anthropics_skills/skills/claude-api/ruby/managed-agents

Managed Agents — Ruby

Bindings not shown here: This README covers the most common managed-agents flows for Ruby. If you need a class, method, namespace, field, or behavior that isn't shown, WebFetch the Ruby SDK repo or the relevant docs page from shared/live-sources.md rather than guess. Do not extrapolate from cURL shapes or another language's SDK.

Agents are persistent — create once, reference by ID. Store the agent ID returned by client.beta.agents.create and pass it to every subsequent client.beta.sessions.create; do not call agents.create in the request path. Recommended: define agents and environments as version-controlled YAML applied with the ant CLI — see shared/anthropic-cli.md (its live-docs URL is in shared/live-sources.md). The CLI owns the control plane (create/update); your code owns the data plane (sessions with the stored ID). The examples below show in-code creation for when you must provision programmatically; in production the create call belongs in setup, not in the request path.

Installation

gem install anthropic

Client Initialization

require "anthropic"

# Default (uses ANTHROPIC_API_KEY env var)
client = Anthropic::Client.new

# Explicit API key
client = Anthropic::Client.new(api_key: "your-api-key")

⚠️ Trailing underscores: The Ruby SDK uses system_: and send_( (trailing underscore) to avoid shadowing Kernel#system and Kernel#send. Use these forms throughout managed-agents code.

---

Create an Environment

environment = client.beta.environments.create(
  name: "my-dev-env",
  config: {
    type: "cloud",
    networking: {type: "unrestricted"}
  }
)
puts "Environment ID: #{environment.id}" # env_...

---

Create an Agent (required first step)

⚠️ There is no inline agent config. model/system_/tools live on the agent object, not the session. Always start with client.beta.agents.create() — the session takes either agent: agent.id or the typed hash form agent: {type: "agent", id: agent.id, version: agent.version}.

Minimal

# 1. Create the agent (reusable, versioned)
agent = client.beta.agents.create(
  name: "Coding Assistant",
  model: :"claude-opus-4-8",
  system_: "You are a helpful coding assistant.",
  tools: [{type: "agent_toolset_20260401"}]
)

# 2. Start a session
session = client.beta.sessions.create(
  agent: {type: "agent", id: agent.id, version: agent.version},
  environment_id: environment.id,
  title: "Quickstart session"
)
puts "Session ID: #{session.id}"
puts "Trace: https://platform.claude.com/workspaces/default/sessions/#{session.id}"  # swap 'default' for your workspace ID if the API key is not in the Default workspace

Updating an Agent

Updates create new versions; the agent object is immutable per version.

updated_agent = client.beta.agents.update(
  agent.id,
  version: agent.version,
  system_: "You are a helpful coding agent. Always write tests."
)
puts "New version: #{updated_agent.version}"

# List all versions
client.beta.agents.versions.list(agent.id).auto_paging_each do |version|
  puts "Version #{version.version}: #{version.updated_at.iso8601}"
end

# Archive the agent
archived = client.beta.agents.archive(agent.id)
puts "Archived at: #{archived.archived_at.iso8601}"

---

Send a User Message

client.beta.sessions.events.send_(
  session.id,
  events: [{
    type: "user.message",
    content: [{type: "text", text: "Review the auth module"}]
  }]
)

💡 Stream-first: Open the stream before (or concurrently with) sending the message. The stream only delivers events that occur after it opens — stream-after-send means early events arrive buffered in one batch. See Steering Patterns.

---

Stream Events (SSE)

# Open the stream first, then send the user message
stream = client.beta.sessions.events.stream_events(session.id)

client.beta.sessions.events.send_(
  session.id,
  events: [{
    type: "user.message",
    content: [{type: "text", text: "Summarize the repo README"}]
  }]
)

stream.each do |event|
  case event.type
  in :"agent.message"
    event.content.each { |block| print block.text }
  in :"agent.tool_use"
    puts "\n[Using tool: #{event.name}]"
  in :"session.status_idle"
    break
  in :"session.error"
    puts "\n[Error: #{event.error&.message || "unknown"}]"
    break
  else
    # ignore other event types
  end
end

ℹ️ Event .type is a Symbol (compare with :"agent.message", not "agent.message").

Reconnecting and Tailing

When reconnecting mid-session, list past events first to dedupe, then tail live events:

require "set"

stream = client.beta.sessions.events.stream_events(session.id)

# Stream is open and buffering. List history before tailing live.
seen_event_ids = Set.new
client.beta.sessions.events.list(session.id).auto_paging_each { |past| seen_event_ids << past.id }

# Tail live events, skipping anything already seen
stream.each do |event|
  next if seen_event_ids.include?(event.id)
  seen_event_ids << event.id
  case event.type
  in :"agent.message"
    event.content.each { |block| print block.text }
  in :"session.status_idle"
    break
  else
    # ignore other event types
  end
end

---

Provide Custom Tool Result

ℹ️ The Ruby managed-agents bindings for user.custom_tool_result are not yet documented in this skill or in the apps source examples. Refer to shared/managed-agents-events.md for the wire format and the anthropic Ruby gem repository for the corresponding params.

---

Poll Events

client.beta.sessions.events.list(session.id).auto_paging_each do |event|
  puts "#{event.type}: #{event.id}"
end

---

Upload a File

require "pathname"

file = client.beta.files.upload(file: Pathname("data.csv"))
puts "File ID: #{file.id}"

# Mount in a session
session = client.beta.sessions.create(
  agent: agent.id,
  environment_id: environment.id,
  resources: [
    {
      type: "file",
      file_id: file.id,
      mount_path: "/workspace/data.csv"
    }
  ]
)

Add and Manage Resources on an Existing Session

# Attach an additional file to an open session
resource = client.beta.sessions.resources.add(
  session.id,
  type: "file",
  file_id: file.id
)
puts resource.id # "sesrsc_01ABC..."

# List resources on the session
listed = client.beta.sessions.resources.list(session.id)
listed.data.each { |entry| puts "#{entry.id} #{entry.type}" }

# Detach a resource
client.beta.sessions.resources.delete(resource.id, session_id: session.id)

---

List and Download Session Files

files = client.beta.files.list(scope_id: "sesn_abc123", betas: ["managed-agents-2026-04-01"])
content = client.beta.files.download(files.data[0].id)
File.binwrite("output.txt", content.read)

---

Session Management

# List environments
environments = client.beta.environments.list

# Retrieve a specific environment
env = client.beta.environments.retrieve(environment.id)

# Archive an environment (read-only, existing sessions continue)
client.beta.environments.archive(environment.id)

# Delete an environment (only if no sessions reference it)
client.beta.environments.delete(environment.id)

# Delete a session
client.beta.sessions.delete(session.id)

---

MCP Server Integration

# Agent declares MCP server (no auth here — auth goes in a vault)
agent = client.beta.agents.create(
  name: "GitHub Assistant",
  model: :"claude-opus-4-8",
  mcp_servers: [
    {
      type: "url",
      name: "github",
      url: "https://api.githubcopilot.com/mcp/"
    }
  ],
  tools: [
    {type: "agent_toolset_20260401"},
    {type: "mcp_toolset", mcp_server_name: "github"}
  ]
)

# Session attaches vault(s) containing credentials for those MCP server URLs
session = client.beta.sessions.create(
  agent: {type: "agent", id: agent.id, version: agent.version},
  environment_id: environment.id,
  vault_ids: [vault.id]
)

See shared/managed-agents-tools.md §Vaults for creating vaults and adding credentials.

---

Vaults

# Create a vault
vault = client.beta.vaults.create(
  display_name: "Alice",
  metadata: {external_user_id: "usr_abc123"}
)
puts vault.id # "vlt_01ABC..."

# Add an OAuth credential
credential = client.beta.vaults.credentials.create(
  vault.id,
  display_name: "Alice's Slack",
  auth: {
    type: "mcp_oauth",
    mcp_server_url: "https://mcp.slack.com/mcp",
    access_token: "xoxp-...",
    expires_at: "2026-04-15T00:00:00Z",
    refresh: {
      token_endpoint: "https://slack.com/api/oauth.v2.access",
      client_id: "1234567890.0987654321",
      scope: "channels:read chat:write",
      refresh_token: "xoxe-1-...",
      token_endpoint_auth: {
        type: "client_secret_post",
        client_secret: "abc123..."
      }
    }
  }
)

# Rotate the credential (e.g., after a token refresh)
client.beta.vaults.credentials.update(
  credential.id,
  vault_id: vault.id,
  auth: {
    type: "mcp_oauth",
    access_token: "xoxp-new-...",
    expires_at: "2026-05-15T00:00:00Z",
    refresh: {refresh_token: "xoxe-1-new-..."}
  }
)

# Archive a vault
client.beta.vaults.archive(vault.id)

---

GitHub Repository Integration

Mount a GitHub repository as a session resource (a vault holds the GitHub MCP credential):

session = client.beta.sessions.create(
  agent: agent.id,
  environment_id: environment.id,
  vault_ids: [vault.id],
  resources: [
    {
      type: "github_repository",
      url: "https://github.com/org/repo",
      mount_path: "/workspace/repo",
      authorization_token: "ghp_your_github_token"
    }
  ]
)

Multiple repositories on the same session:

resources = [
  {
    type: "github_repository",
    url: "https://github.com/org/frontend",
    mount_path: "/workspace/frontend",
    authorization_token: "ghp_your_github_token"
  },
  {
    type: "github_repository",
    url: "https://github.com/org/backend",
    mount_path: "/workspace/backend",
    authorization_token: "ghp_your_github_token"
  }
]

Rotating a repository's authorization token:

listed = client.beta.sessions.resources.list(session.id)
repo_resource_id = listed.data.first.id

client.beta.sessions.resources.update(
  repo_resource_id,
  session_id: session.id,
  authorization_token: "ghp_your_new_github_token"
)