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Agent handoffs

A handoff builds a mechanical summary of a session so a different agent can continue it without re-explaining context by hand.

A handoff is AgentDock's way of switching agents mid-task without starting over. Instead of copying context by hand into a new conversation, AgentDock builds a summary of the current session and hands it to a different agent as the opening context for a new one.

What goes into a handoff

  • The original request or objective.
  • Files the current agent touched, so the next agent has the same starting point.
  • Open issues or unresolved parts of the task the current agent flagged or left incomplete.

This is a mechanical summary, not a transfer of hidden provider-side state — the receiving agent starts a genuinely new session with that summary as context, not a continuation of the first agent's own internal state.

Note

A handoff is context, not a guarantee. The receiving agent re-derives its own understanding of the workspace from the summary and its own inspection — it doesn't inherit anything the first agent's provider held privately.

When to use one

Handoffs are useful when one CLI stalls or seems stuck (see Agent appears stalled), or when you want a different agent's take on the same problem without repeating yourself. If you want several agents' takes on the same prompt from the start instead, use Compare Mode rather than a handoff.

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