Background Task Runtime
Types shared by long-running producers, ctx.jobs, and job controls. The runtime Agent Note owns the design; this page records the exact fields and variants from packages/jobs/jobs/src/types.ts.
Ids and status
JobId is a branded id generated as <kind>-N. Access control relies on owner authorization, not id secrecy. JobKind derives from a merge-extensible map; the registry treats kinds as opaque id namespaces.
/**
* Producer-defined job kinds. Plugins extend this map by declaration merging;
* the registry treats every value as an opaque id namespace.
*/
interface JobKindMap {
bash: 'bash'
subagent: 'subagent'
}JobStatus is 'running' | 'stopping' | 'completed' | 'killed' | 'failed'; producer-specific facts belong in JobSnapshot.detail.
Producer contract
JobStart declares identity and a starter. The runtime finishes preflight before calling run() and commits without a later failable step. Producers own execution resources; the runtime owns identity, access, and lifecycle state.
/**
* Producer declaration passed to {@link JobRegistry.start}. The runtime
* preflights access and cleanup before invoking {@link run}; the producer owns
* execution resources while the runtime owns identity and lifecycle state.
*/
interface JobStart {
/** Producer kind — also the id prefix (`bash`, `subagent`, …). */
kind: JobKind
/** One-line model-facing label (the command; the delegation description). */
label: string
/**
* Optional UTF-8 byte cap for each complete model-facing completion notice or
* output read, including controller status metadata.
*/
outputLimitBytes?: number
/**
* Owning live agent. Access is fenced by its session id, and agent disposal
* cancels and awaits the job. The instance must be the one currently
* registered under its agent id. Omitting the owner creates an unowned job,
* open to any caller until service disposal.
*/
owner?: Agent
/**
* Start the work after preflight and synchronously return its hooks. Called
* once; a throw leaves nothing registered, and the producer must clean up any
* partially started resources.
*/
run(): JobHooks
}JobHooks.done resolves after the producer releases its resources, not merely when work finishes. Optional readOutput distinguishes consuming stream jobs from final-output-only jobs.
/** Hooks through which the runtime controls and observes producer work. */
interface JobHooks {
/**
* Request termination. Must be synchronous, idempotent, and eventually settle
* {@link done}; throws propagate. The optional reason is forwarded verbatim.
*/
cancel(reason?: string): void
/**
* Resolves after the producer releases its resources, not merely when work
* finishes. Must not reject; the runtime converts a rejection to `failed`.
* If teardown cancellation throws, the runtime may force-fail only the
* registry record without claiming that the work stopped.
*/
done: Promise<JobOutcome>
/**
* Consume output produced since the previous call. The producer formats
* truncation and spill notices. Absence marks a final-output-only job; each
* job has one consuming cursor.
*/
readOutput?(): string
}/** Terminal result supplied by a producer through {@link JobHooks.done}. */
interface JobOutcome {
/** How the job ended: finished (`completed`), cancelled (`killed`), or broke (`failed`). */
status: 'completed' | 'killed' | 'failed'
/** Kind-specific detail rendered into status lines ('exit code: 3', 'max-tokens'). */
detail?: string
/** Final output for jobs without `readOutput`; stream jobs leave it unset. */
output?: string
}Consumer views
Snapshots are fresh read-only projections. ownerSession carries the shared SessionId used for authorization; completion listeners separately receive the exact owner object used for lifecycle cleanup. reported suppresses a completion notice after another reporter has delivered or committed to deliver the terminal state, including the teardown cancel that drains an owner or the service.
/**
* A read-only projection of one job, safe to hand to listeners and tools —
* a fresh object per call, never live registry state.
*/
interface JobSnapshot {
/** The registry-issued id (`<kind>-N`). */
id: JobId
/** The producer kind the job was registered with. */
kind: JobKind
/** The producer-supplied one-line label. */
label: string
/** Producer-owned cap for complete model-facing notices and output reads. */
outputLimitBytes?: number
/**
* Owner session id used for authorization and correlation; absent for
* unowned jobs. Completion listeners receive the exact {@link Agent}
* separately through {@link JobDoneListener}.
*/
ownerSession?: SessionId
/** Current lifecycle state. */
status: JobStatus
/** Kind-specific status detail, present once the producer supplied one (usually terminal). */
detail?: string
/** Epoch ms when the job was registered. */
startedAt: number
/** Epoch ms when the job settled; absent while `running`/`stopping`. */
finishedAt?: number
/**
* True when a kill, read, wait, or teardown cancel has reported or committed
* to report the terminal state. Completion reporters suppress redundant
* notices when set. Teardown claims it because the owner or service being
* destroyed leaves no reader: a reporter that opens a turn on notice would
* otherwise spend a model request per teardown layer.
*/
reported: boolean
}/** Output and post-read state returned by {@link JobRegistry.read}. */
interface JobRead {
/**
* Stream kinds: the consuming delta since the previous read. Final-output
* kinds: empty while live, the terminal {@link JobOutcome.output} (or
* empty) once settled — idempotent, never consumed.
*/
text: string
/** The job's state at read time. */
snapshot: JobSnapshot
}Service behavior
The abstract JobRegistry Service Definition specifies atomic start, caller-scoped get and list, read, kill, bounded wait, failure-isolated onJobDone and onJobsChanged listeners, and when attachController becomes available; LocalJobRegistry is the process-local Service Provider. Authorization compares owner sessions; owner cleanup and admission use the exact registered Agent instance. The local provider's positive-safe-integer maxConcurrentJobsPerOwner config defaults to 10 and counts running plus stopping records per exact owner, with one shared bucket for unowned jobs; terminal producer settlement releases capacity. See dsh-jobs for the Service Definition contract, dsh-jobs-local for the registry lifecycle and admission policy, and dsh-tool-jobs for the model-facing Consumer.
Cordis API
Generated from source by scripts/gen-cordis-catalog.ts (verified fresh by pnpm run verify-cordis-catalog in doc-sync; regenerate with pnpm run gen-cordis-catalog) — this section is byte-identical in both language sides of the page. Signature blocks use a ts cordis-catalog fence and keep the original source JSDoc; dispatch modes are defined in the primer, and the framework-inherited ctx API lives in cordis-api/inherited.md.
ctx.jobs — JobRegistry (abstract seam)
Abstract background job registry. Subclass, implement the abstract methods, and load the subclass as a plugin — it registers as ctx.jobs (one implementation per context; loading a second throws, which is cordis' standard duplicate-service behavior).
Implementations must honor these semantics:
- Registrations outlive producer and controller fibers. Owner and service disposal cancel live work and await compliant producers; a throwing teardown cancel force-fails only the record. Teardown cancellation also marks the record reported, because a record its owner is being destroyed for has no reader left.
- Owned-job access is fenced by the owner's session id. Ids are predictable, so authorization — not secrecy — is the boundary.
- Settlement is first-wins: one terminal record, released waiters, and one round of contained listener notification, even against a late producer outcome. Completion is announced last, after the record is committed and every other observer of the settlement has seen it, because a reporter may open a model turn synchronously.
- start refuses work while no attached job controller serves the spec's owner, so a producer cannot start work that owner cannot collect or stop. One registry serves every composition in the process, so this question — and completion-listener delivery — is owner-relative rather than process-wide: registrations made from an unscoped context serve every owner, and registrations made under an agent composition's scope serve exactly the agents composed under it.
/**
* Preflight access, validation, owner cleanup, and implementation-owned
* admission before starting and atomically registering work. Any preflight
* rejection leaves no job id or execution resource. A throwing starter
* leaves nothing registered; after it returns, registration cannot fail.
* Settlement records the outcome, notifies listeners, and releases waiters.
* @param spec - job identity, owner, and synchronous starter.
* @returns the registry-issued `<kind>-N` id.
*/
abstract start(spec: JobStart): JobId
/**
* List caller-owned and unowned jobs in registration order without exposing
* another session's labels.
* @param caller - reading agent; a non-agent caller sees only unowned jobs.
* @returns fresh snapshots.
*/
abstract list(caller?: Agent): JobSnapshot[]
/**
* Return a non-consuming snapshot without changing its read cursor or notice
* state. Throws for an unknown or foreign job.
* @param id - job to look up.
* @param caller - reading agent checked against the owner.
* @returns a fresh snapshot.
*/
abstract get(id: JobId, caller?: Agent): JobSnapshot
/**
* Read the next stream delta, or the idempotent final output after settlement.
* A terminal read marks the job reported. Throws for an unknown or foreign
* job.
* @param id - job to read.
* @param caller - reading agent checked against the owner.
* @returns output text and the post-read snapshot.
*/
abstract read(id: JobId, caller?: Agent): JobRead
/**
* Request cancellation, then mark the job stopping and reported. A producer
* throw propagates without changing job state. Throws for an unknown or
* foreign job.
* @param id - job to cancel.
* @param caller - killing agent checked against the owner.
* @param reason - logged reason forwarded to the producer.
* @returns `requested` for live work, otherwise `already-finished`.
*/
abstract kill(id: JobId, caller?: Agent, reason?: string): 'requested' | 'already-finished'
/**
* Wait for settlement or timeout without cancelling the job. Caller abort
* rejects only while the job is live; after settlement the terminal
* snapshot wins so a notice suppressed for this waiter is still delivered.
* Throws for invalid, unknown, or foreign input.
* @param id - job to wait for.
* @param timeoutMs - positive finite wait bound in milliseconds.
* @param caller - waiting agent checked against the owner.
* @param signal - optional cancellation of the wait itself.
* @returns snapshot at settlement or timeout.
*/
abstract wait(id: JobId, timeoutMs: number, caller?: Agent, signal?: AbortSignal): Promise<JobSnapshot>
/**
* Register an effect-scoped completion listener. It receives the settlements
* of the owners its registering context's scope covers; each listener is
* contained; returned promises are observed but not awaited. No listener runs
* after service disposal.
* @param listener - receives each terminal snapshot and its exact owner.
* @returns disposer that unregisters the listener.
*/
abstract onJobDone(listener: JobDoneListener): () => void
/**
/**
* Register an effect-scoped observer of visible-set changes. It fires after
* every commit that changes what {@link list} returns for that owner —
* registration, every stopping transition (including the one teardown
* performs before it awaits a slow producer), settlement, owner-disposal
* removal, and the emptying that service disposal commits — so an observer
* re-reads rather than accumulating deltas.
*
* Delivery is owner-relative on the same terms as {@link onJobDone}: an
* observer registered from an unscoped context — a host composition's own
* carrier — sees every owner, while one registered under an agent
* composition's scope sees exactly the agents composed under it.
*
* This is not a superset of {@link onJobDone}: that one delivers the terminal
* record under first-wins semantics a job controller couples to notice
* delivery, while this one carries no delivery meaning and marks nothing
* reported. Listeners are contained and never awaited.
* @param listener - receives the owner whose visible set changed, or
* `undefined` when an unowned job changed and every caller's set did.
* @returns disposer that unregisters the listener.
*/
abstract onJobsChanged(listener: JobsChangedListener): () => void
/**
* Attach an effect-scoped controller that can read and stop jobs. It serves the
* owners its registering context's scope covers, and {@link start} refuses an
* owner no attached controller serves.
* @param name - diagnostic label; duplicate names remain independent.
* @returns disposer that detaches this controller.
*/
abstract attachController(name: string): () => voidTypes: Agent