diagnose-why-work-stopped SKILL.md skillA
diagnose-why-work-stopped from paperclipai/paperclip is an agent skill: a SKILL.md folder an AI agent loads when a task calls for it.
mdr add paperclipai/paperclip/diagnose-why-work-stopped@git:20260710.953b315Pins git:20260710.953b315 in mdr.lock. Pin the fingerprint instead.
- Audit grade
- A, 17 of 17 checks passed
- Kind
- SKILL.md skill
- Repository
- paperclipai/paperclip
- Path
.agents/skills/diagnose-why-work-stopped/SKILL.md- Versions recorded
- 2
- Latest version
- git:20260710.953b315, committed Jul 10, 2026
- First version recorded
- Jun 6, 2026
- Size
- 11,404 bytes
- Repository stars
- 105,684
- License
- MIT
Diagnose stalled, looping, or over-recovered Paperclip issue trees and propose a no-code product-rule plan. Use when asked why work stopped, why it looped, or how to prevent a tree from going too deep.
Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.
What the file says
# Diagnose Why Work Stopped A repeatable procedure for the recurring class of issues where the user (or a manager) points at a stalled / looping / over-recovered issue tree and asks "why did this stop / why is this looping / how do we make sure this doesn't happen again?" This skill is **diagnostic + product-design**, not engineering. The output is a written root cause and an approved plan. No code changes leave this skill. Canonical execution model: read `doc/execution-semantics.md` before diagnosing or proposing a new liveness/recovery rule. Use that document as the source of truth for status, action-path, post-run disposition, bounded continuation, productivity review, pause-hold, watchdog, and explicit recovery semantics. If the investigation finds a true product-rule gap, the plan should say whether `doc/execution-semantics.md` needs a matching update. ## When to use Trigger on an assignment whose title or body matches any of: - "why did this work stop", "why did this stall", "why did this just stop" - "infinite loop", "looping", "spinning", "going too deep", "recovery went too deep" - "liveness — what happened here", "this tree stopped working", "stuck" …
Read the whole file at its exact version.
How to install
mdr add paperclipai/paperclip/diagnose-why-work-stopped@sha256:ded60e799a3f0bfaThe line at the top of this page pins the label git:20260710.953b315, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.
[](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_4vs5grgwuf7wiz6x)
3 badge image fetches in 30 days. What the badge shows.
Versions
The registry has recorded 2 versions of this file, between Jun 6, 2026 and Jul 10, 2026, about one every 34 days.
| version | committed | commit | size | audit | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| git:20260710.953b315 latest | 2026-07-10 | 953b315 | 11,404 B | A | view · diff |
| git:20260606.e50666e | 2026-06-06 | e50666e | 11,707 B | A | view |
Audit of the latest version
- pass: Frontmatter block present
- pass: Frontmatter declares a name
- pass: Frontmatter declares a description
- pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (11404 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
paperclipai/paperclip · 105,684 stars · license MIT · pushed 2026-10-22 · branch master
API
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_4vs5grgwuf7wiz6x GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=paperclipai/paperclip/diagnose-why-work-stopped GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/ded60e799a3f0bfa9175f3b44966bb2132e2a2ce6b89a2c6bb4c3121e6964ad7
Your AI assistant 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.
Guides: the SKILL.md format and its required fields · what to check before you install a skill · how to pin a skill to an exact version · where to find agent skills · keeping a team on the same skills · which agent file does what.