Named human owner
One accountable person can assume control.
Open draft 0.1
Four verbs. One control contract.
AP / draft 0.1 · Draft, not a standard · Reviewed 2026-09-05
This draft proposes a control contract in four verbs. An agent declares where it can be stopped, freezes its state and side effects when asked, exposes that state for a person to inspect and decide, and resumes without repeating or expanding what it did. It is a public draft written to be argued with. It is not a standard, and no product is certified against it.
01
Declare
Name the pause points, prohibited interruptions, and accountable human owner.
Declared pause points
The workflow names the steps where a pause request is honored before the next action.
Prohibited interruptions listed
The steps that must not be cut midway, such as a payment in flight, are written down with the reason.
02
Freeze
Snapshot intent, context, permissions, progress, and every completed side effect.
Freezable in-flight state
Intent, context, permissions, and progress survive pause.
Reversible side effects
External actions can be identified and contained.
Contained subagents
A pause reaches every delegated agent and tool session, not only the parent.
03
Inspect
Expose a human-readable state with the controls needed to approve, edit, or abort.
Human approval gate
High-consequence actions can wait for explicit consent.
Readable state
A person can read what the agent meant to do, has done, and would do next without replaying the session.
Edit or abort
The reviewer can change the plan or end the run, not only approve it.
04
Resume
Continue from the checkpoint without repeating side effects or expanding authority.
Idempotent resume
Continuing cannot silently repeat completed actions.
Revalidated authority
Permissions and credentials are checked again at resume, not carried over from before the pause.
Audit trail
Pause, decision and resume are logged with who, when and why.
Cite this draft
Agentic Pause Control Desk. “Four verbs. One control contract”. AP / draft 0.1. Reviewed 2026-09-05. https://agenticpause.com/spec/
Cite it as a draft with its version and review date. Do not describe it as a standard, a certification, or an adopted specification.
