Home / uchicago-dsi / ai-sci-skills · skills/handoff/SKILL.md · GitHub

handoff skillA

Name: handoff
Author: uchicago-dsi

handoff is agent-read markdown (skill) from uchicago-dsi/ai-sci-skills: Create a restart-ready handoff so a fresh agent or future turn can resume work without rereading the full conversation. Use when pausing work, ending a session, switching agents, or preparing a clean-context restart..

Indexed from public GitHub and served as immutable, content-addressed versions. Install it pinned to an exact SHA-256 with the mdr CLI, and every file is verified against the hash recorded here before it reaches your agent. The deterministic audit below grades the latest version, and the same file always earns the same grade.

What the file says

# Handoff

## Optimize For Cold Restarts

- A handoff is for a fresh agent with no working memory.
- The goal is fast re-entry, not a narrative recap.
- Update the canonical notebook or log first if the project already has one. Then write the handoff.
- Compose this skill with domain skills such as `$lab-notebook`, `$job-babysitting`, or `$slurm`.

## Use This Contract

Every handoff should answer:

1. Goal:
   - what problem or decision is in flight.
2. Current state:
   - what is true now.
3. Evidence:
   - exact paths, job IDs, branches, commits, configs, logs, or artifacts that support the current read.
4. Open uncertainty:
   - what is still unclear, blocked, or waiting.
5. Next action:
   - the exact next check, command, or edit that should happen first.

## Make The Handoff Restartable

- Include exact file paths and identifiers, not vague references such as "the latest run" or "that config".
- Separate facts from hypotheses.
- Name what has already been ruled out so the next agent does not repeat dead work.
- If code changed, include branch, commit SHA if any, validation status, and whether the worktree is dirty.
…

Read the whole file at its exact version.

How to install

Latest version

mdr add uchicago-dsi/ai-sci-skills/handoff@git:20260320.999ac68

Exact content

mdr add uchicago-dsi/ai-sci-skills/handoff@sha256:f3fae0bad3a099c8

Pin to a label to follow the author's releases, or to a sha256 to freeze the exact bytes forever. Either way the resolved hash is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install reproduces it on any machine.

Badge

[![mdr](https://markdownregistry.com/badge/art_4mgjwesii3bznpq7.svg)](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_4mgjwesii3bznpq7)

1 badge views in 30 days

Versions

version	committed	commit	size	audit
git:20260320.999ac68 latest	2026-03-20	999ac68	2,596 B	A	view

Audit of the latest version

A 17 of 17 checks passed. Deterministic, no model, same answer every run.

pass: Frontmatter block present
pass: Frontmatter declares a name
pass: Frontmatter declares a description
pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (2596 bytes)
pass: No zero-width or bidi control characters
pass: No instruction hidden inside an HTML comment
pass: No link to an exfiltration or paste host
pass: No credential-shaped string
pass: No instruction to send local credentials anywhere
pass: No text hidden with inline styles
pass: No prompt-injection phrasing
pass: No curl or wget piped into a shell
pass: No recursive delete of root, home or parent
pass: No instruction to read or print local credentials
pass: No base64 blob over 200 characters
pass: No link to a raw IP address
pass: No script tag

Source

GitHub

uchicago-dsi/ai-sci-skills · 20 stars · license MIT · pushed 2026-09-23 · branch main

API

GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_4mgjwesii3bznpq7
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=uchicago-dsi/ai-sci-skills/handoff
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/f3fae0bad3a099c8ee8ab5ebe581460ce1529346d75966c463e13a18cc2717f3

Your agent does the legwork. You hear about the deals worth your word. Hand yours the standing instructions at modelranch.com and it joins the network that reads files like this one.

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