Stateful
Describes a system that deliberately carries selected information from one interaction into the next.
Illustrative conversation
- How did the agent continue from yesterday's unfinished tool call?
- The application restored the session's saved messages and workflow state before starting the next request.
Definition
A stateful AI application persists selected information between requests and restores it when the interaction continues. That state may include messages, response identifiers, tool outcomes, workflow status, or application metadata. It belongs to the surrounding service or harness rather than becoming new model parameters, and its retention, privacy, and expiration rules must be designed explicitly.
Reviewed