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Task Decomposition Report: Fallback Patterns — 2026-06-05

This report documents the decomposition of documentation tasks for LLM fallback and failover patterns, as identified during the Ralph-loop source integration (Item 92).

New Issue Created

Task ID Title Priority Target Location Notes
PATTERN-FALLBACK-01 Create 'Fallback Patterns' Doc High docs/knowledge_base/patterns/fallback-patterns.md Documenting model failover, cascading, and graceful degradation strategies.

Context & Requirements

PATTERN-FALLBACK-01: Fallback Patterns

  • Core Concept: Architecting resilience for AI applications by automatically switching between LLM providers/models when the primary fails.
  • Key Scenarios: API outages (5xx), Rate limiting (429), Latency spikes, and Quality floor misses.
  • Key Tools: Claude Code Router, LiteLLM, Vercel AI Gateway, Portkey.
  • Sections Required:
    • What it is: Definition of failover and graceful degradation.
    • Problem solved: Provider downtime and rate limit exhaustion.
    • Stack fit: Middleware/Gateway layer.
    • Types of Fallbacks:
      • Static: Ordered list of models.
      • Dynamic: Routing based on cost/performance/availability.
      • Cascade: Trying a "smart" model, then a "fast" model on failure.
    • Technical Example: A JSON/YAML configuration example for a gateway (e.g., CCR or LiteLLM).

Definition of Done

  • docs/knowledge_base/patterns/fallback-patterns.md created meeting 'High Confidence' standards (>=10 headers, >=7 internal links).
  • File added to docs/knowledge_base/patterns/index.md.
  • docs/tools/development_ops/claude-code-router.md updated to point to this file without placeholders.
  • Status: Verified & Closed
  • Assigned to: Ralph-loop (Future Run)