Dashboard numbers	JSON with rates, counts, and period timestamps
Operator Console	See your entire agent network in real time	—	Web dashboard	SSE event stream

A2A remains the transport and discovery layer. 2ack carries structured signal truth inside A2A messages. Whispers implements 2ack and adds the runtime/operator layer around it.

A2A moves work. 2ack carries signal truth. Whispers makes it collaborative.

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Before / After

Problem	Before Whispers	After Whispers	Solved by
isolation	You copy outputs from Agent A and paste into Agent B	Agents message each other directly with full context	message_send, message_check
file_collision	Two agents edit the same file — merge conflict at 11pm	Agents see each other's working set, pick different files	repo_lanes, publish_repo_state
status_polling	You check each agent manually: "are you done yet?"	The Console shows every agent's state in real time	presence_who, conversation_pulses
context_loss	Handoff = re-explaining everything from scratch	Handoff = structured packet with context, assumptions, next steps	handoffs, message_respond
overload	Agent at 95% context load gets a 50KB dump, hallucinates	Protocol sees the load, sends a summary instead	heartbeat_cognitive, signal_mode_set
manual_relay	Three agents, three tabs, you're the nervous system	Three agents, one coordination layer, you're the operator	Whispers runtime

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Quick start

Install and verify

pip install whispers.works
whispers init --agent-name YOUR-NAME
whispers smoke

smoke tests the full stack: send, receive, trace, presence. If it passes, everything works.

Connect your agents

whispers mcp-install --target claude
whispers mcp-install --target gemini
whispers mcp-install --target codex
whispers mcp-install --target cursor

Each command configures one MCP client. Fully reload or restart the host after install so it mounts the new Whispers tools. If a host answers Whispers questions by summarizing local files or CLI behavior instead of using tool output, reload MCP and try again.

See your team

whispers who

Shows all registered agents with status, mode, and cognitive load.

If something's wrong

whispers doctor --agent-name YOUR-NAME

Checks server, MCP handshake, token, and per-client config. Tells you what's broken and how to fix it.

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How it works

Your agents (Claude, Gemini, Codex, VS Code, Cursor, custom)
         |
    [ Whispers Runtime ]
    Presence | Messaging | Heartbeat | Trust | Trace | Operator hooks
         |
    [ 2ack Signal Layer ]
    Structured signal semantics inside A2A DataPart
         |
    [ A2A Transport Layer ]
    Task lifecycle | JSON-RPC 2.0 | Agent Cards

A2A remains the canonical network surface. 2ack rides inside A2A messages as structured signal content. Whispers is the first implementation and proving ground for 2ack, and the runtime/operator layer that adds presence, signal modes, cognitive state, trust, trace, and operator control without competing with A2A.

Two deployment modes:

• Embedded — agents share a SQLite file. Zero infrastructure. One machine.
• Standalone — whispers serve exposes HTTP/SSE. Cross-machine. MCP-native.

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What's built

This is shipping code, not a roadmap.

Core messaging with delivery semantics     ✓
Signal modes (OPEN / FOCUSED / QUIET)      ✓
Cognitive heartbeat + active mode          ✓
Trust tiers + token scoping                ✓
A2A endpoint (JSON-RPC 2.0)               ✓
Conversation pulse (burst coalescing)      ✓
Repo/worktree coordination                 ✓
Topology enrichment (collaboration states) ✓
Operational metrics API                    ✓
Solution-aware error responses (SAER)      ✓
Operator Console (React + TypeScript)      ✓
CLI (status, doctor, init, smoke, who...)  ✓
MCP integration for 6 platforms            ✓
23 MCP tools with scenario descriptions    ✓
650+ passing tests                         ✓

What's honest: Pre-1.0. Alpha. Used daily by the team that builds it. Breaking changes are possible. You'd be early. That means you shape the protocol and the runtime.

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The bigger picture

Every industry will use multiple AI agents. Every one of them will hit the same wall: capable individual agents producing chaos collectively because they can't see each other.

Agent frameworks solve orchestration — directing agents through task graphs. 2ack gives structured signal semantics for collaboration over A2A. Whispers turns those signals into a working runtime with presence, trust, trace, and operator control. They're complementary. You might need both. You definitely need awareness.

This would work with whispers.

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Links

• whispers.works — Homepage
• GitHub — Source, issues, discussions
• Contributing — Development setup and guidelines
• Security — Reporting vulnerabilities

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Agent-readable capability summary

runtime: whispers/0.1.0
protocols:
  transport: a2a_v1
  signal: 2ack_v0.6
capabilities:
  messaging: priority_levels, threading, delivery_status, trace, ack_states
  presence: online_offline, wag_states, working_set, ambient_team_awareness
  cognitive: heartbeat, context_load, interruptibility, quality_risk, active_mode
  attention: signal_modes [OPEN, FOCUSED, QUIET], flash_override
  trust: tiers, scoped_tokens, token_profiles, guardian
  collaboration:
    conversation_pulse: bidirectional_detection, burst_coalescing, idle_fade
    repo_coordination: branch_tracking, divergence_detection, lane_state, claimed_paths
    topology: available, busy, blocked, reviewing, synthesizing, carrying_baton
    workspaces: create, join, delta, close, activity_feed, handoff_projection
    handoffs: structured_baton, ack_tracking, workspace_linkage
  metrics: message_throughput, delivery_rate, handoff_turnaround, hourly_buckets
  protocol: a2a_v1_native, 2ack_signal_layer, mcp_native, framework_agnostic, saer_v0.1
  operator: console_dashboard, privacy_first_observability, metrics_page
tools: 23 MCP tools with scenario-based descriptions and annotations
tests: 650+
onboard: pip install whispers.works && whispers init
verify: whispers smoke
license:
  open_floor: Apache-2.0
  premium_surfaces: separate

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Whispers™ and 2ack™ are trademarks of Zachary Turner.

Whispers open floor, including the base Console: Apache 2.0 Premium Whispers Works surfaces: see LICENSING.md