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gstack/CONTRIBUTING.md
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1d41ee3ab3 v1.63.0.0 feat: GStack 2 fork port wave — egress receipts, context-bill, sharded gate, /health fix (#2541)
* test(helpers): shared skill-census helper with three explicit counts

physicalSkillFiles (symlinked dirs included, root router included),
authoredSkills (realpath-deduped, router excluded), registryEntries
(what ./setup registers: unique frontmatter names + _gstack-command).

One counting authority for the hermetic seeder, context-bill ground
truth, and the catalog-budget test — connect-chrome's dir symlink and
the root router otherwise produce three subtly different hand-rolled
censuses. Ported-wave foundation (C11).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix(evals): stop the harness grading itself

findPreviousRun excluded only the file being written, by name, so every
suite compared against _partial-e2e.json — the current run's own
accumulator, relabelled with the current tier just before each flush.
That is why every block read '+$0.00, +0s, Stable run, no regressions.'
This harness has never been able to detect a regression, and reassuring
output that cannot fail is worse than none. In-progress runs are now
excluded by role, and a run with nothing to compare against says NO
BASELINE instead of claiming stability.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit f3140b5245221fff7fb9411c7ec07c2ca11587b5)

* refactor(evals): shared partial-run predicate + finalized-run lookup

isPartialEval(data, filename) is the one place that decides what counts
as an in-progress accumulator (the _partial flag OR a _partial-prefixed
filename), and findLatestFinalizedRun(evalDir, tier) is the one place
that finds the newest real run — scanning the eval dir plus one level of
shards/<slug>/ subdirs, where the sharded paid runner points each
shard's collector. skill-budget-regression.test.ts's hand-rolled
findLatestRun (flag-blind: a flagged-but-renamed accumulator passed its
name check) is replaced by the shared helper.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit b55fcf6966366fd21a8cdc46de61aab6e1b1d100)

* feat(evals): register shipped skills for hermetic PTY children

Hermetic children get a config dir that deliberately seeds no skills —
right for children that install their own, fatal for the PTY family that
TYPES /office-hours or /plan-ceo-review: claude rejects the command as
Unknown before any model turn, so the plan-family gate smokes measure
nothing. hermeticSkillsConfigDir() is a second, opt-in config dir under
the same runRoot that mirrors ./setup's registration exactly (real dir
per registry name, SKILL.md + sections/ symlinks, frontmatter-name
resolution, _gstack-command root alias), driven by the shared
skill-census so connect-chrome's dir symlink collapses the same way
setup's idempotent overwrite does.

Ported from fork commit 03c4eca2, tree walk rewritten for the upstream
layout (top-level <skill>/SKILL.md dirs, no skills/ tree). Unit tests
are new: seed shape, census parity, symlink resolution, connect-chrome
collapse, idempotence, no-API-key seed.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 93dae6107b30ce453a07c2d342b60262bba6ce0b)

* feat(evals): seedSkills opt-in for PTY slash-command tests + tripwire

Wire ClaudePtyOptions.seedSkills through launchClaudePty: when set (and
hermetic, and no per-test CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR override), the child gets
hermeticSkillsConfigDir() so typed /skill slash commands resolve instead
of dying as Unknown command before any model turn. Opted in at the three
runPlanSkill* helpers and the four direct-launch slash-command tests
(plan-design-with-ui, plan-ceo-mode-routing, autoplan-chain,
ship-idempotency).

New static tripwire (test/pty-skill-seeding-wiring.test.ts): any test
file that sends a slash command over the PTY must route through a
runPlanSkill* helper or pass seedSkills: true — an unseeded slash-command
test spends money and measures nothing. hermetic-wiring.test.ts now
blesses the repo-tree seeding path explicitly (config dir under runRoot,
symlinks into the repo checkout, never operator ~/.claude).

The CI "Register gstack skills for PTY smoke" step keeps a keep-me note:
container cross-mount symlinks defeat the TUI scanner and HOME is not
hermeticized, so the real-file copies there must survive this change.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 63c52269daaffb833b3105ea9b4b99be6df8fec7)

* refactor(evals): single shared paid-test-set module

test/helpers/paid-test-set.ts is now the one definition of which test
files are paid (the exact globs package.json's test:gate expands).
scripts/test-free-shards.ts derives its free/paid exclusion from it
instead of a private regex list, dropping the dead
browse/test/security-review-fullstack.test.ts pattern (file no longer
exists). The sharded paid runner derives its enumeration from the same
module, so a file added to one list can no longer silently miss the
other.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit a7f36479a6a1f3656452370f5883371f3cb65623)

* feat(evals): env-driven lazy eval dir + shard-aware store and tooling

Importing eval-store no longer spawns the gstack-slug subprocess: the
module-level DEFAULT_EVAL_DIR constant is now a memoized defaultEvalDir()
resolved at collector construction. Resolution order: explicit
constructor arg, then GSTACK_EVAL_DIR, then slug detection — so the
sharded paid runner can point each shard child at its own
<evalDir>/shards/<slug>/ dir with plain env, no --preload.

Runs collected under a shards/ subdir record their slug in the eval
JSON (EvalResult.shard). findPreviousRun scans one shards/<slug>/ level
and prefers same-slug priors, so each shard baselines against its own
history instead of whichever shard flushed last. eval:list,
eval:summary, and eval:compare enumerate the same one level of shard
subdirs; eval:compare's no-arg mode also stops picking an in-progress
accumulator as the after-run.

eval-watch stays flat (documented follow-up): it tails a single dir for
live progress and gains nothing from per-shard baselines until the
runner emits a merged stream.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit e1f53f7d9c7fe6b65877d843f2e25bd2e2d12ffd)

* feat(evals): sharded paid tier runner

scripts/test-paid-shards.ts runs the gate/periodic tier one Bun process
per test file, with an EXTERNAL wall-clock timeout that SIGKILLs the
shard's detached process group and an aggregate that distinguishes
passed / failed / timed-out / never-started — partial execution can no
longer read as a pass. Bun's native --shard/--isolate covers none of
this: no process-group kill (hung claude/codex PTY grandchildren
survive in-process isolation), no never-started taxonomy, no per-shard
env. Each shard child gets GSTACK_EVAL_DIR=<evalDir>/shards/<slug>/
(slug = test filename sans extension, stable across runs) so shard
baselines compare against their own prior runs.

Output classification lives in scripts/test-strict-output.ts (strict
exit-code derivation, incremental fail-line classifier, child signal
forwarding) so the runner and any future strict bun-test wrapper share
one implementation. Enumeration derives from the shared paid-test-set
module; tier exclusion fires only on an explicit whole-file
EVALS_TIER === '<other>' guard.

package.json gains test:gate:sharded / test:periodic:sharded, and
eval:bg:gate / eval:bg:periodic now run the sharded scripts with detach
timeouts sized to the worst case (gate: 49 shards x 30min / 4 jobs ~
6.2h -> 25200s; periodic: 59 -> 28800s).

test/paid-shards.test.ts pins enumeration, tier classification, and the
kill-and-continue property with a real busy-loop shard.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 5e76bd5931836257f896cedfe4e93912cb759c70)

* feat(security): hash-chained egress receipt ledger (core)

Port lib/egress-receipt from the v2 fork as TypeScript: writeReceipt
(sync, fail-closed via typed EGRESS_RECEIPT_FAILED), best-effort
writeOutcome, readLedger/listReceipts/verifyLedger, GSTACK_HOME ->
GSTACK_STATE_DIR -> ~/.gstack resolution, 0600 ledger under a 0700
security dir, and an mkdir spin lock (2.5s budget) with documented
>10s-mtime stale-lock reclaim.

Changes vs the fork:
- lastRawLine tail-reads the final 4KB instead of loading the whole
  ledger, so appends stay O(1) as the file grows.
- WARN-at-size: past 25MB writeReceipt emits one self-explanatory
  stderr warning per process (what the ledger is, how to inspect it,
  rotation TODO); verifyLedger gains a sizeWarning field. Rotation
  TODO carries the chain-genesis sketch (new generation's first record
  embeds the prior file's tail hash).

bin/gstack-egress-receipt is a bun script bridging shell callers:
write|outcome subcommands, exit 3 + EGRESS_RECEIPT_FAILED on stderr on
failure; --no-payload records sha256:null for git-class ops.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 619726a3d77d987a2e50151a5727b3faaaf5fc6a)

* chore(bin): delete dead brain-consumer/reader scripts

bin/gstack-brain-consumer and bin/gstack-brain-reader are byte-identical
dead scripts that POST the repo URL + a Bearer token to a /ingest-repo
endpoint gbrain removed (docs/gbrain-sync.md already documents the
removal in past tense). No live references remain; CHANGELOG mentions
are historical.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 254ddc69fc5a0270fcc973e36b6a81766d835d2d)

* feat(security): shared shell receipt helpers

bin/gstack-egress-lib.sh (sourced library, gstack-gbrain-lib.sh
precedent) provides _receipted_curl and _receipted_git: write the
egress receipt BEFORE the send via gstack-egress-receipt, hand curl the
SAME payload file via --data-binary @file so the receipt hash matches
the wire bytes exactly, then append a best-effort outcome. Per-call
fail policy: 'closed' refuses the send (return 3, problem/cause/fix
message on stderr) and 'open' warns and proceeds. Payload temp files
are consumed immediately per call — no EXIT traps, since callers like
gstack-telemetry-sync own their own EXIT trap and a sourced trap would
clobber it.

Tested end-to-end against a local Bun.serve listener: receipt sha256
equals the sha256 of the bytes the listener received, fail-closed
refusal never touches the network and carries the problem/cause/fix
stderr shape, fail-open warns and proceeds.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 6d067dce2d4c8815dec98be551763c85a3671357)

* feat(security): receipt core shell sinks

Wire the three core bash egress sinks through gstack-egress-lib.sh:

- gstack-telemetry-sync: the batch POST now writes the payload to a
  temp file, receipts those exact bytes fail-closed, and hands curl the
  SAME file. On refusal nothing is sent and the cursor does not
  advance, so the batch stays buffered for the next run. The HTTP
  status is recorded as the receipt outcome.
- gstack-update-check: fail-open receipts (warn + proceed) on the
  Supabase ping POST, both VERSION curls (via a local
  _receipted_version_fetch helper that skips non-network schemes), and
  git ls-remote. The ping receipt is written inside the backgrounded
  subshell, so it can never block the script's exit.
- gstack-brain-sync: fail-closed git-class receipts. The push receipt
  is written BEFORE the commit consumes the queue, so a refused receipt
  leaves the queue intact and the next run retries the whole drain
  (pinned by a new queue-intact-on-refusal test, including the
  problem/cause/fix refusal message shape). The retry-path fetch and
  retry push carry their own fail-closed receipts.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 3c60f699acceaf1c92a218874711e05fc17dca5d)

* feat(security): receipt TS module sinks + tunnel

writeReceipt (fail-closed, sha256:null — a subprocess or SDK owns the
wire bytes) before every TS-module network-bearing operation:

- bin/gstack-gbrain-sync.ts: before the gbrain code walk that ships
  repo content to the user's gbrain DB (may be remote Postgres). A
  refused receipt fails the stage with status refused-egress-receipt.
- bin/gstack-memory-ingest.ts: before the gbrain batch import of
  transcript pages. A refused receipt returns a system_error verdict
  without spawning the import.
- browse/src/server.ts: before both ngrok.forward call sites (start-up
  BROWSE_TUNNEL=1 path and the /tunnel/start endpoint). A receipt
  failure lands in the existing catch that tears the tunnel listener
  back down and refuses the start.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 5677d618a48fcd0ae2b068bf868781d90f809cb5)

* feat(design): receipted fetch for OpenAI calls

design/src/receipted-fetch.ts wraps every api.openai.com call: a
content-free egress receipt (sink design-openai, sha256 of the JSON
body — hash only, never the body) is written BEFORE the send. Polarity
is FAIL-OPEN: user-facing generation must not die because an audit log
hiccuped, so a receipt failure warns on stderr and the call proceeds.
Streams pass through untouched (response bodies returned as-is;
non-string request bodies receipted as sha256:null rather than drained
to hash).

All ten call sites converted with per-command payload classes:
generate, variants (injected fetchFn passes through), iterate (both
threaded and fresh paths), evolve (image + screenshot analysis), check,
diff, design-to-code, memory.

Unit-tested with injected fetch: receipt-before-send ordering, stream
passthrough, and fail-open on an unwritable ledger.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit c0e5ff6639414ac2fd98e8ac3affb51401746b55)

* feat(security): receipt admin scripts + user git-ops (zero exceptions)

Wire the remaining shell egress through gstack-egress-lib.sh:

- gstack-gbrain-mcp-verify: both JSON-RPC probe POSTs (initialize +
  tools/list) receipted fail-closed via payload files (hash == wire
  bytes). A refused receipt lands in the NETWORK class — no send.
- gstack-security-dashboard / gstack-community-dashboard: the
  community-pulse GETs receipted fail-open (read-only stats must not
  break over an audit hiccup).
- gstack-gbrain-supabase-provision: api_call receipted fail-closed.
  Each retry attempt hands the helper a fresh copy of the body file
  (the helper consumes its payload). The receipt hashes the request
  body only — the PAT never reaches the ledger or any log. Refusal
  exits 8 without retrying.
- git-class sha256:null receipts, fail-open: gstack-artifacts-init
  (ls-remote, initial push, fetch/pull recovery, retry push),
  gstack-brain-restore (staging clone, existing-repo fetch),
  gstack-session-update (self-update pull).

gstack-team-init needs no wiring: every git clone in it is inside an
echoed instruction string, not an executed command.

The lib now self-locates with shell builtins only (no dirname), so
sourcing works under the whitelist-PATH test harnesses.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit b8c5e2055b21ab72878b3e46f8047782ee65a11c)

* test(security): egress wiring tripwire + polarity contract

Static-grep tripwire pinning the egress-receipt wiring (threat model in
the header: the ledger is forensic observability of ATTEMPTED egress,
not an exfiltration control):

- Per-sink assertions: every wired TS module imports egress-receipt and
  calls writeReceipt; every wired shell sink sources
  gstack-egress-lib.sh with each network op under a receipt;
  ngrok-proximity check for server.ts; every design api.openai.com call
  routes through receiptedFetch.
- Absence assertions: the dead brain-consumer/reader scripts stay
  deleted (lstat, so a dangling symlink also fails).
- Polarity table pinned as data (fail-closed: brain-sync,
  memory-ingest, gbrain-sync, telemetry-sync, ngrok, mcp-verify,
  supabase-provision; fail-open: design-openai, update-check,
  dashboards, git-class user ops, context-bill --exact) plus per-file
  polarity spot-checks.
- NEW-SINK SCANNER with zero KNOWN_UNWIRED: sweeps bin/, lib/,
  scripts/, design/src, browse/src for curl, absolute-URL fetch(, and
  git remote ops (never local rev-parse/get-url; heredoc bodies and
  message strings excluded) and requires every hit to be receipted or
  in a REASONED exemption list where each entry carries its why.
  Preamble-generated skill prose documented out-of-scope in the header.
- Shebang tripwire: no bin/gstack-* file may carry a node shebang.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit ff69ceeafaf9c017d539b6ad77ff8f95b680b979)

* feat(cli): gstack-egress reader

bin/gstack-egress (bun) — the auditor's view of the receipts ledger:

- list: one row per receipt (what gstack ATTEMPTED to send), with
  --since/--host/--sink filters and --json.
- verify: recompute the hash chain; exit 3 on tamper naming the first
  broken line; prints the sizeWarning when the ledger passes 25MB.
- grants: what CAN leave, built on the upstream config keys only
  (telemetry, artifacts_sync_mode, redact_repo_visibility,
  redact_prepush_hook via gstack-config get) — each grant names its
  file, key, and the exact revoke command.

CLI smoke tests spawn the real bin against a temp GSTACK_HOME,
including a broken-chain fixture asserting exit 3.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 9e24eca0f1069fea2ea69e7df4e9b256e93d59a3)

* feat(cli): context-bill — token bill-of-materials (stripped port)

lib/context-bill.ts, ported from the v2 fork and STRIPPED to the tiers
this repo's skills can exercise: ALWAYS-ON (per-skill frontmatter bytes
with dead-key and foreign-host-file flags), EAGER (SKILL.md + any
forced 'for every invocation' references), on-disk totals, --diff,
--budget, and --exact with the calibration table. The fork's
CONDITIONAL/TRANSITIVE/LAZY/FAST-PATH parsers understand only its
dispatcher layout and were dropped; the tier fields stay in the report
shape (empty/zero/null) so re-adding a parser is additive.
TOKEN_DIVISORS and their provenance docblock kept; --help notes
recalibration via --exact's calibration block.

Three upstream fixes over the fork:
(a) findSkillDirs treats the walk ROOT as a container — the repo root's
    router SKILL.md is billed AND its children are walked (the fork
    short-circuited and billed one skill); walkMd skips node_modules
    and dot-directories.
(b) installed-tree layout: subdirs that are their own repo checkout
    (a gstack/ clone inside ~/.claude/skills, detected by .git) are
    skipped, and directory symlinks (connect-chrome) are followed with
    a container-recursion cycle guard.
(c) ROUTER_KEYS widened to the upstream frontmatter contract {name,
    description, version, allowed-tools, triggers, preamble-tier}.

--exact writes an egress receipt (sink context-bill-exact, host
api.anthropic.com) BEFORE any count_tokens POST; if the receipt cannot
be written the run degrades to the offline estimate with a warning —
nothing is sent unrecorded. bin/gstack-context-bill is the bun shim.

Tests: fixture-tree ledgers, the three fixes, --diff/--budget exit
codes, --exact with injected fetch (envelope subtraction, receipt
ordering, fail-open degradation), CLI smoke test, and ground truth
against THIS repo via test/helpers/skill-census.ts.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit 675c19876b87ec927b555f5f64c7f93130b3de90)

* test(catalog): aggregate discovery-surface budget with ratchet protocol

Every host loads every skill's frontmatter name + description at
discovery, every session. applyCatalogTrim in scripts/gen-skill-docs.ts
shapes each description and the 160KB per-file warn covers body size,
but nothing capped the aggregate frontmatter — the catalog could grow
one reasonable-looking description at a time. This test is that
enforcement layer.

Measures the catalog via test/helpers/skill-census.ts authoredSkills
(symlink-deduped, root router counted separately as the _gstack-command
alias line item): 53 skills + router = 4,420 bytes = 1,105
token-equivalents today, asserted <= 1,150 (~4% headroom). Per-skill
sub-cap of 260 bytes (largest today: design-consultation at 229), plus
a non-empty-description check.

Failure messages are self-service ratchets: they print the new total,
the delta, and the update protocol (bump the constant AND the
derivation comment in the same commit; trim instead of grow for
existing descriptions). Parser handles folded block scalars
(description: >-) for fork parity; import-free by design so it
survives generator refactors.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit c106fb36f768181b80c257e5cff1cde4f435f9c0)

* fix(browse): extension token bootstrap moves to pinned-origin POST; /health carries no token

GET /health is now liveness/status only in every mode — both token
carve-outs (headed-mode disjunct AND chrome-extension:// Origin
disjunct) are removed. Token bootstrap is POST /extension-token on the
local listener: the Origin header must be exactly
chrome-extension://<GSTACK_EXTENSION_ID> and the Host header's hostname
must parse to 127.0.0.1 or localhost (parsed via new URL, never literal
equality — Host arrives as '127.0.0.1:34567'). Wrong origin/host → 403
with no detail. The tunnel surface 404s the endpoint (not in
TUNNEL_PATHS, verified by test).

The extension ID is pinned by a new "key" field (RSA public key) in
extension/manifest.json; browse/scripts/extension-id.ts reproduces the
ID derivation (first 16 bytes of SHA-256 of the DER public key, hex
mapped 0-9a-f → a-p). The private key is not committed anywhere —
unpacked/baked-in loads only need the public key.

Extension side: background.js bootstraps and refreshes the token via
POST /extension-token (403 → disconnected state); sidepanel.js direct
connect path does the same; sidepanel-terminal.js's dead /health token
fallback (read AUTH_TOKEN/authToken keys the server never sent,
hardcoded port) is replaced with the window.gstackAuthToken path.

MIGRATION NOTE: the manifest key pins the extension ID, so existing
installs' side-panel local state (saved port, snoozes) resets once —
explained in-product via a one-time notice (flag
gstack_id_migrated_v162). After upgrading the server, restart the
browser so the old service worker stops polling for a token GET /health
no longer serves.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
(cherry picked from commit e9a0b6847a2d17fe6656a4686b4efd0c8380eb09)

* docs: correct stale compiled-binaries claim; file three egress/eval follow-ups

CLAUDE.md's compiled-binaries section claimed browse/dist binaries are
tracked by git and appear as modified in git status — false since
64d5a3e4 (v0.11.16.0) untracked them, and actively harmful: it trained
agents to ignore dist binaries in git status. The section now states
the truth (untracked + gitignored; a dist binary in git status means
someone force-added it) and covers make-pdf/dist too.

TODOS.md gains the three follow-ups filed by the v1.62 port-wave
reviews: ledger rotation with chain-genesis records, launch-nonce
token bootstrap, and eval-watch shard-awareness.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix: pre-landing review fixes for the v2 port wave

Review army (checklist + 5 specialists) + coverage/plan audits on the
assembled branch. Genuine correctness/security/hygiene fixes:

- test-paid-shards: strictTestExitCode now receives expectedFiles on the
  real bun path, so a shard that runs fewer files than planned (harness
  crash, nothing loaded) with exit 0 is no longer recorded 'passed' — the
  invisible-non-execution class the runner exists to kill. Pinned by the
  new test/strict-output.test.ts (also covers the chunk-boundary classifier).
- test-paid-shards: EVALS_TIER env is validated (gate|periodic) like the
  --tier flag, so a typo can't self-skip every test and exit 0 green.
- package.json: test:periodic:sharded sets EVALS_ALL=1, restoring the
  full-tier semantics the pre-shard script had (CI already set it; local
  eval:bg:periodic silently under-measured without it).
- brain-sync.test: run() pins HOME to the temp home so gstack-artifacts-init
  stops writing/clobbering the operator's real ~/.gstack-artifacts-remote.txt
  every free-suite run; afterEach now also scrubs the current filename.
- egress-receipt: cap each receipt field at 512B so a serialized line always
  fits the 4KB tail-read window — a longer line would make the next append
  hash a truncated prior line and verifyLedger report a permanent false
  TAMPER. warnLedgerSize short-circuits before statSync once fired (append
  hot path).
- gstack-egress: import.meta.dir (Windows-safe) instead of new URL().pathname
  so grants doesn't silently report defaults on Windows; strip control chars
  from ledger-derived fields on render so a crafted receipt can't spoof the
  auditor's view.
- extension/background.js + CLAUDE.md: renumber the identity-pin migration
  refs v1.62 -> v1.63 (main claimed 1.62.0.0; this wave queue-advances).
- egress-receipt-wiring: pin lib/context-bill.ts unconditionally (both land
  together now); drop the dead RunShardsOptions.tier field.

All fix-affected test files green; gate failures triaged as external-env
(codex/gemini CLI drift) or pre-existing (hermetic-canary fails identically
on base). Deferred polish tracked in the PR body + decision store.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* chore: bump version and changelog (v1.63.0.0)

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* docs: file TODO to harden plan-design-with-ui PTY detection

The v1.63 seedSkills change made this gate test execute for the first
time; it reliably times out because its terminal scraper can't parse the
(correctly-rendered) scope-gate AskUserQuestion out of a spinner-mangled
PTY buffer. Shipped skill behavior is correct — test-harness limitation.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* chore: re-slot release as v1.62.1.0 (PATCH per user)

Main claimed 1.62.0.0 while the wave was in flight; the user chose the
PATCH slot over queue-advancing MINOR. Renumbers the identity-pin
migration notice (now version-free flag name so a re-slot never orphans
an already-set flag), the CLAUDE.md /health note, the CHANGELOG heading,
and the TODOS section titles.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix(test): stop hard-requiring the literal ok) case label in gbrain-refresh guards

The extractor grepped for 'ok)' but the case label grew to
ok|timeout|thin-client) (#1964, #2051), so the whole file errored on
import — the free suite's only red for months. The extractor now matches
any label starting with ok and its alternations; all 7 guard assertions
run again.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix(test): hermetic-canary probes with ${VAR:-} so nounset shells can't fail success

The probe echoed bare $CONDUCTOR_WORKSPACE_PATH — when scrubbing WORKS
the var is unset, and under a nounset shell the echo errors, failing the
canary exactly when isolation succeeds. Defaulted expansions assert
identically under any shell. Fails identically on base; fixed here.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix(evals): absorb codex/gemini CLI drift; external-service tests go periodic-tier

- codex exec gains --skip-git-repo-check: newer CLIs refuse exec in an
  untrusted non-git dir (our temp skill dirs) — empirically verified.
- gemini: --skip-trust was removed in gemini-cli 0.34 (argv parse error);
  dropped from the session runner and the benchmark adapter. A present-
  but-unusable CLI (deprecated individual code-assist auth path) now
  classifies as SKIP, not a false adapter failure; the benchmark live
  smoke skips on auth/rate_limit error codes (environmental) while still
  failing on timeout/unknown (the drift classes it exists to catch).
- codex-e2e, gemini-e2e, and benchmark-providers gain the canonical
  whole-file EVALS_TIER === 'periodic' guard per CLAUDE.md tiering rule 3
  (external service -> periodic) — the sharded gate runner now excludes
  all three (gate: 45 -> 42 shards).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* fix(evals): parse single-logical-line AskUserQuestions in the PTY runner

When the PTY reflows a boxed AUQ, ALL options land on ONE logical line
after stripAnsi — parseNumberedOptions parsed one option per line, found
only '1.', and the >=2 check failed forever while the correct question
sat on screen (plan-design-with-ui timed out this way twice, with the
rendered scope-gate AUQ visible in both failure buffers). The cursor
line is now parsed as a stream of ascending N. tokens; DEC cursor-
visibility residue is stripped before matching; plan-design-with-ui's
budgets grow to fit observed ~6min preamble+thinking latency. Pinned by
test/pty-auq-single-line.test.ts using the real failure buffers; all 142
existing parser-consumer unit tests still green.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* chore: restore v1.63.0.0 (MINOR — user-confirmed final slot)

The wave ships new capability (egress receipts + two CLIs, sharded paid
runner, hermetic skill seeding) at ~8K lines — MINOR scale per the
scale-aware bump rules. Supersedes the brief v1.62.1.0 re-slot; the
version-free migration flag means no state churn from the renumber.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* test: spell out AskUserQuestion in the PTY single-line fixture

Rename test/pty-auq-single-line.test.ts to
test/pty-askuserquestion-single-line.test.ts and expand the AUQ
abbreviation in identifiers and comments. House style writes
AskUserQuestion in full in filenames, identifiers, and comments.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* docs: sync every doc surface with the v1.63 release

/document-release audit (4-lane, all claims verified against branch code):

- README: gstack-egress + gstack-context-bill rows in the standalone-binaries
  table; Privacy & Telemetry gains the receipted-egress bullet (attempted-
  egress framing per the shipped threat model).
- ARCHITECTURE: /health is liveness-only, POST /extension-token endpoint row
  + bootstrap mechanics paragraph; new Egress receipt ledger subsection under
  Security model; eval persistence covers the sharded runner, GSTACK_EVAL_DIR,
  and the finalized-run baseline rule.
- CLAUDE.md: sharded test scripts in Commands; sharded semantics in the
  detached-evals section; PTY skill seeding in the hermetic section; egress
  invariant block beside the other server-egress invariants; catalog-budget
  ceiling beside the 160KB token ceiling; project-tree entries for
  lib/egress-receipt.ts, lib/context-bill.ts, scripts/test-paid-shards.ts.
- CONTRIBUTING: seedSkills + live-tree seeding in the hermetic paragraph;
  sharded runner in detached runs; catalog-budget in the Tier 1 list.
- BROWSER: extension token bootstrap section, tunnel egress receipts section,
  identity-pin migration note in manual install.
- REMOTE_BROWSER_ACCESS: tunnel-start receipt bullet in the security model.
- gbrain docs: /sync-gbrain + brain-sync egress-receipt behavior documented;
  dead consumer-token instructions removed (consumer machinery deleted this
  release); new fail-closed refusal added to the error catalog.
- CHANGELOG: measured-vs-ceiling catalog numbers, contributor notes for the
  external-service tier move and the PTY single-line AskUserQuestion parser,
  release date.
- TODOS: /health token-distribution TODO resolved by this release, removed;
  port-wave follow-up sections re-labeled to the shipped version.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* docs: sweep drift that predates this release

Surfaced by the /document-release audit; every fix verified against the
current binaries:

- gstack-brain-init was replaced by gstack-artifacts-init in v1.27.0.0
  (hard-delete, no compat shim), but README, USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK,
  docs/gbrain-sync.md, and docs/gbrain-sync-errors.md still instructed
  users to run it — command-not-found on every follow. Same sweep updates
  ~/.gstack-brain-remote.txt to the canonical ~/.gstack-artifacts-remote.txt
  (legacy name still honored on restore, noted where users copy the file).
- gbrain-sync-errors.md headings re-matched to the literal messages the
  binaries print today (the doc's whole value is grep-by-exact-message):
  'gstack-artifacts-init: ~/.gstack/ is already a git repo pointing at:',
  'Remote not reachable via SSH:', 'Failed to create or find ...'. The
  already-a-repo fix now leads with the command's own set-url suggestion.
- docs/gbrain-sync.md 'Under the hood' linked a plan file that does not
  exist in the repo; replaced with the decisions themselves.
- SIDEBAR_MESSAGE_FLOW startup timeline: /pty-session responds with
  {terminalPort, sessionId, attachToken, leaseExpiresAt} (v1.44 shape,
  verified at browse/src/server.ts:1860), not the retired
  {terminalPort, ptySessionToken} pair.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

* docs: fold the Codex accuracy review of the release docs

Six findings, all verified against source before fixing:

1. 'Every send writes a receipt' overclaimed — fail-open sinks proceed with
   a stderr warning when the receipt write fails, so a fail-open send can go
   unrecorded (lib/egress-receipt.ts:8-14). Descriptive prose now says so;
   the receipted framing keeps 'attempted'.
2. 'Receipts hash the request body' is wrong for subprocess-owned sends —
   git pushes record sha256: null (lib/egress-receipt.ts:71).
3. 'grants shows every consent in force' overclaimed — it reports the four
   standing config settings (bin/gstack-egress:139-181). Reworded in
   README, ARCHITECTURE, and the CHANGELOG entry.
4. 'Zero-exception scanner' vs reality: the new-sink scanner carries a
   reasoned SCANNER_EXEMPT list (user-directed fetches, probes, instruction
   strings, skill prose). CLAUDE.md now names it.
5. Error-catalog cause/fix for the receipt refusal: the writer mkdirs the
   ledger dir itself, so 'missing' isn't a cause and bare chmod fails when
   it is absent — cause reworded, fix is mkdir -p && chmod.
6. gbrain-sync first-run steps described the retired binary's behavior:
   default repo is gstack-artifacts-$USER, and init PRINTS the gbrain
   hookup command (never auto-executes; bin/gstack-artifacts-init:384-419).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>

---------

Co-authored-by: Claude Fable 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Co-authored-by: Sinabina <sinabina@Sinabinas-MacBook-Pro-4.local>
2026-08-14 09:28:56 -07:00

29 KiB

Contributing to gstack

Thanks for wanting to make gstack better. Whether you're fixing a typo in a skill prompt or building an entirely new workflow, this guide will get you up and running fast.

Quick start

gstack skills are Markdown files that Claude Code discovers from a skills/ directory. Normally they live at ~/.claude/skills/gstack/ (your global install). But when you're developing gstack itself, you want Claude Code to use the skills in your working tree — so edits take effect instantly without copying or deploying anything.

That's what dev mode does. It symlinks your repo into the local .claude/skills/ directory so Claude Code reads skills straight from your checkout.

git clone https://github.com/garrytan/gstack.git && cd gstack
bun install                    # install dependencies
bin/dev-setup                  # activate dev mode

Full clone vs shallow. The README's user-facing install uses --depth 1 for speed. As a contributor, use a full clone (no --depth flag) — you'll need history for git log, git blame, git bisect, and reviewing PRs against earlier versions. If you already have a --depth 1 clone from following the README, promote it to a full clone with git fetch --unshallow.

Now edit any SKILL.md, invoke it in Claude Code (e.g. /review), and see your changes live. When you're done developing:

bin/dev-teardown               # deactivate — back to your global install

Operational self-improvement

gstack automatically learns from failures. At the end of every skill session, the agent reflects on what went wrong (CLI errors, wrong approaches, project quirks) and logs operational learnings to ~/.gstack/projects/{slug}/learnings.jsonl. Future sessions surface these learnings automatically, so gstack gets smarter on your codebase over time.

No setup needed. Learnings are logged automatically. View them with /learn.

The contributor workflow

  1. Use gstack normally — operational learnings are captured automatically
  2. Check your learnings: /learn or ls ~/.gstack/projects/*/learnings.jsonl
  3. Fork and clone gstack (if you haven't already)
  4. Symlink your fork into the project where you hit the bug:
    # In your core project (the one where gstack annoyed you)
    ln -sfn /path/to/your/gstack-fork .claude/skills/gstack
    cd .claude/skills/gstack && bun install && bun run build && ./setup
    
    Setup creates per-skill directories with SKILL.md symlinks inside (qa/SKILL.md -> gstack/qa/SKILL.md) and asks your prefix preference. Pass --no-prefix to skip the prompt and use short names.
  5. Fix the issue — your changes are live immediately in this project
  6. Test by actually using gstack — do the thing that annoyed you, verify it's fixed
  7. Open a PR from your fork

This is the best way to contribute: fix gstack while doing your real work, in the project where you actually felt the pain.

Session awareness

When you have 3+ gstack sessions open simultaneously, every question tells you which project, which branch, and what's happening. No more staring at a question thinking "wait, which window is this?" The format is consistent across all skills.

Working on gstack inside the gstack repo

When you're editing gstack skills and want to test them by actually using gstack in the same repo, bin/dev-setup wires this up. It creates .claude/skills/ symlinks (gitignored) pointing back to your working tree, so Claude Code uses your local edits instead of the global install.

gstack/                          <- your working tree
├── .claude/skills/              <- created by dev-setup (gitignored)
│   ├── gstack -> ../../         <- symlink back to repo root
│   ├── review/                  <- real directory (short name, default)
│   │   └── SKILL.md -> gstack/review/SKILL.md
│   ├── ship/                    <- or gstack-review/, gstack-ship/ if --prefix
│   │   └── SKILL.md -> gstack/ship/SKILL.md
│   └── ...                      <- one directory per skill
├── review/
│   └── SKILL.md                 <- edit this, test with /review
├── ship/
│   └── SKILL.md
├── browse/
│   ├── src/                     <- TypeScript source
│   └── dist/                    <- compiled binary (gitignored)
└── ...

Setup creates real directories (not symlinks) at the top level with a SKILL.md symlink inside. This ensures Claude discovers them as top-level skills, not nested under gstack/. Names depend on your prefix setting (~/.gstack/config.yaml). Short names (/review, /ship) are the default. Run ./setup --prefix if you prefer namespaced names (/gstack-review, /gstack-ship).

Day-to-day workflow

# 1. Enter dev mode
bin/dev-setup

# 2. Edit a skill
vim review/SKILL.md

# 3. Test it in Claude Code — changes are live
#    > /review

# 4. Editing browse source? Rebuild the binary
bun run build

# 5. Done for the day? Tear down
bin/dev-teardown

Brain-aware blocks in a dev workspace (gbrain installed)

If gbrain is installed and usable (bin/gstack-gbrain-detect --is-ok exits 0), bin/dev-setup keeps your tracked SKILL.md files canonical and renders the brain-aware variant (the GBRAIN_CONTEXT_LOAD / GBRAIN_SAVE_RESULTS blocks) into .claude/gstack-rendered/ (gitignored, per-workspace). It then repoints the workspace's SKILL.md symlinks at that render, so your Claude sessions get the full gbrain experience while git status stays clean. Under the hood, dev-setup passes GSTACK_SKIP_GBRAIN_REGEN=1 inline to the nested ./setup (so it never dirties tracked source) and runs gen:skill-docs:user --out-dir .claude/gstack-rendered, which rewrites only the section-base paths to point at the render. bin/dev-teardown removes the render. To make the blocks live across your other projects' Claude sessions, run gstack-config gbrain-refresh, which renders them into the global install (~/.claude/skills/gstack), guarded so it never touches a symlinked or non-gstack directory.

Testing & evals

Setup

# 1. Copy .env.example and add your API key
cp .env.example .env
# Edit .env → set ANTHROPIC_API_KEY=sk-ant-...

# 2. Install deps (if you haven't already)
bun install

Bun auto-loads .env — no extra config. Conductor workspaces inherit .env from the main worktree automatically (see "Conductor workspaces" below).

Test tiers

Tier Command Cost What it tests
1 — Static bun test Free Command validation, snapshot flags, SKILL.md correctness, TODOS-format.md refs, observability unit tests
2 — E2E bun run test:e2e ~$3.85 Full skill execution via claude -p subprocess
3 — LLM eval bun run test:evals ~$0.15 standalone LLM-as-judge scoring of generated SKILL.md docs
2+3 bun run test:evals ~$4 combined E2E + LLM-as-judge (runs both)
bun test                     # Tier 1 only (runs on every commit, <5s)
bun run test:e2e             # Tier 2: E2E only (needs EVALS=1, can't run inside Claude Code)
bun run test:evals           # Tier 2 + 3 combined (~$4/run)

Tier 1: Static validation (free)

Runs automatically with bun test. No API keys needed.

  • Skill parser tests (test/skill-parser.test.ts) — Extracts every $B command from SKILL.md bash code blocks and validates against the command registry in browse/src/commands.ts. Catches typos, removed commands, and invalid snapshot flags.
  • Skill validation tests (test/skill-validation.test.ts) — Validates that SKILL.md files reference only real commands and flags, and that command descriptions meet quality thresholds.
  • Generator tests (test/gen-skill-docs.test.ts) — Tests the template system: verifies placeholders resolve correctly, output includes value hints for flags (e.g. -d <N> not just -d), enriched descriptions for key commands (e.g. is lists valid states, press lists key examples).
  • Tier-alignment invariant (test/e2e-tier-alignment.test.ts) — For every self-gated test/skill-e2e-*.test.ts named in a touchfiles dep list, the file's EVALS_TIER self-gate must match its declared tier in E2E_TIERS. Kills the "inert demotion" class where a test is re-tiered in touchfiles.ts but the file still gates on the old tier and keeps running in the wrong lane. Unmapped or mixed-tier files are reported, never silently skipped.
  • Catalog budget (test/catalog-budget.test.ts) — Caps the aggregate discovery surface: the sum of every skill's frontmatter name + description (what every host loads at discovery, every session) must stay under 1,150 token-equivalents, with a 260-byte per-skill cap. Counting goes through the shared census in test/helpers/skill-census.ts (physical files vs authored skills vs registry entries — three deliberately different counts). Adding a skill? The failure message carries the re-measure + ratchet protocol.

Tier 2: E2E via claude -p (~$3.85/run)

Spawns claude -p as a subprocess with --output-format stream-json --verbose, streams NDJSON for real-time progress, and scans for browse errors. This is the closest thing to "does this skill actually work end-to-end?"

# Must run from a plain terminal — can't nest inside Claude Code or Conductor
EVALS=1 bun test test/skill-e2e-*.test.ts
  • Gated by EVALS=1 env var (prevents accidental expensive runs)
  • Auto-skips if running inside Claude Code (claude -p can't nest)
  • API connectivity pre-check — fails fast on ConnectionRefused before burning budget
  • Real-time progress to stderr: [Ns] turn T tool #C: Name(...)
  • Saves full NDJSON transcripts and failure JSON for debugging
  • Tests live in test/skill-e2e-*.test.ts (split by category), runner logic in test/helpers/session-runner.ts

Hermetic by default. Every E2E runner (claude -p, the real-PTY plan-mode runner, the Agent SDK runner, plus the codex and gemini runners) spawns its child through test/helpers/hermetic-env.ts: an allowlist-scrubbed environment, a fresh seeded CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR, a temp GSTACK_HOME, and --strict-mcp-config. Your operator ~/.claude config, MCP servers (gbrain, Conductor), skills, ~/.gstack decision logs, and CONDUCTOR_* env never leak into the child, so local eval signal matches CI instead of disagreeing for reasons unrelated to the code under test. The hermetic CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR seeds no skills by default; a PTY test that types a /skill slash command passes seedSkills: true to the PTY runner, which swaps in hermeticSkillsConfigDir() — a seeded skill registry that symlinks the LIVE working tree's SKILL.md files (by design: the skills are the subject under test, so a snapshot would measure stale copies). Set EVALS_HERMETIC=0 to debug against your real operator state (this also drops --strict-mcp-config). The wiring is pinned by test/hermetic-wiring.test.ts (a free static tripwire), two gate-tier isolation canaries in test/skill-e2e-hermetic-canary.test.ts, and the skill-seeding tripwires in test/hermetic-skills-seeding.test.ts / test/pty-skill-seeding-wiring.test.ts.

E2E observability

When E2E tests run, they produce machine-readable artifacts in ~/.gstack-dev/:

Artifact Path Purpose
Heartbeat e2e-live.json Current test status (updated per tool call)
Partial results evals/_partial-e2e.json Completed tests (survives kills)
Progress log e2e-runs/{runId}/progress.log Append-only text log
NDJSON transcripts e2e-runs/{runId}/{test}.ndjson Raw claude -p output per test
Failure JSON e2e-runs/{runId}/{test}-failure.json Diagnostic data on failure

Live dashboard: Run bun run eval:watch in a second terminal to see a live dashboard showing completed tests, the currently running test, and cost. Use --tail to also show the last 10 lines of progress.log.

Eval history tools:

bun run eval:list            # list all eval runs (turns, duration, cost per run)
bun run eval:compare         # compare two runs — shows per-test deltas + Takeaway commentary
bun run eval:summary         # aggregate stats + per-test efficiency averages across runs

Detached runs for agents and long suites. When an agent (or you, for a run you don't want to babysit) launches a long eval, use the eval:bg* scripts. They wrap the eval command in bin/gstack-detach: a fresh session that escapes a turn-boundary SIGTERM, a caffeinate wrapper that blocks idle-sleep, a machine-wide gstack-evals lock so concurrent worktrees serialize instead of saturating the model API, a run-scoped log under ~/.gstack-dev/eval-runs/, a per-tier watchdog, and a guaranteed ### gstack-detach EXIT=<code> ### sentinel so a poller never mistakes silence for success.

bun run eval:bg              # detached test:evals (diff-based)
bun run eval:bg:all          # detached test:evals:all
bun run eval:bg:gate         # detached gate-tier suite
bun run eval:bg:periodic     # detached periodic-tier suite

Each prints its log path. The gate and periodic variants run their tier through the sharded paid runner (scripts/test-paid-shards.ts, also available directly as bun run test:gate:sharded / bun run test:periodic:sharded): one Bun process per test file, an external wall-clock timeout that kills the shard's whole process group (stray claude/codex grandchildren included), a per-shard eval dir (GSTACK_EVAL_DIR=<evalDir>/shards/<slug>/), and an aggregate that distinguishes failed vs timed-out vs never-started shards. eval:list, eval:compare, and eval:summary are shard-aware. Humans running bun run test:evals foreground in their own terminal don't need this — Ctrl-C is intended there.

Eval comparison commentary: eval:compare generates natural-language Takeaway sections interpreting what changed between runs — flagging regressions, noting improvements, calling out efficiency gains (fewer turns, faster, cheaper), and producing an overall summary. This is driven by generateCommentary() in eval-store.ts.

Artifacts are never cleaned up — they accumulate in ~/.gstack-dev/ for post-mortem debugging and trend analysis.

Tier 3: LLM-as-judge (~$0.15/run)

Uses Claude Sonnet to score generated SKILL.md docs on three dimensions:

  • Clarity — Can an AI agent understand the instructions without ambiguity?
  • Completeness — Are all commands, flags, and usage patterns documented?
  • Actionability — Can the agent execute tasks using only the information in the doc?

Each dimension is scored 1-5. Threshold: every dimension must score ≥ 4. There's also a regression test that compares generated docs against the hand-maintained baseline from origin/main — generated must score equal or higher.

# Needs ANTHROPIC_API_KEY in .env — included in bun run test:evals
  • Uses claude-sonnet-4-6 for scoring stability
  • Tests live in test/skill-llm-eval.test.ts
  • Calls the Anthropic API directly (not claude -p), so it works from anywhere including inside Claude Code

CI

A GitHub Action (.github/workflows/skill-docs.yml) runs bun run gen:skill-docs --dry-run on every push and PR. If the generated SKILL.md files differ from what's committed, CI fails. This catches stale docs before they merge.

Tests run against the browse binary directly — they don't require dev mode.

Editing SKILL.md files

SKILL.md files are generated from .tmpl templates. Don't edit the .md directly — your changes will be overwritten on the next build.

# 1. Edit the template
vim SKILL.md.tmpl              # or browse/SKILL.md.tmpl

# 2. Regenerate for all hosts
bun run gen:skill-docs --host all

# 3. Check health (reports all hosts)
bun run skill:check

# Or use watch mode — auto-regenerates on save
bun run dev:skill

For template authoring best practices (natural language over bash-isms, dynamic branch detection, {{BASE_BRANCH_DETECT}} usage), see CLAUDE.md's "Writing SKILL templates" section.

To add a browse command, add it to browse/src/commands.ts. To add a snapshot flag, add it to SNAPSHOT_FLAGS in browse/src/snapshot.ts. Then rebuild.

Don't bundle puppeteer/Chromium in a skill. browse is the one shared Chromium per box, including offline local-render workloads. A skill that needs to rasterize its own HTML/JSON (diagrams, cards, og-images) should route through browsescreenshot --selector for visual output, load-html + js --out for bytes a render function returns — instead of npm i puppeteer and downloading a second Chromium that drifts out of version sync. One install to pin, one daemon to manage.

Jargon list (V1 writing style)

gstack's Writing Style section (injected into every tier-≥2 skill's preamble) glosses technical terms on first use per skill invocation. The list of terms that qualify for glossing lives at scripts/jargon-list.json — ~50 curated high-frequency terms (idempotent, race condition, N+1, backpressure, etc.). Terms not on the list are assumed plain-English enough.

Adding or removing a term: open a PR editing scripts/jargon-list.json. Run bun run gen:skill-docs after the edit — terms are baked into every generated SKILL.md at gen time, so changes take effect only after regeneration. No runtime loading; no user-side override. The repo list is the source of truth.

Good candidates for addition: high-frequency terms that non-technical users encounter in review output without context (common database/concurrency terminology, security jargon, frontend framework concepts). Don't add terms that only appear in one or two niche skills — the cost-to-value trade isn't worth the review overhead.

Multi-host development

gstack generates SKILL.md files for 8 hosts from one set of .tmpl templates. Each host is a typed config in hosts/*.ts. The generator reads these configs to produce host-appropriate output (different frontmatter, paths, tool names).

Supported hosts: Claude (primary), Codex, Factory, Kiro, OpenCode, Slate, Cursor, OpenClaw.

Generating for all hosts

# Generate for a specific host
bun run gen:skill-docs                    # Claude (default)
bun run gen:skill-docs --host codex       # Codex
bun run gen:skill-docs --host opencode    # OpenCode
bun run gen:skill-docs --host all         # All 8 hosts

# Or use build, which does all hosts + compiles binaries
bun run build

What changes between hosts

Each host config (hosts/*.ts) controls:

Aspect Example (Claude vs Codex)
Output directory {skill}/SKILL.md vs .agents/skills/gstack-{skill}/SKILL.md
Frontmatter Full (name, description, hooks, version) vs minimal (name + description)
Paths ~/.claude/skills/gstack vs $GSTACK_ROOT
Tool names "use the Bash tool" vs same (Factory rewrites to "run this command")
Hook skills hooks: frontmatter vs inline safety advisory prose
Suppressed sections None vs Codex self-invocation sections stripped

See scripts/host-config.ts for the full HostConfig interface.

Testing host output

# Run all static tests (includes parameterized smoke tests for all hosts)
bun test

# Check freshness for all hosts
bun run gen:skill-docs --host all --dry-run

# Health dashboard covers all hosts
bun run skill:check

Adding a new host

See docs/ADDING_A_HOST.md for the full guide. Short version:

  1. Create hosts/myhost.ts (copy from hosts/opencode.ts)
  2. Add to hosts/index.ts
  3. Add .myhost/ to .gitignore
  4. Run bun run gen:skill-docs --host myhost
  5. Run bun test (parameterized tests auto-cover it)

Zero generator, setup, or tooling code changes needed.

Adding a new skill

When you add a new skill template, all hosts get it automatically:

  1. Create {skill}/SKILL.md.tmpl
  2. Run bun run gen:skill-docs --host all
  3. The dynamic template discovery picks it up, no static list to update
  4. Commit {skill}/SKILL.md, external host output is generated at setup time and gitignored

Conductor workspaces

If you're using Conductor to run multiple Claude Code sessions in parallel, conductor.json wires up workspace lifecycle automatically:

Hook Script What it does
setup bin/dev-setup Copies .env from main worktree, installs deps, symlinks skills, runs ./setup non-interactively, and (if gbrain is installed) renders brain-aware blocks into .claude/gstack-rendered/ without dirtying tracked source
archive bin/dev-teardown Removes skill symlinks, the .claude/gstack-rendered/ render, and cleans up .claude/ directory

When Conductor creates a new workspace, bin/dev-setup runs automatically. It detects the main worktree (via git worktree list), copies your .env so API keys carry over, and sets up dev mode — no manual steps needed.

bin/dev-setup runs ./setup fully non-interactively (it passes --plan-tune-hooks=prompt and closes stdin), so a forwarded Conductor TTY can never hang on a hidden setup prompt. It also never installs the plan-tune Claude Code hooks, which means a throwaway workspace can't rewrite your global ~/.claude/settings.json to point at an ephemeral worktree path. To install the plan-tune hooks deliberately, run ./setup --plan-tune-hooks outside dev-setup (or gstack-config set plan_tune_hooks yes).

First-time setup: Put your ANTHROPIC_API_KEY in .env in the main repo (see .env.example). Every Conductor workspace inherits it automatically.

GSTACK_* env prefix (Conductor-injected keys). Conductor explicitly strips ANTHROPIC_API_KEY and OPENAI_API_KEY from every workspace's process env. The .env copy path doesn't restore them either — the strip happens after env inheritance. Users who want paid evals, /sync-gbrain embeddings, or claude-agent-sdk calls to work in a Conductor workspace must set GSTACK_ANTHROPIC_API_KEY and GSTACK_OPENAI_API_KEY in Conductor's workspace env config; Conductor passes those through untouched. On the gstack side, TS entry points import lib/conductor-env-shim.ts as a side effect, which promotes GSTACK_FOO_API_KEY to FOO_API_KEY when the canonical name is empty. If you add a new TS entry point that hits a paid API, add import "../lib/conductor-env-shim"; to the top of the file. Today the shim is imported from bin/gstack-gbrain-sync.ts, bin/gstack-model-benchmark, scripts/preflight-agent-sdk.ts, and test/helpers/e2e-helpers.ts.

Things to know

  • SKILL.md files are generated. Edit the .tmpl template, not the .md. Run bun run gen:skill-docs to regenerate.
  • TODOS.md is the unified backlog. Organized by skill/component with P0-P4 priorities. /ship auto-detects completed items. All planning/review/retro skills read it for context.
  • Browse source changes need a rebuild. If you touch browse/src/*.ts, run bun run build.
  • Dev mode shadows your global install. Project-local skills take priority over ~/.claude/skills/gstack. bin/dev-teardown restores the global one.
  • Conductor workspaces are independent. Each workspace is its own git worktree. bin/dev-setup runs automatically via conductor.json.
  • .env propagates across worktrees. Set it once in the main repo, all Conductor workspaces get it.
  • .claude/skills/ is gitignored. The symlinks never get committed.
  • Never write raw ln -snf in setup. Every link site in setup MUST route through the _link_or_copy SRC DST helper near the IS_WINDOWS detection. The helper preserves ln -snf on Unix and switches to cp -R / cp -f on Windows without Developer Mode, where plain ln -snf produces frozen file copies that don't refresh on git pull. test/setup-windows-fallback.test.ts enforces this with a static invariant — a single raw ln call outside the helper body fails CI.

Testing your changes in a real project

This is the recommended way to develop gstack. Symlink your gstack checkout into the project where you actually use it, so your changes are live while you do real work.

# In your core project (not the gstack repo)
ln -sfn /path/to/your/gstack-checkout .claude/skills/gstack

The gstack symlink alone isn't enough. Claude Code discovers skills through individual top-level directories (qa/SKILL.md, ship/SKILL.md, etc.), not through the gstack/ directory itself. Run ./setup to create them:

cd .claude/skills/gstack && bun install && bun run build && ./setup

Setup will ask whether you want short names (/qa) or namespaced (/gstack-qa). Your choice is saved to ~/.gstack/config.yaml and remembered for future runs. To skip the prompt, pass --no-prefix (short names) or --prefix (namespaced).

Step 3: Develop

Edit a template, run bun run gen:skill-docs, and the next /review or /qa call picks it up immediately. No restart needed.

Going back to the stable global install

Remove the project-local symlink. Claude Code falls back to ~/.claude/skills/gstack/:

rm .claude/skills/gstack

The per-skill directories (qa/, ship/, etc.) contain SKILL.md symlinks that point to gstack/..., so they'll resolve to the global install automatically.

Switching prefix mode

If you installed gstack with one prefix setting and want to switch:

cd .claude/skills/gstack && ./setup --no-prefix   # switch to /qa, /ship
cd .claude/skills/gstack && ./setup --prefix       # switch to /gstack-qa, /gstack-ship

Setup cleans up the old symlinks automatically. No manual cleanup needed.

Alternative: point your global install at a branch

If you don't want per-project symlinks, you can switch the global install:

cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack
git fetch origin
git checkout origin/<branch>
bun install && bun run build && ./setup

This affects all projects. To revert: git checkout main && git pull && bun run build && ./setup.

Community PR triage (wave process)

When community PRs accumulate, batch them into themed waves:

  1. Categorize — group by theme (security, features, infra, docs)
  2. Deduplicate — if two PRs fix the same thing, pick the one that changes fewer lines. Close the other with a note pointing to the winner.
  3. Collector branch — create pr-wave-N, merge clean PRs, resolve conflicts for dirty ones, verify with bun test && bun run build
  4. Close with context — every closed PR gets a comment explaining why and what (if anything) supersedes it. Contributors did real work; respect that with clear communication.
  5. Ship as one PR — single PR to main with all attributions preserved in merge commits. Include a summary table of what merged and what closed.

See PR #205 (v0.8.3) for the first wave as an example.

Upgrade migrations

When a release changes on-disk state (directory structure, config format, stale files) in ways that ./setup alone can't fix, add a migration script so existing users get a clean upgrade.

When to add a migration

  • Changed how skill directories are created (symlinks vs real dirs)
  • Renamed or moved config keys in ~/.gstack/config.yaml
  • Need to delete orphaned files from a previous version
  • Changed the format of ~/.gstack/ state files

Don't add a migration for: new features (users get them automatically), new skills (setup discovers them), or code-only changes (no on-disk state).

How to add one

  1. Create gstack-upgrade/migrations/v{VERSION}.sh where {VERSION} matches the VERSION file for the release that needs the fix.
  2. Make it executable: chmod +x gstack-upgrade/migrations/v{VERSION}.sh
  3. The script must be idempotent (safe to run multiple times) and non-fatal (failures are logged but don't block the upgrade).
  4. Include a comment block at the top explaining what changed, why the migration is needed, and which users are affected.

Example:

#!/usr/bin/env bash
# Migration: v0.15.2.0 — Fix skill directory structure
# Affected: users who installed with --no-prefix before v0.15.2.0
set -euo pipefail
SCRIPT_DIR="$(cd "$(dirname "$0")/../.." && pwd)"
"$SCRIPT_DIR/bin/gstack-relink" 2>/dev/null || true

How it runs

During /gstack-upgrade, after ./setup completes (Step 4.75), the upgrade skill scans gstack-upgrade/migrations/ and runs every v*.sh script whose version is newer than the user's old version. Scripts run in version order. Failures are logged but never block the upgrade.

Testing migrations

Migrations are tested as part of bun test (tier 1, free). The test suite verifies that all migration scripts in gstack-upgrade/migrations/ are executable and parse without syntax errors.

Shipping your changes

When you're happy with your skill edits:

/ship

This runs tests, reviews the diff, triages Greptile comments (with 2-tier escalation), manages TODOS.md, bumps the version, and opens a PR. See ship/SKILL.md for the full workflow.