# Error passing outputs between agents

**URL:** <https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459>\
**Category:** CrewAI Community Support\
**Created:** [November 16, 2024, 10:37am UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459 "2024-11-16T10:37:46Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 8\
**Page:** 1

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Nexago](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/nexago/32/1057_2.png) [@Nexago](https://community.crewai.com/u/Nexago)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2024, 10:37am UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/1 "2024-11-16T10:37:46Z")

</div>

I have a crew with 3 agents. First agent define a query to be search using SerperAI, second agent take the query and do the search extracting the content, and last agent analyse the articles found.

The problem that I am facing is that agent 3 (article\_analyst) is not receiving or considering the articles found by agent 2 (article\_researcher), sometimes it invents the result (fake articles) and sometimes only take one article.

This is the code used:

- Crew.py:

> from crewai import Agent, Crew, Process, Task  
> from crewai.project import CrewBase, agent, crew, task  
> from crewai\_tools import SerperDevTool  
> from datetime import datetime, timedelta  
> import logging  
> import os
> 
> from nexago\_agents\_project.src.nexago\_agents\_project.crews.mrk.search\_articles.tools.article\_analysis import ArticleAnalysis  
> from nexago\_agents\_project.src.nexago\_agents\_project.crews.mrk.search\_articles.tools.article\_validator\_extractor import ArticleValidatorExtractor
> 
> logging.basicConfig(level=logging.DEBUG, format=“%(asctime)s - %(name)s - %(levelname)s - %(message)s”)  
> logger = logging.getLogger( **name** )
> 
> from pydantic import BaseModel  
> from typing import Optional, List  
> from langchain\_openai import ChatOpenAI
> 
> class ArticleOutput(BaseModel):  
> title: str  
> date: str  
> link: str  
> snippet: str  
> content: str  
> imageUrl: Optional[str]  
> relevance\_score: int  
> sentiment: str
> 
> @CrewBase  
> class ArticleResearchCrew:  
> “”“NexagoAgentsProject crew”“”
> 
> ```
> agents_config = "config/agents.yaml"
> tasks_config = "config/tasks.yaml"
> 
> def prepare_data(self, data):
> start_date = (datetime.today() - timedelta(days=7)).strftime('%Y-%m-%d')
> end_date = datetime.today().strftime('%Y-%m-%d')
> keywords = " and ".join(data.get("keywords", []))
> return {
> "keywords": keywords,
> "startDate": start_date,
> "endDate": end_date,
> "numQueries": data.get("numQueries"),
> "userQuery": data.get("userQuery")
> }
> 
> def kickoff(self, data):
> try:
> prepared_data = self.prepare_data(data)
> crew_instance = self.crew()
> 
> result = crew_instance.kickoff(inputs=prepared_data)
> logger.debug("Kickoff result: %s", result)
> return result
> 
> except Exception as e:
> logger.error(f"Error in kickoff: {e}")
> return {"error": str(e), "status": "kickoff_failed"}
> 
> @agent
> def query_generator(self) -> Agent:
> return Agent(
> config=self.agents_config['query_generator'],
> verbose = True,
> allow_delegation=False
> )
> 
> @agent
> def article_researcher(self) -> Agent:
> serper_tool = SerperDevTool(n_results=15, tbs="qdr:w")
> 
> return Agent(
> config=self.agents_config['article_researcher'],
> tools=[serper_tool, ArticleValidatorExtractor(result_as_answer=True)],
> verbose = True,
> memory=True,
> allow_delegation=False
> )
> 
> @agent
> def article_analyst(self) -> Agent:
> return Agent(
> config=self.agents_config['article_analyst'],
> verbose=True,
> max_iter=1,
> memory=True,
> allow_delegation=False
> )
> 
> @task
> def query_generator_task(self) -> Task:
> return Task(
> config=self.tasks_config['query_generator_task'],
> expected_output=self.tasks_config['query_generator_task'].get('expected_output'),
> agent=self.query_generator()  
> )
> 
> @task
> def article_research_task(self) -> Task:
> return Task(
> config=self.tasks_config['article_research_task'],
> expected_output=self.tasks_config['article_research_task'].get('expected_output'),
> agent=self.article_researcher(),
> context=[self.query_generator_task()]
> )
> 
> @task
> def article_analyst_task(self) -> Task:
> return Task(
> config=self.tasks_config['article_analyst_task'],
> expected_output=self.tasks_config['article_analyst_task'].get('expected_output'),
> agent=self.article_analyst(),
> context=[self.article_research_task()], # Ensure it gets the output from the article_research_task
> output_type='json'          
> )
> 
> @crew
> def crew(self) -> Crew:
> """Creates the NexagoAgentsProject crew"""
> logger.debug("Initializing agents and tasks in crew")
> return Crew(
> agents=self.agents, # Automatically created by the @agent decorator
> tasks=self.tasks, # Automatically created by the @task decorator
> process=Process.sequential,
> verbose=True,
> memory=True
> )
> 
> ```

Following other posts, I have activated the memory, I have also done test creating a manager, but it doesn’t work.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![olaservo](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/olaservo/32/971_2.png) [@olaservo](https://community.crewai.com/u/olaservo)\
**Post date:** [November 16, 2024, 1:44pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/2 "2024-11-16T13:44:52Z")

</div>

I am facing a similar issue and the approach I am taking is based on a few suggestions made by Claude while referencing the crewai source code as context in Cursor.

I will let you know how it goes on my end.

For what its worth, here is (Claude + Cursor) reply to your original question, which is similar to my scenario:

I can help explain the behavior you’re experiencing and propose a solution. The core issue appears to be that while your `prepare_data` function handles initial data preparation, there’s no mechanism ensuring your analyst agent properly processes all articles from the researcher agent.

The solution involves implementing a custom tool for your analyst agent. Instead of relying solely on instructions to the agent, a tool enforces a structured processing pipeline. Consider this implementation:

```python
class ArticleAnalysisTool(BaseTool):
    def run(self, articles):
        results = []
        # Enforces processing of each article
        for article in articles:
            analysis = self._analyze_single_article(article)
            results.append(analysis)
        
        return {
            "total_analyzed": len(articles),
            "analyses": results
        }

@agent
def article_analyst(self) -> Agent:
    return Agent(
        config=self.agents_config['article_analyst'],
        tools=[ArticleAnalysisTool()]
    )

```

This approach provides several key benefits:

- Ensures comprehensive processing of all articles
- Prevents hallucination of non-existent articles
- Maintains consistent output structure
- Provides validation of inputs and outputs

The tool effectively creates a structured pipeline that the agent must follow, rather than just relying on instructions that the agent might interpret loosely or ignore.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![olaservo](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/olaservo/32/971_2.png) [@olaservo](https://community.crewai.com/u/olaservo)\
**Post date:** [November 17, 2024, 6:03pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/3 "2024-11-17T18:03:17Z")

</div>

After more experimenting I can confirm that adding simple tools to handle and validate the data being passed between agents does allow the task results to be passed reliably in between agents. Here’s an example custom tool:

```python
class ArticleAnalysisTool(BaseTool):
    name: str = "ArticleAnalysis"
    description: str = "Analyzes article content and extracts key information"
    
    def _run(self, article_data: str) -> str:
        try:
            # Handle both JSON strings and raw data
            if isinstance(article_data, str):
                try:
                    articles = json.loads(article_data)
                except:
                    articles = article_data
            
            # Process and return structured analysis
            return self._analyze_articles(articles)
            
        except Exception as e:
            return f"Error analyzing articles: {str(e)}\nRaw data: {article_data}"

```

This implementation helps ensure your Article Analyst actually works with the articles found by the Researcher, rather than inventing content or only considering a single article.

Other considerations that can help: proper task context chaining using the `context` parameter, as well as managing the volume of search results to prevent truncation. (I think you are already handling context chaining here…search results of 15 might be pushing the context window boundary? That one I’m not so sure about.)

I don’t think enabling memory is necessary for this to work the way you expect.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Nexago](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/nexago/32/1057_2.png) [@Nexago](https://community.crewai.com/u/Nexago)\
**Post date:** [November 19, 2024, 4:03pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/4 "2024-11-19T16:03:13Z")

</div>

Thank you, @olaservo. I’ve implemented your recommendations, but the error persists. The analysis is still only processing the last article, not the entire list. ☹. I have tried activating and deactivating the memory. I have also checked to setup the context as task level.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![olaservo](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/olaservo/32/971_2.png) [@olaservo](https://community.crewai.com/u/olaservo)\
**Post date:** [November 20, 2024, 1:03pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/5 "2024-11-20T13:03:59Z")

</div>

I’m curious what version of crewai you’re using?

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Nexago](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/nexago/32/1057_2.png) [@Nexago](https://community.crewai.com/u/Nexago)\
**Post date:** [November 22, 2024, 4:03pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/6 "2024-11-22T16:03:14Z")

</div>

![Screenshot 2024-11-22 at 19.00.51](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/uploads/crewai/original/2X/5/50949c58b313e10ff8e2d2d324c5ec40ae0f34c6.png)

I am using 0.80.0 version.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Nexago](https://sea1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/user_avatar/community.crewai.com/nexago/32/1057_2.png) [@Nexago](https://community.crewai.com/u/Nexago)\
**Post date:** [November 25, 2024, 7:59pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/7 "2024-11-25T19:59:42Z")

</div>

Finally, my last agent is taking the output of previous agent. I had to redefine the agents and tasks iteratively until I achieved the desired outcome.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![system](https://us1.discourse-cdn.com/flex025/uploads/crewai/original/1X/ecda97e72f77c7100e0a761444b1c991925cc789.png) [@system](https://community.crewai.com/u/system)\
**Post date:** [November 26, 2024, 8:00pm UTC](https://community.crewai.com/t/error-passing-outputs-between-agents/1459/8 "2024-11-26T20:00:16Z")

</div>

This topic was automatically closed 24 hours after the last reply. New replies are no longer allowed.