Glossary
AI harness (coding agent)
Quick answer
An AI harness is the tooling wrapped around a model — Claude Code, Cursor, Cline — that manages context, tools, files, and execution. The harness, not just the model, determines real-world agent performance.
Two teams on the same model get very different results depending on the harness. Evaluating harnesses on their own dimensions, and detecting lock-in before it compounds, is its own discipline.
Related skills
AI Evaluation
Evaluating AI Harness Dimensions
AI Harnesses
Detecting Harness Lockin
AI Harnesses
Routing Work Across AI Harnesses
Turn this into a skill your agent can run
Loreto packages any workflow or source into a production-ready Claude Code skill.