git:20260830.6f36d8d to git:20260907.386e515

28 added, 22 removed. Audit A to A.

---

name: seat-continuity-and-handover

description: Use when replacing a seat's occupant (rebuild/handover/swap), reasoning about stable-seat-identity vs fluid-occupant-identity, choosing an old-occupant disposition (retire/advise/shadow), or recording provenance for an occupant change. Two independent outcomes (continuityOutcome + seatBindingOutcome) and the 5 failure modes that prevent silent dishonesty.

metadata:

openrig:

stage: factory-approved

sibling_skills:

- claude-compaction-restore

- mental-model-ha

- scope-recovery

- session-compaction-and-restore

- retiring-and-inheriting-a-seat

- agent-startup-and-context-ingestion

- agent-starters

- composable-priming-packs

- session-source-fork

- claude-compact-in-place

- pre-maintenance-agent-preservation

---

# Seat Continuity and Handover

A pair of primitive families that separate *who is sitting in a seat* from

*what the seat itself is*:

1. **Occupant-creation primitives** — `resume`, `fork`, `rebuild`, `fresh` — produce a candidate new occupant. Answer: "where did the new occupant come from?"

- 2. **Seat-binding primitives** — `seat handover`, later `seat transfer` / `seat retire` / `seat swap` — bind a candidate occupant into the topology. Answer: "what happened to the stable seat identity?"

+ 2. **Seat-binding operations** — handover binds a candidate occupant into the topology. Answer: "what happened to the stable seat identity?" Inspect the current CLI for executable operations; design vocabulary alone does not establish a command.

Core architectural decision: **stable seat identity, fluid occupant

- identity, explicit provenance.** Today's `lead2`/`lead3`/`lead4`/`lead5`

- pattern encodes successor lineage into seat names — that's the wrong

- shape. Stable seat name + separately-recorded provenance trail is the

- right shape.

+ identity, explicit provenance.** Do not encode successive occupants into live

+ seat names. Keep the stable address and record lineage separately.

## Use this when

- - Replacing a seat's occupant via rebuild, fork, fresh, or future seat-handover

+ - Replacing a seat's occupant via rebuild, fork, fresh, or seat-handover

- Choosing old-occupant disposition: retire / advise / shadow

- Reasoning about whether a seat's lineage is stable or has drifted

- Reading or writing the provenance record for a seat

- Designing or auditing topology stability across an occupant change

## Don't use this when

- The seat is freshly created (no occupant to replace) — use `rig launch` / `rig expand` directly

- The intent is to change topology shape (add/remove seats), not replace an occupant — use topology-mutation primitives

## The two-outcome honesty model

Every seat-binding operation produces two **independent** outcomes:

```yaml

continuityOutcome: rebuilt | resumed | forked | fresh | failed

seatBindingOutcome: handed_over | partial | failed | unchanged

```

These can disagree honestly. Examples:

- `continuityOutcome: failed` + `seatBindingOutcome: unchanged` — new occupant didn't materialize; seat correctly retains old occupant.

- `continuityOutcome: rebuilt` + `seatBindingOutcome: failed` — candidate created OK; bind failed mid-flight; provenance records the gap.

**Don't collapse these into one outcome.** The system can describe what

actually happened only if the two are recorded independently.

## Provenance record (durable, queryable)

Every handover writes:

- seat id

- old occupant id

- new occupant id

- creation mode (`resume`/`fork`/`rebuild`/`fresh`)

- source artifacts used

- whether old occupant remains alive as advisor/shadow

- operator or loop that initiated the motion

- timestamp

- result (`handed_over` / `partial` / `failed`)

This is the system's truth-source for "how did the current occupant get

there." Without it, the control plane shows the current occupant but

not the legitimacy of the transition.

## State models — independent

### Occupant-creation state (per candidate)

1. **Requested** — input to rebuild/fork/fresh/resume

2. **Realized** — runtime/artifact path produced an occupant with managed-seat shape

3. **Failed** — candidate didn't materialize; `continuityOutcome: failed`

### Seat-binding state (per seat)

1. **Stable** — current occupant attached, no in-flight binding

2. **Binding** — handover in progress

3. **Bound** — handover succeeded; provenance record written

4. **Unchanged** — bind failed before completion; seat retains old occupant

A seat stays `Stable` even if multiple candidate-occupants were produced and discarded.

## Failure modes (5)

1. **Candidate creation failed** — `rebuild` couldn't synthesize from artifacts; `fork` couldn't resolve `session_source`; `fresh` couldn't launch. **Action**: bind operation does not begin; seat unchanged; provenance records the failed candidate-creation step.

2. **Old occupant cannot be detached cleanly** — runtime hung, tmux locked, etc. **Action**: bind halts mid-flight; seat enters `Binding` state with explicit "halted" sub-status; operator alerted. **Do NOT auto-rollback by reattaching old-occupant if detach didn't complete cleanly.**

3. **Bind succeeded but provenance write failed** — disk/db error. **Action**: not durable until provenance writes; treat as `Binding` halted, not `Bound`.

4. **Old occupant disposition unfulfillable** — operator requested `advise` (keep alive as advisor) but runtime can't keep old alive. **Action**: degrade to `retire` with explicit notification, OR fail if operator passed strict-disposition flag.

5. **Concurrent handover attempts** — two operations target the same seat. **Action**: serialize by seat-id lock; second attempt refuses with clear error.

## Hard boundaries (do-not list; verbatim)

- **Do NOT collapse `rebuild` and `seat handover` into one primitive.** The design specifically separates them so the system can describe what actually happened.

- - **Do NOT introduce successor-suffix seat names** (`lead2`/`lead3`). Stable seat identity is the architectural goal. *(Reconciliation: this governs the **live** seat address, which stays clean — the seat name is whoever sits now. A **retired** tenure IS versioned (`<seat>-vN`) as the separately-recorded provenance trail / cold wake-target — that is the lineage, not a live successor-suffix. See `retiring-and-inheriting-a-seat` and its lineage ledger.)*

+ - **Do NOT introduce successor-suffix seat names** (`lead2`/`lead3`). Stable seat identity is the architectural goal. The live address stays stable. A retired tenure is distinguished by its ledger

+ generation and exact history token; preserving it does not require a renamed live pane.

- **Do NOT report `seatBindingOutcome: handed_over`** if the provenance record didn't write durably.

- **Do NOT auto-rollback a half-completed handover** by re-attaching the old occupant unless detach completed cleanly first.

- ## Composition: seat handover over fork

+ ## Composition and current command surface

- Once `session_source` fork v1 lands (already shipped at openrig

- `c7b6df1`), the next composition is **seat handover over fork**:

- candidate occupant created via fork, bound into the existing seat via

- handover. Continuity outcome is `forked`; binding outcome is independent.

+ A fork can create a candidate occupant; handover binds it into an existing seat.

+ The continuity outcome is `forked`; the binding outcome is independent.

- ## Currently shipped vs deferred

+ The packaged `rig handover <seat>` and `rig seat handover <seat>` accept `fresh`,

+ `discovered:<id>`, `fork:<id>` and `rebuild` sources. Use `--dry-run` to request

+ planning only. Without it, these surfaces can execute; do not infer read-only

+ behavior from the shorter seat command's planning-oriented description.

+ `rig seat status <seat>` is the read-only observability surface.

- - **Option A (rebuild) shipped** at openrig `578bd5c` (2026-04-30): `session_source.mode: rebuild` with `ref.kind: artifact_set`; identity-honesty bedrock at 4 layers (schema dispatch, orchestrator threading, SQLite read-back, negative-grep on resolver output). 26/26 Tier 1 cases green; full daemon regression 2146/2146 PASS.

- - **Option B partially shipped, partially deferred to Mode 3**: the `rig seat handover` CLI exists as a planning/observability surface — `status <seat>` reads the seat-handover observability tables (migration `021`); `handover <seat>` plans a safe two-phase handover sequence with actual execution flowing through existing seat-launch surfaces under operator gating. Full code-direct `SeatHandoverService` daemon module + `seat-binding-outcome` provenance record + nodes-table provenance migration remain deferred to Mode 3. MVP composition `seat handover over fork` is highest-leverage v1.

+ Source support is declared by the running daemon and depends on actual identity,

+ history and artifact prerequisites. Read the returned source, continuity, binding

+ and provenance results independently. A help listing or dry-run is not proof of a

+ successful transition. The linked cutover SOP supplies the operator mechanics

+ and required effect checks after the named owner authorizes the action.

## Why load-bearing for RSI

Any recursive seat-refresh loop must be able to replace an occupant

while keeping topology stable. Without these primitives, RSI loops will

either accumulate suffixed seat names (lineage leaking into identity) or

destabilize topology references on each cycle. Provenance must be

durable AND queryable so RSI loops can decide whether a seat is fresh

enough to receive new work or needs re-handover.

- ## Discovery-registration gap (pilot-observed 2026-08-05)

+ ## Managed binding and retained history

- A renamed / retired occupant (`<seat>-vN`, kept alive as a cold advisor) is intentionally **absent from

- the managed node registry** — `rig ps`, discovery, and the delivery verbs (`walk` / `send`) cannot find

- it. This is by design (only bound occupants are registered), and it makes the **lineage ledger +

- boot-captured session id the wake path** (harness-level `--resume` / `codex exec`, not the rig registry).

- Two live handovers confirmed this. See `retiring-and-inheriting-a-seat`.

+ A retired advisor's history can remain available without a managed node or live

+ pane. Query current binding and the lineage ledger separately: one answers who

+ holds the seat, the other identifies the retained history and exact resume token.

+ Do not infer that a predecessor is unreachable from registry absence alone, or

+ that a preserved token proves a successful resume. Check the actual runtime and

+ history when consultation is needed; see `retiring-and-inheriting-a-seat`.

## See also

- `references/apprentice-successor-seat-cutover.md` — the portable mechanic SOP used only after the owner-worded gate

- `references/orchestrator-role.md` — the orchestration judgment, authority, custody, and receipt contract

- `references/apprentice-evidence-toolkit.md` — optional evidence apparatus selected only when the stakes earn it

- `session-source-fork` skill — `fork` occupant-creation primitive (sibling)

- `agent-starters` skill — composes occupant-creation + binding into named reusable starting points

- - `cross-host-rig-commands` skill — multi-host handover (deferred)

+ - `cross-host-rig-commands` skill — remote addressing and transport; verify lifecycle support on the target