Stepwise Planner Migration Guide

This migration guide shows how to migrate from FunctionCallingStepwisePlanner to a new recommended approach for planning capability - Auto Function Calling. The new approach produces the results more reliably and uses fewer tokens compared to FunctionCallingStepwisePlanner.

Plan generation

Following code shows how to generate a new plan with Auto Function Calling by using FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto(). After sending a request to AI model, the plan will be located in ChatHistory object where a message with Assistant role will contain a list of functions (steps) to call.

Old approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

FunctionCallingStepwisePlanner planner = new();

FunctionCallingStepwisePlannerResult result = await planner.ExecuteAsync(kernel, "Check current UTC time and return current weather in Boston city.");

ChatHistory generatedPlan = result.ChatHistory;

New approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

IChatCompletionService chatCompletionService = kernel.GetRequiredService<IChatCompletionService>();

ChatHistory chatHistory = [];
chatHistory.AddUserMessage("Check current UTC time and return current weather in Boston city.");

OpenAIPromptExecutionSettings executionSettings = new() { FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto() };

await chatCompletionService.GetChatMessageContentAsync(chatHistory, executionSettings, kernel);

ChatHistory generatedPlan = chatHistory;

Execution of the new plan

Following code shows how to execute a new plan with Auto Function Calling by using FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto(). This approach is useful when only result is needed without plan steps. In this case, Kernel object can be used to pass a goal to InvokePromptAsync method. The result of plan execution will be located in FunctionResult object.

Old approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

FunctionCallingStepwisePlanner planner = new();

FunctionCallingStepwisePlannerResult result = await planner.ExecuteAsync(kernel, "Check current UTC time and return current weather in Boston city.");

string planResult = result.FinalAnswer;

New approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

OpenAIPromptExecutionSettings executionSettings = new() { FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto() };

FunctionResult result = await kernel.InvokePromptAsync("Check current UTC time and return current weather in Boston city.", new(executionSettings));

string planResult = result.ToString();

Execution of the existing plan

Following code shows how to execute an existing plan with Auto Function Calling by using FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto(). This approach is useful when ChatHistory is already present (e.g. stored in cache) and it should be re-executed again and final result should be provided by AI model.

Old approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

FunctionCallingStepwisePlanner planner = new();
ChatHistory existingPlan = GetExistingPlan(); // plan can be stored in database  or cache for reusability.

FunctionCallingStepwisePlannerResult result = await planner.ExecuteAsync(kernel, "Check current UTC time and return current weather in Boston city.", existingPlan);

string planResult = result.FinalAnswer;

New approach:

Kernel kernel = Kernel
    .CreateBuilder()
    .AddOpenAIChatCompletion("gpt-4", Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("OpenAI__ApiKey"))
    .Build();

IChatCompletionService chatCompletionService = kernel.GetRequiredService<IChatCompletionService>();

ChatHistory existingPlan = GetExistingPlan(); // plan can be stored in database or cache for reusability.

OpenAIPromptExecutionSettings executionSettings = new() { FunctionChoiceBehavior = FunctionChoiceBehavior.Auto() };

ChatMessageContent result = await chatCompletionService.GetChatMessageContentAsync(existingPlan, executionSettings, kernel);

string planResult = result.Content;

The code snippets above demonstrate how to migrate your code that uses Stepwise Planner to use Auto Function Calling. Learn more about Function Calling with chat completion.