Drop Markdown files into an agents/ folder and their contents are appended to
the main reply LLM's system prompt, so an operator can extend the assistant's
rules/tone without code changes. Files are concatenated in filename order
(use 00-, 10- prefixes to control ordering) and re-read once per turn, so edits
apply on the next reply with no rebuild/restart. Fail-open: a missing, empty,
or unreadable folder yields no instructions and never breaks a reply.
- load_agent_instructions() in system_prompt.py (AGENTS_DIR env, default
/app/agents); reads *.md only, skips blanks, ignores non-dir paths
- engine.py appends it alongside the existing settings-UI llm_instructions,
under the same "Additional instructions from the operator:" framing
- docker-compose.yml bind-mounts ./agents:/app/agents:ro and sets AGENTS_DIR
- agents/example.md.sample starter template (.sample is not loaded)
- tests cover ordering, md-only filtering, blank-skip, env/arg resolution,
and fail-open paths
- README, .env.example, docs/llm_contexts.md updated
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 <noreply@anthropic.com>
