triage git:20260809.5c2aad2A

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---
name: triage
description: Classify and prioritize an incoming bug report or feature request using Impact × Urgency, and route it to the right next step. Use when the user wants a backlog triaged, an issue prioritized, or asks whether something is worth working on now versus later.
---

# Triage

Priority is not a feeling, and it isn't the reporter's tone of voice; it's the product of two independently-scored axes. This skill's defining constraint, from ITIL's incident priority matrix: **Priority = Impact × Urgency**, scored separately before they're combined, so a loud but low-impact request and a quiet but high-impact one land where they actually belong instead of where they were pushed.

This is the ongoing backlog process. For a live production outage happening right now, use `incident-response`'s severity/declaration phase instead; that skill owns the real-time incident path, while this one owns the queue.

## Phase 1: Classify

Tag the item with what kind of work it is before scoring anything:

- **Bug**: something that used to work, or was specified to work, doesn't.
- **Enhancement**: new capability or improvement; nothing is broken.

This decides which axis questions in Phase 2 even apply (a bug's urgency is about ongoing harm; an enhancement's is about a deadline or opportunity cost) and keeps the two from being scored by the same yardstick.

## Phase 2: Score Impact × Urgency

Score each axis independently, then combine, scoring them together is how a vivid report inflates urgency into impact it doesn't have.

| | **Low Urgency** | **High Urgency** |
|---|---|---|
| **High Impact** | P2 | P1 |
| **Low Impact** | P4 | P3 |

- **Impact**: how much of the system, how many users, or how much business function is actually affected. One user's edge case is not the same impact as an outage of a shared path, regardless of how it's phrased.
- **Urgency**: how quickly a resolution is actually needed: is there active harm accumulating (data loss, security exposure, blocked release), or is this tolerable for a while even though it matters?

Write down the reasoning for each axis, not just the resulting P-number; the number alone is where re-litigation starts later; the reasoning is what settles it.

## Phase 3: Verify before committing a priority

Don't prioritize a claim that hasn't been checked:

- **For a bug**, reproduce it from the reporter's steps before scoring impact. An unreproduced bug is a `needs-info` state, not a P-number yet: a report that can't be reproduced can't be sized honestly.
- **For an enhancement**, check whether it's already implemented (search by the underlying capability, not just the request's wording): a request for something that already exists is a routing decision, not a priority decision.
- Report what verification found: confirmed with a reproduction path, not reproduced (strong `needs-info` signal), or already implemented.

## Phase 4: Route

Every triaged item lands in exactly one state:

- **`needs-info`**: verification in Phase 3 couldn't confirm the claim, or scoring in Phase 2 is missing information only the reporter has. State precisely what's missing; a vague "need more detail" ask gets a vague answer back.
- **`ready-to-spec`**: verified, scored, and specific enough to hand to `spec-to-tickets` for slicing into tracer-bullet work.
- **`scheduled`**: verified and scored, but deliberately queued behind higher-priority work; note the P-number so re-triage later starts from the same reasoning instead of from scratch.
- **`wontfix`**: rejected (state why) or already implemented (point to where it lives). The latter is a different reason than rejection and shouldn't be logged the same way, since it means the request was valid but redundant.

## Done when

- [ ] The item is tagged bug or enhancement before any scoring happens.
- [ ] Impact and Urgency are scored independently, with the reasoning written down, not just the resulting P-number.
- [ ] A bug's reproduction (or an enhancement's already-implemented check) was verified before it was assigned a priority.
- [ ] The item is routed to exactly one of needs-info / ready-to-spec / scheduled / wontfix, with the reason stated.