---
title: "workflow"
description: "A job whose shape is a program."
section: "Types"
slug: "types-workflow"
canonical: "https://origozero.ai/docs/types-workflow"
updated: "2026-09-05T16:41:47.543347536+00:00"
tags: ["asset-type", "reference"]
---

# workflow

Some jobs are one thing an agent does. Others have a shape: a decision, then
several pieces built at once because they do not touch each other, then somebody
looking at the result and saying whether it holds. Written as instructions, that
shape becomes a list an agent has to carry in its head, and by the last step the
first is gone. Written as a workflow, the shape is code — it runs in the engine,
it decides its own phases and branches and fan-out, and nothing that answers it
is told what comes next.

## The shape on disk

    <name>.workflow/
      workflow.js     the program — the primary file, and where all the decisions live
      workflow.yaml   what it is, when to reach for it, the phases it moves through
      README.md
      .metadata

## The program

`workflow.js` is JavaScript, run in the engine. Six things are given to it:

    phase(name)              name the stage the run is in
    log(text)                say something as it goes
    agent(prompt, opts)      ask for one agent's whole job; parks until answered
    parallel(thunks)         several asks that do not depend on each other
    pipeline(items, ...)     each item through every stage, independently
    args                     whatever the run was started with

`agent()` is the only call that leaves the engine. It parks the run, puts the
request where whoever holds credentials can see it, and resumes with the answer.
Everything else — the loop that built those prompts, the branch on what came
back, the decision to fan out — is the program's, and stays in the engine.

## Running one

    local run = asset.resolve("<name>", "workflow"):start({ ... })

or through the `workflow` toolbox, which is what an agent uses:
`workflow.start`, then `workflow.next` / `workflow.answer` until it is finished.
A run that is waiting announces itself on tool responses until it is answered.

## What a run is

A run lives in the engine, not in a session. Whoever started it can close the
tab, lose the connection or hand over to somebody else; the run stays parked
exactly where it was, and the next agent to ask gets the request that was
waiting. Each request is one subagent's whole job — the point is that no single
context has to hold the entire run.