Agentic Search for Context Engineering

Hosted by Leonie Monigatti and Doug Turnbull

What you'll learn

Why context engineering is 80% agentic search

Understand how retrieval evolved from passive RAG pipelines to agents that build their own context with search tools

The search tool landscape

Understand which search tools exist, how they work, and their trade-offs

How to curate your agent's search tools

Practical considerations for adding more search tools

Why this topic matters

Context engineering is 80% agentic search. Agents aren’t the passive recipients of context anymore. Today, they build it themselves. And the most important tools they have to do that are their search tools We'll cut through the current debate around filesystems, databases, and shell tools, and give you a practical framework for choosing the right search interface for your agent's actual needs.

You'll learn from

Doug Turnbull

Search + Snuggie Enthusiast

In 2012, Doug got bit by the search bug and he's still trying to keep up. From full-text search, to Learning to Rank models, to search agents that generate their own code, he knows the overwhelming landscape first hand. Yet Doug still works to deeply understand the what / how / why, and help teams use these technologies practically, distinguishing hype from reality.

He’s led search at Reddit, Shopify, and Wikipedia, authored Relevant Search and AI Powered Search, and advised 100+ organizations over the years - all in pursuit of the same question: how does search actually work?