Morph Discovery Pattern

Pattern: Morph-Discovery

Discover morph tools at runtime via ToolSearch. Prefer morph when available for large file edits and intent-based code search. Fall back to built-in tools silently when morph is not installed.

What It Does

Uses ToolSearch keyword queries ("morph edit", "morph warpgrep") to discover morph tools at runtime, prefers them for qualifying operations (large/non-contiguous edits, intent-based searches), and silently uses the built-in Edit/Grep tools when morph is not installed.

When to Use

When authoring an agent or command that performs file edits or code search and would benefit from morph's efficiency for large/scattered edits or semantic searches — but should also work without yellow-morph installed. Skip for trivial single-line edits or exact-string greps where built-ins are already optimal.

Usage

For File Editing

1. Call ToolSearch("morph edit")
2. If found AND (file > 200 lines OR change spans 3+ non-contiguous regions):
   prefer morph edit_file over built-in Edit
3. If not found OR file is small with contiguous changes:
   use built-in Edit
4. No warning on fallback. No degradation message.

For Intent-Based Code Search

1. Call ToolSearch("morph warpgrep")
2. If found AND query is intent-based ("what calls this function?",
   "find similar patterns", "blast radius of this change"):
   prefer morph codebase_search (aka WarpGrep)
3. If not found OR query is exact-match (specific string, regex):
   use built-in Grep
4. No warning on fallback. No degradation message.

Design Choices

• Keyword-based ToolSearch ("morph edit", "morph warpgrep") rather than select:<exact_name> — resilient to tool renames.
• Per-command discovery rather than session-level caching — ToolSearch is fast (sub-100ms), avoids coupling to morph package names.
• No hard dependency — morph tools are never listed in command allowed-tools. Discovery happens at runtime.

Anti-Patterns

• Do not add morph tools to command allowed-tools — use ToolSearch discovery
• Do not warn or message the user when morph is not available

Related

• memory-recall-pattern — query past learnings at workflow start.
• memory-remember-pattern — store learnings at workflow end.