> For the complete documentation index, see [llms.txt](https://docs.uptiq.ai/llms.txt). Markdown versions of documentation pages are available by appending `.md` to page URLs; this page is available as [Markdown](https://docs.uptiq.ai/start-here/core-concepts.md).

# Agent Foundations

The [Agent Builder](/agent-builder/agent-builder.md) documents **what you do** — each screen, each field, each setting. This section documents **what an agent is**: the ideas those screens configure, and how they fit together.

Read a concept page when you want to understand *why* a setting exists and what it trades off. Read the builder page when you want to know what a specific control does and what its default is. Each concept links to the screens that configure it.

## The parts of an agent

An agent is a small number of things working together. Every request it handles moves through all of them.

* [**Steering & Reasoning**](/core-concepts/steering-and-reasoning.md) — How the agent decides what to do. Instructions, autonomy, how deeply it thinks, and how the planner turns a request into a sequence of actions.
* [**Skills & Tools**](/core-concepts/skills-and-tools.md) — What the agent can *do*. The planner can only ever choose from this set.
* [**Knowledge & Context**](/core-concepts/knowledge-and-context.md) — What the agent can *read*. Retrieval from your documents and data.
* [**Memory & Learning**](/core-concepts/memory-and-learning.md) — What the agent *carries forward*, across a conversation and across users.
* [**Guardrails & Validation**](/core-concepts/guardrails-and-validation.md) — The automated checks that inspect what goes in and what comes out.
* [**Human-in-the-Loop**](/core-concepts/human-in-the-loop.md) — The points where a person stays in the decision.
* [**Protocols**](/core-concepts/protocols.md) — How the agent talks to the outside world, and how your product talks to it.

## How they fit together

A request arrives. **Guardrails** inspect it. **Steering** decides how to approach it — the planner reads your instructions, consults **Memory** for what it already knows about this user, and builds a plan. The plan calls **Skills**, which may retrieve from **Knowledge** or reach outside through **Protocols**. Guardrails inspect each step and the final answer. Where you've asked for it, a **human** approves before the agent commits.

For the end-to-end workflow, see [How Agents Work](/start-here/how-an-agent-works.md).

{% hint style="info" %}
**Two catalogs, one idea.** Several concepts here appear in more than one place in the product — for example, an agent's connectors are configured per-agent in [Apps & Services](/agent-builder/build/apps-and-services.md), while the workspace-wide catalog lives in [Integrations](/integrations/integrations-hub.md). Same idea, different altitude. The concept pages say which is which.
{% endhint %}


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# Agent Instructions
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