Part 4: Single Agent Patterns

Name: AI Agent Architecture: From Single Agent to Enterprise Multi-Agent Systems
Author: Wayland Zhang

Before orchestrating multiple Agents, master the patterns that make a single Agent powerful.

What This Part Covers

This part explores advanced patterns for single Agent behavior:

Chapter 10: Planning Pattern — How Agents break down complex tasks into steps
Chapter 11: Reflection Pattern — Self-evaluation and iterative improvement
Chapter 12: Chain-of-Thought — Structured reasoning for better outputs

Key Questions Answered

When should an Agent plan ahead vs. act immediately?
How do you implement self-reflection without infinite loops?
What's the difference between CoT prompting and agentic CoT?
How do you evaluate plan quality before execution?

Prerequisites

Understanding of Agent fundamentals (Part 1)
Knowledge of tool calling (Part 2)
Familiarity with context management (Part 3)

Continue to Chapter 10: Planning Pattern →

@incollection{zhang2026aiagent_en_part4_overview, author = {Zhang, Wayland}, title = {Part 4 Overview}, booktitle = {AI Agent Architecture: From Single Agent to Enterprise Multi-Agent Systems}, year = {2026}, url = {https://waylandz.com/ai-agent-book-en/part4-overview} }