Partner: An AI That Does Research While You Sleep

ty z — Sat, 23 May 2026 15:42:48 +0000

LLM generates text. Agent executes tasks. Partner does research — on its own.

The Problem

As a researcher, I have more ideas than time. Papers to read, experiments to run, code to review, and connections to find between projects. No matter how fast I work, the backlog grows.

What if I had a research companion that worked independently — reading papers, exploring my codebase, building a knowledge base, and proposing new ideas — while I focused on the hard problems?

The Three Layers of AI

We've seen two layers of AI tools:

Introducing Partner 🤝

Partner is an autonomous research entity. It sits on top of existing agent frameworks (like how agents sit on top of LLMs) and conducts research independently.

The core interaction is beautifully simple:

"Hey Partner, what have you been doing?"

And it tells you everything it discovered while you were away.

How It Works

Partner runs in the background, executing a research cycle every 30 minutes (configurable). Each cycle:

Picks a task from its queue (self-generated or user-injected)
Executes it via the agent backend (web search, code analysis, etc.)
Records findings in its knowledge base
Generates new tasks based on what it learned
Repeats — forever

Events: The Heart of Partner

An Event is one complete research cycle — like how Agents have Skills, Partner has Events.

Each Event follows a structured flow:

📖 Literature → Search and read papers
🔬 Project Scan → Analyze your codebase
💡 Idea Generate → Propose improvements
🧭 Exploration → Try new directions
📝 Knowledge → Record findings
🌱 Spawn → Create new Events

Events grow on their own — one Event's findings automatically spawn new Events. The research never stops.

Real Results

I ran Partner overnight on my bioinformatics research projects. By morning:

29 research cycles completed autonomously
34 tasks finished
48 knowledge entries accumulated
94 tasks queued for future exploration

Key discoveries Partner made on its own:

Multi-Agent Support

Partner works on top of existing agent frameworks — it doesn't reinvent the wheel.

Run partner setup to auto-detect installed agents.

Cross-Platform

Partner runs on Linux, macOS, Windows, and WSL. On WSL, it can automatically access your Windows files through the WSL Bridge.

Getting Started

git clone https://github.com/zty522/partner.git
cd partner
pip install -e .
partner setup

Then open your agent (Hermes, OpenClaw, etc.) and say:

"Hey Partner, what have you been doing?"

What's Next

WeChat/QQ integration — ask Partner via voice message
Community Events — share and install Event templates
Multi-Partner collaboration — multiple Partners working together
More agent backends — Claude Code, Cursor, and more

Partner: because research shouldn't wait for you.

GitHub:

zty522 / partner

Partner 🤝 Your AI Research Companion. "What have you been doing?"

🤝 Partner

"Hey Partner, what have you been doing?"

An AI research companion that works independently in the background You don't give it commands. You just check in.

The Idea

LLM:     You ask → It answers → Done
Agent:   You command → It executes → Waits
Partner: It works on its own → You ask "what have you been doing?" → It reports

Partner is proactive. It reads papers, explores your projects, builds a knowledge base, and proposes new ideas — all without you telling it to. When you're ready, you just ask:

"Hey Partner, what have you been doing?"

And it tells you everything it discovered while you were away.

Quick Start

git clone https://github.com/zty522/partner.git
cd partner
pip install -e .
partner setup

The setup wizard detects your installed agents (Hermes, Codex, Claude Code), configures a workspace, and registers Partner as a skill. Then just talk naturally:

You:

…

View on GitHub

DEV Community: ty z

Partner: An AI That Does Research While You Sleep

The Problem

The Three Layers of AI

Introducing Partner 🤝

How It Works

Events: The Heart of Partner

Real Results

Multi-Agent Support

Cross-Platform

Getting Started

What's Next

zty522 / partner

Partner 🤝 Your AI Research Companion. "What have you been doing?"

🤝 Partner

"Hey Partner, what have you been doing?"

The Idea

Quick Start