List available infrastructure backends

Does the description disclose side effects, auth requirements, rate limits, or destructive behavior?

Annotations already declare readOnly, idempotent, non-destructive, and closed-world, so the description does not need to restate safety. It adds genuinely new behavior: the caller must be authenticated and hold namespaces/read on global '*', and results are unfiltered by per-namespace grants — an authorization and result-set nuance that would otherwise surprise an agent.

Agents need to know what a tool does to the world before calling it. Descriptions should go beyond structured annotations to explain consequences.

Is the description appropriately sized, front-loaded, and free of redundancy?

Two short sentences, the purpose front-loaded and the caveat second. The first line duplicates the title verbatim, which is slight waste, but nothing else is padded.

Shorter descriptions cost fewer tokens and are easier for agents to parse. Every sentence should earn its place.

Given the tool's complexity, does the description cover enough for an agent to succeed on first attempt?

With no parameters, no output schema, and full annotation coverage, the description covers access requirements and filtering behavior well. Its remaining gap is the return payload: there is no output schema, so the description should say what a 'backend' record contains or roughly how many/what fields come back.

Complex tools with many parameters or behaviors need more documentation. Simple tools need less. This dimension scales expectations accordingly.

Does the description clarify parameter syntax, constraints, interactions, or defaults beyond what the schema provides?

The input schema has zero parameters, so the baseline is 4; there is no parameter semantics to explain. The description correctly avoids inventing parameters such as namespace filters that do not exist, implicitly confirming the call is unfiltered.

Input schemas describe structure but not intent. Descriptions should explain non-obvious parameter relationships and valid value ranges.

Does the description clearly state what the tool does and how it differs from similar tools?

States a specific verb and resource ('List available infrastructure backends') and adds a scope note distinguishing it from namespace listing. An agent can tell what it enumerates, though the description does not contrast it against other 'list' siblings like providers_list or clusters_list that might appear to overlap.

Agents choose between tools based on descriptions. A clear purpose with a specific verb and resource helps agents select the right tool.

Does the description explain when to use this tool, when not to, or what alternatives exist?

It names a comparison point ('unlike namespace listing, this endpoint does not filter items by per-namespace grants'), which implies when this is the right choice versus namespaces_list. However, there is no explicit 'use this when' statement, no exclusions, and no guidance for an agent choosing among the many other *_list siblings.

Agents often have multiple tools that could apply. Explicit usage guidance like "use X instead of Y when Z" prevents misuse.