#Tag · bonfire.cafe

Coincidentally, I assume, Abhijit Rao posted on LinkedIn earlier today a very interesting blurb, reporting on his use of this condition handling structure in conjunction with LLMs.

(Works for me in an incognito window, but you may not be able to see past the first comment if you don't have a LinkedIn account.)

https://www.linkedin.com/posts/quasiabhi_commonlisp-lisp-agents-activity-7425847332560293888-fYf9

The blurb references this more detailed account of the work, which I haven't been through in detail yet:

https://quasilabs.in/blog/2026/02/07/conditions-restarts-and-the-agent-that-chooses/

#CommonLisp #Lisp #ConditionHandling #Errors #Restarts #Continuations #ErrorHandling #ConditionHandling #LLM #LLMs #AI #Modularity #QuasiLabs #Reflection #Introspection #MetaProgramming

Conditions, Restarts, and the Agent That Chooses

#commonlisp #lisp #agents #llm #programming #code #quasilabs | Abhijit Rao

In 1988 The Common Lisp Condition System was formally introduced by the X3J13 committee, responsible for the ANSI standard. It was a radical idea: The code that /detects/ an error should not decide how to /recover/ from it. Instead, the signaler establishes named recovery options—restarts—and lets a handler higher up the stack choose which one to invoke. The decision belongs to whoever has the broader context. This was ahead of its time. For 35+ years, the "broader context" was either a human in the debugger or a programmer who knew at compile time which restart to pick. Both worked fine. Then LLMs showed up. An agent monitoring a data pipeline encounters a validation error. Three restarts available. No hardcoded strategy. The agent needs to reason about system goals, weigh tradeoffs, adapt to context it wasn't explicitly programmed for. The architecture was already right. What was missing: semantic context for the handler. Restarts come with names and descriptions. Agents need to know what the system is /trying to achieve/. What failed and why. What each recovery option costs. Why these specific restarts exist in the first place. When you add structured intent metadata—goals, failure modes, design rationale—the agent can map recovery options to system objectives. Same restarts. Profoundly different decision-making surface. I built Telos to capture this. It makes the why behind code queryable at runtime. Combined with conditions and restarts, you get agent-legible error recovery. The condition/restart protocol already separates mechanism from policy. It supports multiple recovery options without the signaler knowing which will be chosen. It allows the handler to be arbitrarily far—in code, in time, in understanding—from the signaler. It's an architecture perfect for agentic systems. And, yes, Common Lisp has an ANSI standard. Blog post with full working CSV validator example: https://lnkd.in/dSbuDK6J #commonlisp #lisp #agents #llm #programming #code #quasilabs

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 7 days ago

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings will restart the No. 6 reactor at its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in Niigata Prefecture on Monday after having shut it down in January due to an alarm error. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/business/2026/02/06/companies/kashiwazaki-kariwa-restart/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #business #companies #niigata #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · last week

Electoral candidates in a Hokkaido district are braving the cold to get their messages out before the Feb. 8 election. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/02/03/japan/politics/hokkaido-4-election/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #politics #cra #ldp #sanseito #cdp #komeito #hokkaido #2026lowerhouseelection #sanaetakaichi #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 2 weeks ago

Alarm at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa No. 6 was probably a false alarm, while Fukushima-style meltdown was never a possibility given the reactor's design. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/01/30/japan/science-health/kashiwazaki-kariwa-fukushima/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #sciencehealth #niigata #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 3 weeks ago

An alarm sounds and Tepco suspends restart at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, the world's largest nuclear reactor. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/01/23/japan/science-health/kashiwazaki-kariwa-alarm/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #sciencehealth #niigata #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 3 weeks ago

Control rod alarm sounds at restart of Kashiwazaki-Kariwa reactor No. 6 https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/01/22/japan/science-health/kashiwazaki-kariwa-alarm/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #sciencehealth #niigata #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 3 weeks ago

Tecpo has restarted its reactor at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa, the world’s largest nuclear plant, which had been shut down in 2012 following the 2011 Fukushima disaster. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/01/21/japan/science-health/kashiwazaki-kariwa-restart/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #sciencehealth #niigata #nuclearenergy #energy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · last month

TEPCO has submitted a new business reconstruction program to the government, featuring plans to seek partners for its operations related to data centers and decarbonization. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/business/2026/01/11/companies/tepco-business-reconstruction-plan/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #business #companies #fukushima #niigata #tepco #nuclearenergy #restarts #kashiwazakikariwa #fukushimano1

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · last month

Japan's nuclear regulator said it was halting the screening needed to restart Chubu Electric Power's only nuclear power plant after the ‍company ⁠reported inappropriate seismic data handling ‍for the regulatory review. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2026/01/07/japan/hamaoka-nuclear-plant-screening-halt/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #chubuelectric #nuclearenergy #utilities #nra #restarts #earthquakes #shizuoka #hamaoka

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 3 months ago

Hokkaido Gov. Naomichi Suzuki has announced his support for a planned restart of the No. 3 reactor at Hokkaido Electric Power’s Tomari nuclear plant. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/11/28/japan/politics/hokkaido-governor-tomari-nuclear-restart-support/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #politics #hokkaido #naomichisuzuki #nuclearenergy #energy #tomari #restarts #localgovernment

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 3 months ago

Niigata Gov. Hideyo Hanazumi inspected Tepco's Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power station on Friday, before making a decision on whether to approve the restart of a reactor at the plant. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/11/14/japan/kashiwazaki-kariwa-niigata-governor-visit/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #niigata #kashiwazakikariwa #tepco #restarts #localgovernment #nuclearenergy

The Japan Times

@thejapantimes@mastodon.social · 8 months ago

Tokyo Electric Power Company Holdings has changed the schedule for restarting reactors at its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear plant in Niigata Prefecture, sources said Wednesday. https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2025/06/26/japan/tepco-change-plan-niigata/?utm_medium=Social&utm_source=mastodon #japan #nuclearenergy #tepco #restarts #niigata #kashiwazakikariwa