git:20260903.8c73006 to git:20261006.2bb32f6

<!--

Purpose: Canonical body text for the dinostack skill loaded by AI coding agents.

This file is the single source of truth for the skill's instructional content;

adapter-specific frontmatter (name, description, trigger conditions) is kept

separately in each adapter's build directory and prepended at build time.

Public API: consumed as-is by adapter build scripts. For Claude, .claude/build.sh

strips this manifest comment, prepends SKILL.frontmatter.yaml, and then

embeds the MINIMAL-corpus methodology body (build-methodology.sh

--corpus minimal, DS-204) plus content/rules/{code-standards,conventions}.md

verbatim to produce the final .claude/skills/dinostack/SKILL.md

(this file accounts for a fraction of that assembled artifact's size -

see check-skill-embed-budget.sh); METHODOLOGY.md itself stays the FULL

corpus, the sibling file a "Deferred at this corpus" pointer block in

SKILL.md sends a reader to when a named trigger fires. .gemini follows the

same minimal-embed-plus-full-sibling pattern (its own build.sh). .kimi and

.copilot (.github/skills) were flipped the same way and then HELD BACK in

the same DS-204 round (runtime QA came back INCONCLUSIVE for both - no

drivable runtime on the verification host) - both embed the full corpus

unconditionally, pending a live-runtime verification path. Other adapters

differ in whether and how they consume this file, and that set has changed

as adapters were added independently - check each adapter's own build.sh

directly rather than trusting an enumeration here, which has gone stale

before.

Upstream deps: none (leaf content file; no imports or code dependencies).

Downstream consumers: .claude/skills/dinostack/SKILL.md (assembled by

.claude/build.sh), plus the per-adapter SKILL.md outputs listed

under Public API above.

Failure modes: edits here take effect for .claude after re-running .claude/build.sh.

Adapters whose SKILL.md is a static committed file will drift silently

until their own build or manual sync is run. No side effects at read time.

Performance: standard (static markdown file).

-->

> **IMPORTANT - READ THIS FIRST:** If `skill_auto_load: true` is set in `~/.claude/agentic-engineering.json`, this skill is configured to auto-load. Read this entire SKILL.md before taking any action on software development tasks. Do not start implementing until you have read the Rules section below.

The Agentic Engineering system defines how to plan, delegate, review, and ship software using a

structured multi-agent workflow. It covers risk classification, adversarial review, task

decomposition, and quality gates so that changes are correct, safe, and reviewable. Read the rules

files on every session and the reference docs on the triggers described in METHODOLOGY.md §Protocol Details (read on trigger).

**Early relaxed-advice routing gate.** This gate applies only after activation resolves

`profile=relaxed` and all four canonical predicates pass. If profile is `default` or `strict`, this

gate does not apply and the motivating advisory retains its existing Elevated routing. After the

relaxed-only guard passes, apply risk classification before the first project-content read. Relaxed

ephemeral chat advice remains direct only when the answer can be produced from context already held;

otherwise classify Elevated before reading. Within that relaxed-only override, breadth alone is not

an investigation request. For the exact prompt `How would you recommend changing DinoStack?` in

that relaxed-only override, give bounded high-level advice from the methodology and context loaded

during mandatory skill activation, state specificity or evidence limitations when useful, and do

not explore the project merely to improve specificity. An explicit user request for unfamiliar,

repository-specific, multi-file or multi-read evidence is Elevated and delegated before any

project-content read. That explicit-request qualifier narrows only whether advisory wording

constitutes an investigation request; it does not narrow risk classification. After the four

predicates and carrier exceptions, every other canonical Elevated signal still wins, including

security-sensitive, high-stakes, state-changing, and protocol or infrastructure signals. If the

required named-agent route cannot start, report the blocker or offer only bounded context-only

advice that does not perform the requested investigation; never fall back to conductor multi-file

or project exploration.

State-changing implementation requests (implement, change, fix, or build) never qualify for this

advice exception: establish the named Engineer/Worker route before any non-mandatory project read

or command. Until that route starts, do not inspect or verify candidate work; a failed route ends

in a blocker. Canonical candidate-branch and fail-closed details:

`content/sections/04-risk-classification.md` §Relaxed ephemeral chat-advice override.

**Conductor default: act, don't ask.** The conductor's job is to complete the goal, not to approve every step. Stop and ask only for destructive/irreversible actions, missing information only the user has, materially ambiguous acceptance criteria, or scope-completion decisions. Repeated stops within one task are a planning signal, not a virtue. See `Proactive autonomy` in METHODOLOGY.md §Delegation for the full rule, anti-patterns, and stop-frequency thresholds.

## Rules (read these files)

- **METHODOLOGY.md** - the assembled kernel: delegation, risk classification, activation preflight, planning gate,

task decomposition, and worktree lifecycle; the core rules for when to act directly vs. spawn Workers and Skeptics.

- **rules/code-standards.md** - documentation lookups via Context7, tool discipline (Read always

primary; prefer Glob/Grep when available, Bash `rg`/`grep`/`find` as the sanctioned fallback

otherwise), code quality gates, package management conventions, and browser verification with

agent-browser.

- **rules/conventions.md** - writing style including length discipline (write for the permanent

audience), project structure, session context and memory handling, and git workflow including

protected branches and worktree-per-feature conventions.

## Commands (invoke by name)

- `/ds-help` - static, zero-token command reference; lists every slash command with a one-line description.

- `/ds-status` - read-only resolver dump; shows the resolved mode, profile, and marker with provenance plus a plain-English explainer of what they do and how to change them.

- `/ds-brief` - interactive planning dialogue; produces the Brief artifact before architect and engineer are spawned. Invoke when operator implies planning intent at session start, or use `/ds-brief --from <path>` to extract a Brief from an existing PRD.

- `/ds-update` - update an existing dinostack/DinoStack install (or fresh-install if none exists); invoke when the user says "pull and install DinoStack", "update DinoStack", "install the latest DinoStack", "reinstall dinostack", or "update my AE install".

Run `/ds-help` for the full command inventory.

## Reference Docs (read on trigger - see Protocol Details in METHODOLOGY.md)

- **references/skeptic-protocol.md** - Skeptic loop orchestration, findings classification

(Critical/Major/Minor), sign-off format, adversarial briefs, and the Elevated + Cleanup path.

- **references/subagent-protocol.md** - parallel spawning rules, worktree isolation, check-in

behavior, phase breadcrumbs, and task decomposition rules for multi-Worker plans.

- **references/agent-team.md** - named agent roles (engineer, architect, investigator, debugger,

security-auditor, orchestration-planner), composed flows, decision rules, and spawn requirements.

- **references/design-goals.md** - design principles and goals of the Agentic Engineering system;

read when evaluating whether a proposed change aligns with the system's intent.

- **references/regression-test-obligation.md** - per-finding regression-test obligation: every

Skeptic finding fixed during a task must come with a regression test that would have caught it;

read when fixing a Skeptic finding to confirm what counts as a valid regression test.

- **references/doc-sync-obligation.md** - per-change doc-sync obligation: a reality-asserting

change (alters a count/list/path/convention/behavior an intent-layer doc states) must update

the affected docs in the same change; read when a change touches a documented surface.

- **references/role-models.md** - Pi / oh-my-pi per-role model routing and antagonist

reviewer model diversity; read when resolving `role-models.yml` or spawning reviewers on Pi/omp.

- **references/model-discovery.md** - Pi/oh-my-pi model selection paths (ask-user

wizard, harness-native, pin-by-hand) and the per-role ranking heuristics in

`bin/ds-models`; read when seeding `role-models.yml`.

- **references/evidence-on-disk.md** - spill/sketch/rehydrate protocol for large

tool output; when to spill, the three-step loop, teardown, and ephemerality.

- **references/cross-harness-teams.md** - `ds-team` CLI and `team.yml` schema for

orchestrating parallel agent teams across multiple AI harnesses; read when using

`ds-team` or configuring cross-harness dispatch with `team.yml`.

- **references/digest-return-pattern.md** - digest-return discipline: when a background

loop-running spawn (multi-iteration Skeptic/QA, long investigation) returns, the conductor

reads the structured digest and acts - it does not re-read the internal transcript; read

when running a multi-unit plan with parallel background loops.

- **references/learnings-capture-instruction.md** - the standing "watch for learnings"

instruction: what counts as a learning, the in-flight `ds-learning-shard append` path for

the four roles it belongs to (`engineer`, `adr-generator`, `product-discovery`,

`release-orchestrator`), the `learnings_candidate[]` path for the three roles whose return

contract declares that field, and its canonical definition; read when acting as any

subagent role.

- **references/command-authoring.md** - authoring discipline for commands, skills, and

agent definitions: trigger-keyword descriptions (always injected into context even when

unused, so enumerate when to fire, not behavior) and bad/good example-pair seeding to

encode taste; read when authoring or editing a command file, skill definition, or agent

definition.

- **references/memory-shard-convention.md** - git-tracked per-fact shard directory

(`.agentic/memory-shards/`) a project's root MEMORY.md compiles from, the frontmatter

every shard carries, and the split/regenerate round-trip's entry-loss and reordering

or any writer that captures a fact into a shard.

## Rules (read on trigger)

- **rules/module-manifest.md** - required manifest header format for non-trivial source files;

read when creating or substantially modifying a file that exports a public symbol, exceeds ~50

LOC, or implements a side-effecting operation.