41 lines
3.4 KiB
Markdown
41 lines
3.4 KiB
Markdown
# Ornith Q8 best practices
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How to get real work out of Ornith 1.5-9B (Qwen3.5-based, 8-bit / Bfp8) on one Tenstorrent p150 through Pantheon + Argus. From the 2026-10-25 runs (social-media doc, K80 MTP Phase 1).
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## What it's good at
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- Mechanical engineering work: git merges (incl. a real conflict), detached remote jobs + polling, reading results, pushes.
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- Following written rules that are still in its context.
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- Writing careful commands with small outputs.
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## What to expect
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- **Work is more reliable than its reports.** It mixes up similar events and states them confidently. Never trust its summary or the notes it writes into a plan; check against git and logs.
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- **It doesn't explore on its own.** A plain ask gets generic output; "read X first" gets accurate output.
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- **It doesn't know when it's done**, and doesn't push back on a task that makes no sense (an hour on an already-finished phase; 42 min re-verifying finished work).
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- **Thinking is the cost, not tools.** Reasoning blocks run 4–10k chars. Decode is fast at short context (~50 tok/s greedy with MTP, ~21.5 plain) but ~8 tok/s at 51k context.
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- **Big reads fill its context fastest.** Given a function name in a 12,000-line file, it read 2,000 lines to find four functions; two reads added more context than all its reasoning.
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- **It skips saving its progress.** It treats "I understand it now" as done and moves to the next step without writing the result down.
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## How to brief it
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- [ ] Name the exact files to read, in order.
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- [ ] **Give line ranges, not just names**: exact start–end lines for each function the step needs (e.g. `file.c:11966-12019`), and cap each read at ~150 lines. `grep -n` only finds where a function starts, so a name alone leads to huge reads.
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- [ ] **Small files are part of the brief.** If a step's target file is over ~1,000 lines, split it first (behaviour-preserving, gated) or hand over exact ranges.
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- [ ] Write every rule down; it misses rules that were only said in conversation.
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- [ ] Every step ends in a check that is a command with the exact expected output, not "looks right".
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- [ ] Include the stop rules: "if your task is already marked done, say so and stop"; "two failed checks → write `BLOCKED:` and stop".
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- [ ] Say where scratch files go (in the repo, never `/tmp`).
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## How to run it
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- [ ] **One task card per session; fresh session per card.** Don't keep saying "continue" into a long session.
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- [ ] **A card isn't done until its output is saved**: the written result in the plan/spec, the box checked, a commit. Only then start the next card (in a new session).
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- [ ] **Keep context small** (well under ~50k tokens): decode slows a lot past that, and when the agent compacts a long context the model can lose its place.
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- [ ] **The plan file is the memory**: every step leaves a one-line note in the plan, so a fresh session can resume.
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- [ ] For long remote jobs, expect sleep/poll loops that look like a hang; check `argus.log` before assuming it's stuck.
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- [ ] Double-check the files you hand it are the right ones (two similarly named plans cost an hour).
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## Before anything lands
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- [ ] Verify its claims against git, the logs and the real files: the step that caught every bad note in Phase 1.
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- [ ] Only a human (or a stronger model on the human's go) merges or deploys.
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## Split of labour
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Ornith executes the long, mechanical, hardware-bound work on our own machines; something stronger verifies before merge.
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