Lesson 1242 of 1455
Telling Your Agent When to Actually Stop
Define a clear success signal so the agent does not loop forever.
Builders · Agentic AI · ~4 min read
The big idea
agents need an explicit done condition or they will burn tokens forever
Some examples
- All tests pass and the diff is under 100 lines
- The user said yes to the final summary
- A timer hit 10 iterations
Try it!
Open your favorite AI tool and try one of the examples above. Pick the one that matches what you are actually working on this week. Spend 10 minutes, no more. Notice what worked and what did not — that's the real lesson.
Key terms in this lesson
Practice this safely
Try this with a school, hobby, or family example where the stakes are low. Use the AI output as a draft you can question, not as the final answer.
- 1Ask AI to explain stop condition in plain language, then underline anything that sounds uncertain or too broad.
- 2Give it one detail from "Telling Your Agent When to Actually Stop" and ask for two possible next steps plus one reason each step might be wrong.
- 3Check success signal against a trusted source, teacher, adult, expert, or original document before you use it.
End-of-lesson quiz
Check what stuck
8 questions · Score saves to your progress.
Lesson help
Questions are best handled with a grown-up here.
For this age range, Tendril keeps freeform AI chat paused until parent/guardian consent and child-safe moderation are fully verified. Use the quiz, notes, and related lessons below, or ask a parent, guardian, teacher, or librarian to work through the question with you.
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