Christmas assistants are a good reminder that structure matters

Since it’s Christmas, I’ve been thinking about Christmas assistants, mostly as a way to highlight beyond the foundational design principles.

Most assistants handle individual questions well, but struggle once you ask them to manage anything over time, like:

  • tracking who you’ve already bought gifts for
  • remembering a budget cap across multiple suggestions
  • not suggesting items that won’t arrive before Christmas

A more structured design might include:

  • an intent analyzer that extracts things like “budget-sensitive” or “last-minute”
  • a simple planner that maintains a checklist (e.g., gifts left, budget remaining)
  • task-specific workers (one focused on gift ideas, another on reminders)
  • a validation step that checks for obvious issues before replying

Automating these parts helps the assistant stay consistent instead of reinventing logic every turn.

What would be your Christmas themed Agent 😁😉 and how would you approach it?

submitted by /u/coolandy00
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