4. Design Philosophy¶

Dokugent is built on a core belief: trust is earned through structure, not sentiment. In a world where AI agents operate with increasing autonomy, it's no longer enough to assume alignment or hope for good behavior. Developers and organizations need tools that make agent behavior legible, enforceable, and inspectable—by design.

Principles that Guide Dokugent¶

1. Plans, Not Prompts¶

Prompting is useful for experimentation, but too fragile for production. Dokugent introduces plans—structured, declarative blueprints that define what an agent is allowed to do, what data it may access, and what goals it is tasked to achieve.

2. Boundaries Must Be Explicit¶

Unscoped agents are unpredictable and unsafe. Dokugent plans must declare inputs, constraints, and output expectations. This reduces ambiguity and prevents silent failure modes like scope creep or privilege escalation.

3. Trust Is Verifiable¶

Every certified Dokugent plan is signed using a cryptographic key tied to the author’s identity. This allows any execution environment to verify the authenticity and integrity of the plan before running it.

4. Auditability Enables Accountability¶

Dokugent leaves a trace. Every plan, simulation, dry run, and certification is logged and traceable—making it easier to debug agent behavior, conduct security reviews, and provide compliance reports.

5. Developer Experience Matters¶

Security tools that slow down developers don’t get used. Dokugent is designed to be CLI-first, markdown-native, and IDE-friendly. Safety should feel like momentum, not friction.

This philosophy grounds Dokugent not just as a tool for compliance, but as a foundation for the future of agentic software: safer, more composable, and built on shared expectations—not guesswork.