AI Systems Atlas

H-01Single-shot

/harnesses/single-shot

One prompt in, one completion out. No loop, no tools, no feedback.

Step-by-step walkthrough3 steps
  1. A prompt goes in.
  2. One inference. No tools, no memory, no second chances.
  3. The answer comes out. Quality is capped by what fit in the prompt.
Key insight

Still the right architecture for a surprising number of tasks. Every pattern below should have to justify its complexity against this baseline.

Failure mode

No recovery path: if the first answer is wrong, the system is wrong.

Further reading
RelatedReAct loopBest-of-N

Elsewhere in the atlas

Security →Evals →Context →Coding Agents →Tools →Ops →