ReTrace preprint reports lower automation costs with code-directed workflows

Researchers report that ReTrace, a system that converts written procedures and logged AI agent runs into reusable workflows, completed tasks at 24% lower cost than an agent across 79 procedures from their production platform. Completion fell to 93.8%, compared with the agent's 96.8%. ReTrace extracts the conditions behind an agent's actions, combines them into rules and generates executable workflows in which code selects the next step. On τ²-Bench, workflows ran in 1.3 seconds instead of 170 seconds, but task success was 75.8%, compared with 80.6% for the agent. The preprint also reports that repairs using labeled training failures improved results on other tests.