Agent management

Agent states

Agents in Jackadi can exist in one of three states:

State	Description	Capabilities
Candidate	The initial state when an agent first connects to the manager, not yet approved.	Cannot execute tasks, awaits approval.
Accepted	Agents that have been approved and can execute tasks.	Can receive and execute tasks, full system access.
Rejected	Agents that have been denied access to the system, e.g. duplicate agents or manually rejected.	Cannot connect or execute tasks.

List agents

command

jack agents list

output

Accepted

 • agent1
 • agent2

 Candidates


 Rejected

Detailed view

command

jack agents list --verbose

output

Accepted

 • agent1 (172.18.0.3 MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...EJEX0CAwEAAQ==)
 • agent2 (172.18.0.2 MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ==)

 Candidates


 Rejected

JSON output

command

jack agents list --json

output

{
   "Accepted": [
      {
         "Id": "agent1",
         "Address": "172.18.0.3",
         "Certificate": "MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...EJEX0CAwEAAQ==",
         "IsConnected": true,
         "Since": {
            "Seconds": 1757578390,
            "Nanos": 564026075
         },
         "LastMsg": {
            "Seconds": 1757610077,
            "Nanos": 274820288
         },
         "IsActive": true
      },
      {
         "Id": "agent2",
         "Address": "172.18.0.2",
         "Certificate": "MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ==",
         "IsConnected": true,
         "Since": {
            "Seconds": 1757578390,
            "Nanos": 569209812
         },
         "LastMsg": {
            "Seconds": 1757610077,
            "Nanos": 274888616
         },
         "IsActive": true
      }
   ],
   "Candidates": null,
   "Rejected": null
}

Check agent health

command

jack agents health

output

Agents

 • agent1 (connected, active)
 • agent2 (connected, active)

agent1 is connected and had recent activity (e.g. a task has been executed).
agent2 is connected and did not have any recent activity.
agent3 is not connected to the manager anymore (e.g. due to service down, or network issue).

Detailed health view

command

jack agents health --verbose

output

Agents

 • agent1
   • state: connected, active
   • connected since: September 11, 2025 at 08:13 UTC
   • last active: September 11, 2025 at 17:02 UTC
 • agent2
   • state: connected, active
   • connected since: September 11, 2025 at 08:13 UTC
   • last active: September 11, 2025 at 17:02 UTC

Accept agents

command

jack agents accept <agent_id>

example

# Accept a candidate agent
$ jack agents accept agent2

output

agent registered: id:"agent2"  address:"172.18.0.2"  certificate:"MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ=="

Accept with specific configuration

command

jack agents accept <agent_id> --address <address> --certificate <cert>

example

# Accept agent with specific address and certificate
$ jack agents accept agent2 --address "192.168.1.101:8080" --certificate "agent2.pem"

output

agent registered: id:"agent2"  address:"192.168.1.101:8080"  certificate:"MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ=="

Reject agents

command

jack agents reject <agent_id>

example

# Reject a candidate agent
$ jack agents reject agent5

output

agent rejected: agent2

Remove agents

command

jack agents remove <agent_id>

example

# Remove an accepted agent
$ jack agents remove agent1

output

agent removed: agent2

Force accept rejected agents

command

jack agents accept <agent_id> --force

example

# Force accept a previously rejected agent
$ jack agents accept agent4 --force

output

agent registered: id:"agent2"  address:"172.18.0.2"  certificate:"MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ=="

Auto-acceptance

For development or trusted environments, you can enable auto-acceptance on the manager:

command

manager --auto-accept-agent

This automatically accepts new agents when they connect without requiring manual approval.

Security considerations

Production environments: Disable auto-accept and manually review all agent connection requests.
Rogue agent protection: Jackadi prevents multiple agents with the same ID - duplicates are automatically rejected.
TLS certificates: Use certificates for secure agent authentication in production.
Regular auditing: Monitor agent lists regularly to ensure only authorized agents are connected.

Agent workflow example

example

# 1. Start an agent (from agent machine)
$ agent --id="web-server-01" --manager-address="manager.example.com:8080"

# 2. Check for new candidates (from manager machine)
$ jack agents list

output

Accepted

 • agent1

 Candidates

 • web-server-01

 Rejected

example

# 3. Accept the new agent
$ jack agents accept web-server-01

output

agent registered: id:"web-server-01"  address:"172.18.0.4"  certificate:"MIICIjANBgkqhkiG9w...HWGG0CAwEAAQ=="

example

# 4. Verify the agent is now accepted and connected
$ jack agents health

output

Agents

 • agent1 (connected, active)
 • web-server-01 (connected, inactive)

Manual installation