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Building Your First AI Agent

Practical Framework, Tools & Tips

Livestream Session

Oct 2025

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Building Your First AI Agent
Today's Agenda

What We'll Cover Today

Your roadmap for the session

Framework

How to approach building AI agents from scratch

Landscape

Overview of popular tools (no-code & code)

Demos

Live demonstrations of selected tools

Practical Tips

Best practices and common pitfalls to avoid

Goal: By the end of this session, you'll have a clear roadmap for building your first AI agent, knowledge of popular tools, and practical insights to get started.

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Building Your First AI Agent
Understanding AI Agents

What is an AI Agent?

Understanding autonomous AI systems

Core Definition

An AI agent is an autonomous system that can perceive its environment, make decisions, and take actions to achieve specific goals

Autonomy

Operates without constant human intervention

Tool Use

Accesses and uses various tools and APIs

Memory

Remembers context and past interactions

Planning

Breaks down complex tasks into steps

Unlike simple chatbots, AI agents can take actions in the real world by using tools, maintaining context, and working towards goals autonomously.

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Building Your First AI Agent
No-Code Demo

Build Without Code in Minutes

n8n visual workflow + AI = Beautiful results

Visual Builder

Drag & drop nodes

4 Nodes

Complete workflow

GPT-4 Powered

Smart planning

Styled Output

Professional HTML

The Flow

  • User submits goal via form
  • OpenAI node processes request
  • Generates structured HTML
  • Returns beautiful formatted plan

Notes

  • No coding required
  • Take less than hour to build
  • Professional UI built-in
  • Easy to modify & extend
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Building Your First AI Agent
Quick Start Demo

Your First Agent in 30 Lines of Code

Streamlit + OpenAI Agents SDK

What It Does

  • Takes any goal as input
  • AI agent analyzes and plans
  • Returns structured task breakdown
  • Real-time streaming response

Tech Stack

  • Streamlit for UI
  • OpenAI Agents SDK
  • Async Python
  • ~30 lines of code total
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Building Your First AI Agent
n8n Multi-Agent Demo

n8n Multi-Agent System

Made in the AI Agent Bootcamp

n8n Workflow Canvas

System Components

Main Orchestrator

Intelligently routes user queries to specialized agents, combines results, and maintains conversation context

RAG Agent

Searches internal knowledge base using vector similarity, retrieves company documentation and policies

Web Search Agent

Performs real-time internet research for current events, news, and external data using SerpAPI

Communication Agent

Creates and formats professional reports in Google Docs, handles document generation

Hierarchical Architecture

PGVector RAG

Live Web Search

Google Docs API

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Building Your First AI Agent
Real-World Example

Production Multi-Agent System

Built in the AI Agent Bootcamp

Streamlit Web Interface

Project Structure

investment-agents/
├── research_agents/
│   ├── portfolio_manager.py
│   ├── fundamental_analyst.py
│   ├── macro_analyst.py
│   └── quantitative_analyst.py
├── tools/
│   ├── fred_api.py
│   └── memo_editor.py
├── prompts/
│   └── *.md (agent instructions)
├── database/
│   ├── models.py
│   └── memory.py
├── streamlit_app/
│   └── app.py
└── main.py

Parallel Execution

@function_tool
async def run_all_specialists_parallel(
    query: str
) -> str:
    """Run 3 agents simultaneously"""
    tasks = [
        Runner.run(fundamental_agent, query),
        Runner.run(macro_agent, query),
        Runner.run(quant_agent, query),
    ]
    # Execute in parallel - 3x faster!
    results = await asyncio.gather(*tasks)
    return combine_analyses(results)

4 Specialist Agents

Parallel Processing

PostgreSQL + Vector

Heroku Deployed

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Building Your First AI Agent
Framework: Getting Started

How to Approach Building an AI Agent

Your step-by-step framework

Step 1: Define Your Use Case

Key Questions:

  • What specific problem are you solving?
  • What tasks will the agent perform?
  • Who will use this agent?
  • What's the expected input and output?

Step 2: Choose Your Approach

No-Code

Best for: Quick prototypes, simple workflows, non-technical users

Pros: Fast, visual, easy to modify

Cons: Less flexibility, potential scaling limits

Code-Based

Best for: Complex logic, custom integrations, production systems

Pros: Full control, scalable, customizable

Cons: Requires coding skills, longer development time

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Building Your First AI Agent
Framework: Core Components

Essential Components Every Agent Needs

The building blocks of AI agents

1. LLM (Brain)

The reasoning engine - choose GPT-4, Claude, or Gemini based on your needs

2. Instructions

Clear prompts defining the agent's role, capabilities, and constraints

3. Tools

Functions the agent can call (APIs, databases, calculators, etc.)

4. Memory

Context storage for conversations and long-term information

5. Guardrails

Safety measures and output validation

6. Orchestration

The logic that connects everything together

Pro Tip: Start simple with just LLM + Instructions + 1-2 Tools. Add complexity as needed.

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Building Your First AI Agent
The Tool Landscape

Popular Agent Building Tools: No-Code & Code

Curated selection with highest adoption

Selected tools with the highest adoption and community support

We've curated the most popular options for building AI agents in 2025, covering both visual builders and code frameworks.

No-Code Tools

15

Visual builders for creating agents without writing code

Code-Based Tools

13

SDKs and frameworks for programmatic agent development

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Building Your First AI Agent
No-Code Agent Builders

No-Code Tools (15 Options)

Visual builders for every skill level

When to use no-code: Rapid prototyping, simple workflows, business users without coding experience, quick MVPs

Popular & Accessible

n8n

Visual workflow automation

Make

Advanced automation platform

Zapier Agents

Automation with AI agents

Gumloop

Agent workflow builder

Relevance AI

AI agent platform

MindStudio

AI app builder

Developer-Friendly

Dify

Open-source LLM platform

Langflow

Visual LangChain builder

Flowise AI

Drag-and-drop LLM apps

Enterprise Platforms

OpenAI AgentKit

OpenAI toolkit

Google Vertex AI

Google builder

Amazon Bedrock

AgentCore

MS Copilot Studio

Enterprise

Salesforce Agentforce

CRM agents

Oracle AI Studio

Enterprise

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Building Your First AI Agent
Code-Based Agent Frameworks

Code-Based Tools (13 Options)

SDKs and frameworks for developers

When to use code: Complex logic, custom integrations, production deployments, full control over behavior, advanced use cases

Official Provider SDKs

OpenAI Agents SDK

Official OpenAI framework

Amazon Bedrock

Strands Agents on AWS

Google ADK

Agent Development Kit

Microsoft Ecosystem

AutoGen

Open-source multi-agent framework

Semantic Kernel

Open-source SDK for AI apps

Popular Open Source

LangChain

Most popular

LangGraph

State-based

CrewAI

Multi-agent

Auto-GPT

Autonomous

Agno

Function-calling

Haystack

NLP framework

Pydantic AI

Type-safe

Smolagents

Hugging Face

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Building Your First AI Agent
Choosing the Right Tool

No-Code vs Code: Decision Matrix

Compare and choose the right approach

Criteria No-Code Code-Based
Learning Curve Low - Visual interface High - Requires programming
Development Speed Very Fast - Hours/days Slower - Days/weeks
Customization Limited to platform features Unlimited flexibility
Scalability Depends on platform limits Highly scalable
Cost Platform subscription fees Development time + infrastructure
Maintenance Platform handles updates You manage everything
Integration Pre-built connectors Custom integrations
Best For MVPs, simple workflows, business users Production apps, complex logic, custom needs

Recommendation: Start with no-code to validate your idea quickly. Move to code when you need more control or hit platform limitations.

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Building Your First AI Agent
Model Context Protocol (MCP)

MCP: Universal Tool Connectivity

The "USB for AI Agents"

What is MCP?

A universal standard that lets AI agents connect to any tool or data source seamlessly

Why It Matters

  • Connect to any tool without custom code
  • Works across all AI platforms
  • Future-proof your agent integrations
  • Rapidly expand agent capabilities

Examples

  • Google Drive, Gmail, Calendar
  • Slack, Notion, Linear
  • GitHub, databases, APIs
  • Custom internal tools

Think of MCP as USB for AI - one standard that connects everything. We cover MCP tool creation in the Bootcamp!

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Building Your First AI Agent
Testing Your Agent

Evaluations: Testing & Improving

Measure to improve agent performance

"What doesn't get measured doesn't get improved"

Run multiple test cases through your agent to measure performance, catch issues, and iterate on your prompts.

1. Create Test Cases

Build a spreadsheet with various inputs to test different scenarios

2. Run Evaluations

Execute all test cases and capture agent outputs automatically

3. Analyze & Iterate

Review results, adjust prompts, and re-test to improve performance

Common Evaluation Metrics

Helpfulness: How useful is the response?

Correctness: Is the information accurate?

Format: Does it match expected structure?

Custom: Your specific business metrics

The Bootcamp covers building complete evaluation pipelines with automated scoring!

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Building Your First AI Agent
Publishing Your Agent

Deploy & Monitor Your Agent

From development to production

Deployment Checklist

Test thoroughly

Run evaluations across all test cases

Set up monitoring

Track usage, errors, and performance metrics

Enable guardrails

Content filtering, rate limits, error handling

Deploy gradually

Start with small user group, scale up

Continuous improvement

Regular evaluations, prompt updates, feature additions

Activation

Toggle your workflow from "inactive" to "active" to make it live

  • Generate production URLs
  • Set up webhooks/triggers
  • Configure access controls

Monitoring

Track your agent's performance in production

  • Execution logs and history
  • Error rates and types
  • Usage patterns and costs

Learn production-ready deployment strategies in the AI Agent Bootcamp!

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Building Your First AI Agent
Common Pitfalls & Solutions

Common Pitfalls to Avoid

Learn from common mistakes

Vague Instructions

Problem: Agent doesn't know what to do

Solution: Be extremely specific about role, tasks, and expected behavior

Too Many Tools

Problem: Agent gets confused choosing tools

Solution: Start with 2-3 essential tools, add more only when needed

No Memory Management

Problem: Context grows too large, costs spike

Solution: Implement token limits and summarization strategies

Poor Error Handling

Problem: Agent crashes on unexpected inputs

Solution: Validate inputs, catch exceptions, provide graceful failures

Cost Overruns

Problem: API costs spiral out of control

Solution: Set spending limits, cache responses, use cheaper models where possible

Slow Response Times

Problem: Users wait too long for results

Solution: Optimize prompts, reduce tool calls, use streaming responses

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Building Your First AI Agent
Your Action Plan

Your Next Steps: Getting Started Today

Follow this step-by-step plan

Ready to build your first agent? Follow this step-by-step plan:

1
Define Your Use Case

What problem will your agent solve? Write it down in one clear sentence.

2
Choose Your Tool

No-code (n8n, Make) for quick start or Code (OpenAI SDK, LangChain) for flexibility

3
Start Simple

Build a basic agent with just instructions and one tool. Test it thoroughly.

4
Iterate & Expand

Add more tools, refine instructions, improve error handling based on testing.

5
Deploy & Monitor

Launch to real users, track performance, gather feedback, and continuously improve.

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Building Your First AI Agent
Session Complete

Thank You!

Ready to build your first AI agent?

Key Takeaways

  • 28 popular tools covered (15 no-code, 13 code-based)
  • Start simple with one task and one tool
  • Choose no-code for speed, code for control
  • Test extensively before deploying
  • Iterate based on real usage

Start Building

Visit our website to learn more about the AI Agent Bootcamp & community.

lonelyoctopus.com

Get in Touch

Questions? Reach out to
contact@lonelyoctopus.com