ask

The ask step invokes external reasoning: an LLM, a symbolic planner, or any governed reasoning provider. It is the primary way machines think.

Variants

ask has three forms depending on how the reasoning provider is specified:

Form	Syntax	Purpose
ask ... using	ask name using "provider:model"	Specify the model directly
ask ... from	ask name from: "@mashin/actions/..."	Delegate to an effect machine
ask ... of	ask name of "agent-name"	Ask another agent

Basic syntax

ask classify using "anthropic:claude-sonnet-4-6"
  with task
    "Classify this email by urgency and category."
  returns
    category as text
    urgency as number

How it works

1. The runtime evaluates the context and task blocks to build the prompt
2. A governance directive is emitted (the reason capability must be allowed)
3. The reasoning provider processes the request
4. The response is parsed into the returns schema
5. The result is available as steps.{name}.{field}

Governance

Every ask step emits a governance directive before execution. The machine must declare the reason capability in its ensures > permissions section:

ensures
  permissions
    allowed to
      reason

Without this permission, the governance pipeline denies the step.

Step type

ask steps have step type :reason in the execution trace and ledger events.

See also

• ask … using — specify model directly
• ask … from — delegate to effect machine
• ask … of — ask another agent
• compute — pure computation (no reasoning)
• decide — branching based on values