The ARTF Intent Cheat Sheet Every OpenRTB Bid Ops Engineer Needs

IAB Tech Lab finalized ARTF v1.0 on 12 August 2026, bringing the Agentic Real Time Framework into production OpenRTB bidstreams. The framework lets agents propose patches to bid requests and responses, each tagged with an intent, operation, semantic path and value oneof, and an accompanying cheat sheet maps those intents to the OpenRTB fields a host applies. Engineers are warned that mismatches such as ADD_CIDS on older 2.6 snapshots or ADJUST_DEAL_MARGIN with no OpenRTB target can silently produce mutations that never reach buyers.

On 12 August 2026 IAB Tech Lab posted that ARTF v1.0 is FINAL https://iabtechlab.com/a-milestone-for-the-agentic-advertising-ecosystem/ and ready for production bidstreams. That is the week exit codes on container health checks start standing in for OpenRTB conformance. The Agentic Real Time Framework still ends on the same object buyers parse: a bid request https://rtblint.org/docs/openrtb/bid-request/ or bid response inside an RTBRequest / RTBResponse envelope. Agents return patches, not replacements. Each patch line carries an intent why , an operation add, replace, remove , a semantic path which auction entity , and a value oneof ids , adjust deal , adjust bid , metrics , or content data . If you wire agents without a sheet that maps intent to path and payload, you will green-light RPCs that leave deals on impressions that never carried them or shade bids that do not exist yet. This table is for engineers who own the orchestrator: SSP curators, exchange sidecars, DSP shading hooks. It is not a substitute for the ARTF explained guide https://rtblint.org/guides/artf-explained/ ; it is the bookmark you open when a mutation JSON lands in logs. ARTF splits work by lifecycle . Request-stage intents run at LIFECYCLE PUBLISHER BID REQUEST on the publisher ticket. Response-stage intents run at LIFECYCLE DSP BID RESPONSE when a bid object exists. The host also sends applicable intents : an ACL of what the agent is allowed to propose. An intent outside that list is policy, not syntax. Semantic paths are not JSON pointers. They name business entities with stable segments such as /imp/imp-1/pmp/deals/deal-premium or /seatbid/seat-1/bid/bid-42 . RTBlint resolves paths the same way the reference rules do: imp/{id} , imp/{id}/pmp/deals/{deal id} or the shorter .../deals/{deal id} form , /user/data/segment , and /seatbid/{seat}/bid/{bid id} . | Intent | Lifecycle | Example semantic path | Payload oneof | OpenRTB field the host applies | |---|---|---|---|---| | ACTIVATE SEGMENTS | Publisher bid request | /user/data/segment | ids | user.data .segment | | ACTIVATE DEALS | Publisher bid request | /imp/imp-1/pmp/deals/deal-premium | ids | Deal id added under imp.pmp.deals | | SUPPRESS DEALS | Publisher bid request | /imp/imp-1 remove op | ids | Named deals removed from imp.pmp.deals | | ADJUST DEAL FLOOR | Publisher bid request | /imp/imp-1/pmp/deals/deal-premium | adjust deal | deals .bidfloor | | ADJUST DEAL MARGIN | Publisher bid request | /imp/imp-1/pmp/deals/deal-premium | adjust deal | No OpenRTB 2.6 field orchestrator only | | ADD METRICS | Publisher bid request | /imp/imp-1 | metrics | imp.metric | | BID SHADE | DSP bid response | /seatbid/seat-1/bid/bid-42 | adjust bid | seatbid .bid .price | | ADD CIDS | Publisher bid request | /user/data/segment | ids or content data | data .cids OpenRTB 2.6-202505+ | One row worth reading twice: ADD CIDS on an exchange pinned to an earlier 2.6 snapshot . The intent is legal ARTF. The member may not exist on the wire version the host runs, so apply either no-ops or produces a field downstream DSPs reject. Version negotiation sits outside the mutation list; the envelope does not carry a dated snapshot string for the agent to read. ADJUST DEAL MARGIN with a perfect protobuf JSON mutation. Floor and margin share the adjust deal oneof on the wire, but margin is not part of the OpenRTB Deal object. The orchestrator is supposed to apply margin in commercial logic the bid object never sees. Static validation warns with artf.mutation.no openrtb target https://rtblint.org/docs/rule-reference/artf-mutation-no openrtb target/ . Treating that warning as success means you billed for a mutation that never changed what buyers parse. ACTIVATE DEALS carrying adjust bid . Copy-paste from a DSP shading template is the common source. Protobuf JSON parsing succeeds; gRPC returns OK; pass two fails because artf.mutation.payload intent mismatch https://rtblint.org/docs/rule-reference/artf-mutation-payload intent mismatch/ binds ACTIVATE DEALS to ids , not adjust bid . The curator thought it activated a deal. The exchange got an illegal oneof. BID SHADE at publisher request lifecycle. Shading needs a bid. LIFECYCLE PUBLISHER BID REQUEST has no bid response payload to target. That is artf.mutation.intent not applicable https://rtblint.org/docs/rule-reference/artf-mutation-intent not applicable/ plus missing target payload, not a floor tweak you can forward anyway. ADD METRICS with Metric.value as a string. ARTF can accept the mutation object; OpenRTB expects a numeric value . Framework v1.0 does not require a third pass after apply, so the failure shows up only if you revalidate the bid request the host will fan out. The longer walkthrough of apply-then-revalidate is in ARTF mutations and bid request validation https://rtblint.org/blog/artf-mutations-bid-request-validation/ . Paths that look like JSON pointers. /imp/imp-1/pmp/deals/deal-premium/bidfloor is not a documented semantic reference. You get artf.mutation.path unrecognized https://rtblint.org/docs/rule-reference/artf-mutation-path unrecognized/ even when the deal id exists on the ticket. Deal floors use ADJUST DEAL FLOOR on the deal path, not a fake leaf segment. I run three passes on every ARTF hop: envelope and carried OpenRTB as protobuf JSON, each mutation against lifecycle, applicable intents , path resolution, and intent-specific oneof members, then apply accepted mutations and revalidate OpenRTB so field damage appears on the object buyers will see. The ARTF simulator https://rtblint.org/demo/artf/ runs the same engine in a browser: paste an RTBRequest , paste mutations, watch apply-then-revalidate. CLI: bash $ rtblint validate --type artf-request rtb-request.json $ rtblint validate --type artf-response --request rtb-request.json rtb-response.json $ rtblint validate --type artf-response --apply \ --request rtb-request.json rtb-response.json MCP tools validate artf request and validate artf response with apply when you need post-patch OpenRTB let an agent implementation call the check on its own output. The RPC can still return OK; the wire contract inside the envelope does not move. rtblint cargo install rtblint , npm install rtblint-core , MCP rtblint-mcp is the deterministic check on that object and mutation set. It is independent of IAB Tech Lab and of AAO; the spec does not require it, and nothing in v1.0 replaces pass two before you forward. Production ARTF means production mutation bugs. gRPC success is transport; OpenRTB validity is still what decides fill.