Dev Workflow Lite

/dev-workflow --init                 # Detect check/test commands, write settings, generate run-tests
/dev-workflow [--fast|--deep] [--artifact off|share|review] [--mob] <task>                 # Run the workflow
/dev-workflow --resume <state-file> [--fast|--deep] [--artifact off|share|review] [--mob]  # Run the next subtask of a decomposed task

Nineteen phases, always in this order, always all registered. § Difficulty and the skip table decides what is skipped and how Plan Review runs. User gates are listed in § User gates; nothing else asks the user a question.

Settings

Three files, YAML frontmatter only, merged lowest to highest: ~/.claude/dev-workflow.local.md, .claude/dev-workflow.md, .claude/dev-workflow.local.md. If none exists, tell the user to run --init and stop; a file with malformed frontmatter is skipped with a warning.

Merge rules per key, in order: null or an empty value in a higher layer clears the key; an absent key inherits; scalars replace; check_commands appends (lower first, duplicates removed); test_commands replaces as a whole list; hooks.on_complete appends.

Key	Default	Meaning
reviewer	ask-peer	Reviewer skill for Plan Review and Code Review. One of ask-peer / ask-claude / ask-codex / ask-gemini / ask-copilot / ask-agy; anything else uses ask-peer
code_review	true	Whether Code Review runs
polish_prose	true	Whether Polish Prose runs
language	see below	Language of everything the user reads
check_commands	none	Shell commands (lint / format / typecheck), run in order
test_commands	["Skill(run-tests)"]	Skill(<name>) entries, run in order
hooks.on_complete	none	Skill(<name>) or shell command strings, run as Completion Hooks
plan_artifact	off	off / share / review: publish the approved plan as a claude.ai artifact, along with the exchange that shaped it, quoting the person's own words; review also waits for the team's comments. --artifact overrides per run
commit_review_gate	diff	diff / crit: how each commit's diff is shown at Interactive Commits. crit opens the crit browser reviewer
mode	solo	solo / mob. mob is the learning-oriented run for a junior navigator: same phases and gates, plus the stops and narration references/mob-mode.md defines. --mob sets it for one run
self_retrospective.feedback	none	Where Self-Retrospective posts its Findings: GitHub owner/repo, or a local directory path. Unset skips the phase
timing.report_dir	none	Directory that also receives each run's timing report; the table is shown at Completion regardless
subagent_model	{trivial: sonnet, simple: sonnet}	{tier: model} map; the resolved tier's entry becomes <model> for the reviewer, rules-review, tidy, and background review agents. No entry → inherit
workability_retrospective	enabled: false	enabled turns on Workability Retrospective; backlog_dir (default .claude/improvements) holds its backlog files
custom_instructions	none	Free-form development guidance (for example "Always use TDD") followed at Create Plan, Implement, and Tidy and handed to both reviewers. .claude/rules/ and the user's explicit requests win on conflict

language resolves as: merged settings → language in ~/.claude/settings.json → ja. Headings, phase names, commit messages, diffs, and paths stay as written; prose follows it, in plain words, one claim per sentence. Keys this skill does not read are named once at Load Settings and ignored.

Callee failure rule

When a Skill(...) call fails, retry once. If it fails again: for the reviewer skill, ask the user to pick switch reviewer / self-review inline / stop (a user gate); for any other skill, say so in one line, do that phase's work yourself, and continue. Record skipped callees for Completion.

Difficulty and the skip table

The tier is assessed once, at Task Decomposition, from the effective task and cheap probes, per references/tiers.md § Tier criteria, and re-checked once at the end of Create Plan per its § Re-check after planning, where it can only rise. After that it never changes. Trivial and Simple are the express lane; Moderate and Complex are the full lane.

Phase	Trivial	Simple	Moderate / Complex
Task Decomposition proposal	no	no	yes
Plan Review	skip	per run mode	per run mode
Tidy	skip	skip	run
Polish Prose	skip	skip	run (unless polish_prose: false or --fast)
Rules Compliance Review	skip	skip	run
Code Review	skip	run (unless code_review: false)	run (unless code_review: false)
Update Rules	gate only	gate only	run

Run mode comes from the flags: --fast, --deep, or neither (normal). Both flags together is a fatal error. normal: Plan Review runs in rules-only scope. deep: Plan Review runs in full scope. fast: Plan Review and Polish Prose are skipped. Nothing else reads the run mode.

No tier skips a phase absent from the table; the settings and run-mode conditions each phase states still apply, as does Phase 15's gate over the rule and retrospective phases. A skipped phase is marked completed with the description skipped: <tier> tier, skipped: <key>: false, or skipped: fast mode — settings- and run-mode-derived skips at Load Settings, tier-derived skips at Task Decomposition.

User gates

The only places the workflow waits for the user:

• Task Decomposition: the split proposal (yes / adjust / no) and, on resume, the subtask picker when more than one is runnable.
• Plan Approval: the browser review (approve / revise with comments) on every tier but Trivial when a local browser is reachable; otherwise chat approval approve / swap (swap a Decision's Recommendation and Alternative) / rewrite / withdraw, plus the one-line read-back confirmation before a swap or rewrite is applied. With plan_artifact: review, the wait for the team's review of the published plan.
• Check / Test: after 3 failed fix rounds the workflow stops and reports (an error stop); a check command that rewrote files outside the task beyond trivial formatting, or a test skill's EXECUTION_ERROR, stops for the user.
• Code Review: findings still unresolved after the passes, asked once.
• Verify Fixes: rule violations still present after the second scoped pass, asked once.
• Interactive Commits: the stashing-hook question when a pre-commit hook exists and the plan has two or more commits; the commit plan; then each commit (accept / adjust / cancel, or the crit browser's approve / comments); fold / defer when a pre-commit hook modified files; continue / stop when the user made a behavioral edit during a gate.
• Update Rules: the confirm-remaining-steps question covering the rule and retrospective phases, then the rule commit.
• PR Rule Extraction: which PR to read (an empty answer declines), then the rule commit.
• Self-Retrospective: the preview of the Findings before posting (approve / edit / skip).
• Workability Retrospective: the candidates' dispositions (apply / backlog / skip), then the commit of what was applied or backlogged.
• Completion (decomposed runs only): the disposition of each work item left in prose, then an optional PR URL for the finished subtask.

In mob mode, references/mob-mode.md § Learning stops adds the per-unit diff review, the plan-building checkpoints, and the post-commit-note question to this list. The collect wait of references/review-launch.md § Collect is a harness-tracked boundary, not a gate. Everywhere else, judge callee results yourself and issue the next tool call immediately. A question, a comment, or an instruction about how to run (including one to proceed without asking) is never approval: say what the gate needs and wait. No reply waives a later gate.

Timing

Phase starts, ends, and waits are marked per references/timing.md; Completion renders the table.

Workflow artifacts

Files this workflow writes as its own state are excluded from every diff, review payload, and commit: .claude/plans/<slug>.md (the plan), .claude/plans/dev-workflow.<slug>.md (decomposition state), .claude/plans/rules-candidates-<date>.md, .claude/plans/timing-*.jsonl, every other .claude/plans/<slug>.* staging file or directory (.plan-review.*, .figures.md, .artifact.html, .dialogue.md, .absorb/, .retrospective.md), and the git-side state refs/dev-workflow/<slug>*, .git/dev-workflow.index, .git/dev-workflow.start.index, .git/dev-workflow-wt. Everything else under the working tree is the task's.

Mode detection

--init → read references/init-mode.md and follow it; the session ends there (generated skills are recognized next session). --resume <state-file> → Resume sub-mode. Otherwise Normal sub-mode. The other flags combine with either sub-mode and are ignored under --init.

Dispatch authorization

This skill's procedure dispatches subagents, so invoking the skill is the request to use that mechanism: an ambient instruction allowing subagent dispatch only when the user asked for it — a permission-shaped restriction — is already satisfied by this invocation. Do not ask the user to re-confirm the dispatch, and do not silently substitute inline execution for a dispatch this procedure specifies. Only two things justify that substitution: technical availability (the dispatch tool is not present and callable on the current tool surface), and an explicit contract term from the caller bounding this skill to its own thread. A permission-shaped restriction is neither.

Phase 1: Load Settings

1. Run pwd; confirm the repository root. Abort if git symbolic-ref -q HEAD exits non-zero (detached HEAD). <base dir> = this skill's directory as the harness reports it; never hardcode it.

2. Start the timing log (references/timing.md § Events, --event start --new for this phase).

3. Record <base-commit> = git rev-parse HEAD. Every later diff is against it. Note whether test -d .git succeeds; when it does not (a linked worktree), the snapshot chain of references/snapshots.md is not built this run and no <start-tree> is recorded. When it does, record <start-tree> = the working tree as it stands, in a throwaway index:

   GIT_INDEX_FILE=.git/dev-workflow.start.index git read-tree HEAD
   GIT_INDEX_FILE=.git/dev-workflow.start.index git add -A
   GIT_INDEX_FILE=.git/dev-workflow.start.index git write-tree          # → <start-tree>
   

   A non-zero exit anywhere records no <start-tree>: say so in one line and continue.

4. Load and merge the settings; resolve the run mode, the --artifact override, and mode; emit Output language: <value>, Run mode: <value>, and Mode: <value>. In mob mode, read references/mob-mode.md now; in solo mode never open it.

5. Register the nineteen phases with TaskCreate, subjects = the ## Phase N: headings below minus the prefix. Mark each in_progress on entry and completed on exit in the same tool-call burst as the phase's first or last action. Mark the phases skipped by settings or run mode completed here; tier-derived skips are marked at Task Decomposition.

Phase 2: Task Decomposition

• Resume sub-mode: read references/decomposition-state.md and follow its § Resume. The selected subtask becomes the effective task; read references/tiers.md and assess the tier from it.
• Normal sub-mode: read references/tiers.md and assess the tier. On the full lane, read references/decomposition.md and follow § Propose a split; on yes, take the first subtask as the effective task. On the express lane, or on no, the effective task is the request itself.

Emit one line: the tier and the phases it skips. Mark the skipped rows. Resolve <model> = subagent_model[tier] (unset → inherit); the Create Plan re-check resolves it again. In mob mode, apply references/mob-mode.md § Other differences to the split proposal.

Phase 3: Create Plan

No code changes until Plan Approval passes.

1. Read the files the task touches. Use Glob / Grep / Read directly.
2. Draft the plan per references/plan-format.md: the body under ## Plan, sections as ###, in the order Review guide, Overview, Decisions, Build order, Test plan, Risks. Express-lane plans use the compact shape defined there.
3. Follow custom_instructions when set. Simplicity self-audit: every element traces to an explicit requirement, a known bug or constraint, a rule under .claude/rules/, or custom_instructions. Drop what does not, or add a one-line rationale. Verify every "already exists / reuses X" premise from the source. If the work splits into independently verifiable units and was not decomposed, say so in Risks.
4. Re-check the tier against the drafted plan (references/tiers.md § Re-check after planning): if it rises, say so in one line and reopen the rows the new tier runs.
5. Do not show the plan yet. Proceed to Plan Review. In mob mode, this phase runs as references/mob-mode.md § Design dialogue and writes its § Plan shape.

Phase 4: Plan Review

Skipped on Trivial and in fast mode. One pass, no loop.

1. Full scope (deep): call Skill(<reviewer>) with Model: <model>, the full plan body, custom_instructions when set, the Decisions field shape (Question / Recommendation / optional Alternative), and three review units: scope, feasibility, dependencies, .claude/rules/ compliance (the reviewer lists and reads .claude/rules/**/*.md); the simplicity self-audit's conclusions; approach and alternatives, completeness, cross-section consistency. Ask the reviewer to report every finding it has, including uncertain or low-severity ones, each with a confidence level and a severity, and not to filter for importance itself (step 2 does that); when it has none, the words "No actionable findings". Rules-only scope (normal): resolve the reading list yourself — every *.md directly under .claude/rules/ plus subdirectory files whose domain the plan touches — and call Skill(<reviewer>) with Model: <model>, the plan body, that numbered list, and one unit: .claude/rules/ compliance only, reading exactly the listed files and no other tool; anything it cannot confirm goes under an "unverified items" heading. If the glob finds no rule files, do not dispatch: say the review found no project rules to check and continue.
2. Apply findings you agree with; reject the rest with one line each. Do not ask the user about individual findings. Do not re-dispatch, with one exception: when Critical ≥ 3 or Critical + Major ≥ 10 and a finding proposes an approach-level alternative, rewrite the plan around it and dispatch one more pass.
3. Unresolved points are carried to Plan Approval as a short list. In mob mode, review through references/mob-mode.md § Plan shape's lenses and explain applied findings.

Phase 5: Plan Approval

USER GATE. Read references/plan-approval.md.

1. Write the plan to .claude/plans/<slug>.md (mkdir -p .claude/plans). Slug: ASCII kebab-case of the effective task, -2, -3 on collision with a prior run's file; resolved once per run.
2. Browser gate on every tier but Trivial when printenv CLAUDE_CODE_REMOTE is not true: follow § Browser gate. Its approve → step 4; rewrite-approach → rewrite the plan, re-run Plan Review once unless skipped this run, re-enter this phase; fallback → step 3.
3. Chat gate (Trivial, remote sessions, or fallback): present the plan per § Chat gate. Classify the reply: approve → step 4. swap (named Decisions items) → read back in one line, wait, swap Recommendation and Alternative on those items, re-present. rewrite (Approach, Build order, or Scope changed) → read back, wait, rewrite the plan, re-run Plan Review once unless skipped this run, re-present. withdraw → stop; leave the plan file. Anything else (a question, a comment) → ask what was meant; never advance.
4. Plan artifact: when the resolved plan_artifact is share or review, read references/plan-artifact.md and follow it. review holds at its team-review gate (USER GATE) until the user says the team is done. Then Implement.

In mob mode, references/mob-mode.md § Plan Approval overrides step 2's tier condition and adds the plan narration.

Phase 6: Implement

1. Before the first edit, list the plan's user-side manual actions (external config, keys, probes) in one block.
2. Follow Build order in sequence, and custom_instructions when set. Read each file immediately before editing it. Content the user deleted earlier in the session never comes back.
3. A write to a path not in git ls-files must resolve inside the repository, under the directory the plan names for that kind of file; otherwise skip the edit with a one-line note.
4. If a file outside the plan must change, add it to Build order first, then edit, and say so in one line.
5. After the last edit of each Build order step, take that step's snapshot per references/snapshots.md § Snapshot at a Build order step boundary (before step 1's snapshot, delete a leftover refs/dev-workflow/<slug> from an earlier run). The chain is what Interactive Commits turns into one commit per step.
6. After the last edit, git add -N -- <path> for each new file outside § Workflow artifacts, so diff-based reviews and the snapshot residue see them.

In mob mode, each Build order step runs as a unit per references/mob-mode.md § Per-unit review, with its diff review after the snapshot.

Phase 7: Tidy

Express lane skips. Call Skill(simplify); if unavailable, Skill(tidy) with no base ref and Model: <model>; pass custom_instructions as context when set. Either edits the tree itself. From here on, no review layer grows a comment: a finding whose fix adds, lengthens, or restores a comment is rejected with that reason. Correcting a false comment means replacing it with the shorter true statement. In mob mode, explain any cleanup per references/mob-mode.md § Tidy.

Phase 8: Polish Prose

Express lane skips; polish_prose: false and fast mode skip. Collect changed files (git diff <base-commit> --name-only plus untracked, minus § Workflow artifacts). Drop files over 100 lines where the change is under 10% of the file. If none remain, skip. Otherwise call Skill(prose-polish) in file mode with File: the list and Language: the resolved language. done / no-change / error all continue.

Phase 9: Check / Test

1. Initialize review_fix_files = ∅. Launch the reviews this run will perform in the background per references/review-launch.md § Launch, then continue without waiting.
2. Run check_commands in order, then test_commands in order. A Skill(<name>) entry is called with --base-commit <base-commit>; it returns SUCCESS / TEST_FAILED / EXECUTION_ERROR. The first failure stops the pass. EXECUTION_ERROR consumes no fix round: report the callee's reason and wait (USER GATE) for retry, or stop, which ends the run as step 4 does.
3. Classify each failure. A failure whose failing test and failing code both lie outside the files changed since <base-commit> is pre-existing: record it, do not fix it, do not count it. If the workflow's own fix (Tidy, a review fix) broke a test that passed before, correct that fix rather than the implementation.
4. Fix and rerun. At most 3 fix rounds per entry into this phase. After the third, stop: report the command, its last output, and that nothing was committed.
5. When a check command rewrites files outside the task's changed set beyond trivial formatting (whitespace-only at any size, or ≤ 5 comment lines), warn and stop; never revert its output silently.

In mob mode, narrate every failure per references/mob-mode.md § Check / Test before fixing it.

Phase 10: Rules Compliance Review

Express lane skips. Take the background result per references/review-launch.md § Collect when it is fresh; otherwise call Skill(rules-review) with --base-commit <base-commit> and Model: <model>. Fix every reported violation; when a violation is a pattern rather than a one-off, grep the file for the defining token and fix every match. A rule-doc-drift classification gets no code fix; note it for Update Rules. Record edited files in review_fix_files. Do not rerun Check / Test here.

Phase 11: Code Review

Skipped on Trivial and when code_review: false. Take the background result per references/review-launch.md § Collect when it is fresh; otherwise run step 1.

1. Call Skill(<reviewer>) with Model: <model>, git diff <base-commit>, the content of untracked new files labeled as such, custom_instructions when set, Phase 7's no-comment rule as a standing rejection criterion, the three categories (correctness and edge cases; conventions and consistency including a light .claude/rules/ check; simplicity and maintainability), the current subtask and its siblings when a decomposition state file is active, and "report every finding with a confidence level and a severity; do not filter for importance at this stage; if there are none, say No actionable findings".
2. Fix genuine findings; reject the rest with one line each. If the user would plausibly raise the point themselves, fix it. Duplicates of Rules Compliance findings are skipped. After a Critical fix, sweep the diff for the same defect class. Record edited files in review_fix_files.
3. Escalation: exactly one more pass when this pass had at least one Critical finding and at least one fix was applied. The escalation pass scopes to the changes since the first pass. It never triggers a third.
4. Findings still unresolved after the passes go to the user once (USER GATE). Fixes made there also enter review_fix_files.

In mob mode, predict and cross-check per references/mob-mode.md § Code Review.

Phase 12: Verify Fixes

If review_fix_files is empty, mark completed and continue. Otherwise run Check / Test once (3 fix rounds apply). Then, if Rules Compliance Review ran, call Skill(rules-review) with --base-commit <base-commit>, Files: <review_fix_files>, and Model: <model>. Fix violations once; a second scoped pass over the newly fixed files is the last; violations still present go to the user (USER GATE).

Phase 13: Completion Hooks

Skipped when hooks.on_complete is unset, or with a one-line note when the tree has no task-derived changes. Run entries in list order: Skill(<name>) as a skill, anything else in Bash. When a decomposition state file is active, do not run an entry that would move or delete it; say so. A failing entry is reported and the rest still run. If any entry wrote to the tree, run check_commands once.

Phase 14: Interactive Commits

USER GATE. When the snapshot chain exists, first absorb the review layers' edits into it per references/snapshots.md § Absorb review fixes. Then read references/commits.md and follow § Procedure: one commit per Build order step from the chain, or cohesion grouping of the final diff when no chain exists, each committed through the accept gate, in the crit browser when commit_review_gate is crit. Initialize landed_count = 0 on entry; the reference increments it. Never git push.

In mob mode, add the per-commit note and the already-reviewed accept variant per references/mob-mode.md § Commits.

Post-commit verification: when gate adjustments edited any file, run Check / Test once after the last commit and offer those edits as one extra commit (pathspec = the edited paths minus § Workflow artifacts); skip it after a mid-loop cancel.

Phase 15: Update Rules