Pr Contributor Review

Review Contributor PR

This skill defines how to review and assist with a contributor's pull request (someone else's PR, e.g. from a fork or another branch). Use it when you are helping make a contributor PR merge-ready, not when submitting your own PR (use pr-new for that).

Goals

• PR is up to date with its upstream base branch (no merge conflicts, clean rebase).
• Hosted quality gates pass: every applicable required CI check for the latest PR head is green. Missing, pending, or failing checks block a merge-ready assessment unless a maintainer explicitly grants an exception.
• PR description follows the project template (Summary, Changes, Test plan) so reviewers and history have clear context.
• Avoid pushing to the contributor's branch with failing CI or an outdated base.

Workflow

1. Fetch PR metadata and diff

Use the GitHub API or gh pr view to get:

• PR number, title, body, base/head refs, author.
• List of changed files and patch/diff.

Confirm the base branch (e.g. ansible:main) and that you know which remote/branch you will push to if you make changes (e.g. djdanielsson:branch).

2. Check if the branch is up to date with upstream

• Fetch the PR's actual base branch from the upstream remote, not necessarily main.
• Ensure the PR head commit is available locally before checking ancestry. For example, fetch the reported head SHA (or use the GitHub API comparison endpoint as a fallback), then run git merge-base --is-ancestor <upstream-base-ref> <head-sha> using the PR's actual base ref.
• Confirm the PR is reported as mergeable by GitHub and inspect the commit range for an unintended merge-based update when a clean rebase is required. If upstream has newer commits, the contributor's branch should be rebased onto the actual upstream base branch, or updated by fast-forward only, before merge. Do not merge the base branch into the contributor branch where the repository requires linear history.

GitHub's REST mergeable value can temporarily be null while GitHub computes it. Retry the metadata request a bounded number of times. If it remains null, report mergeability as pending and do not assess the PR as ready.

• If you are going to push changes to the contributor's branch (e.g. adding fixes or improving the PR):

• Rebase the local branch that mirrors their PR onto the resolved upstream base ref before pushing. That way the PR stays mergeable and CI runs against the latest base branch.

3. Review hosted CI checks

Review every applicable required workflow and check for the latest PR head, rather than rerunning the full quality gates locally. Include path-triggered checks and repository gates such as lint, unit, integration, UI, AI, OpenAPI, and Helm checks when the changed files require them. Compare the result with branch-protection requirements and workflow path filters; gh pr checks alone cannot show a check that was never scheduled. This is faster, avoids duplicating CI work, and keeps the review focused on the contributor's actual execution environment.

gh pr checks <N> --repo ansible/apme

For deeper investigation, inspect failed workflow/job logs with gh run view <run-id> --repo ansible/apme --log-failed, or use the GitHub web UI. Confirm that checks correspond to the current head SHA, not an older commit.

Do not rerun tox -e lint or tox -e unit locally by default when the corresponding hosted checks are complete and green. Run local quality gates when the user explicitly requests local validation, the relevant CI check is unavailable or inconclusive, or a failure cannot be diagnosed from hosted logs. This review-specific optimization does not relax the repository's tox-only quality-gate policy. If local validation is needed, use tox and never invoke ruff, mypy, pytest, or prek directly (ADR-047).

If CI is still running, report validation as pending rather than claiming the PR is ready, unless an explicit maintainer exception is recorded. If CI is absent or does not cover an applicable required quality gate, report that limitation and do not claim the PR is ready unless an explicit maintainer exception is recorded.

See the /tox skill for the full environment reference when local validation is warranted.

Do not push unrelated changes to the contributor's branch while required hosted checks are failing. If the user has authorized a corrective push, explain the failure, push the fix, and wait for the new checks on that head before proceeding.

4. PR description quality

• If the PR body is minimal or missing structure, suggest or apply the pr-new template: Summary, Changes, Test plan (and optionally Related Specs, Type of Change, Security Checklist from CONTRIBUTING).

• You can update the PR body via GitHub (if you have permission) or draft text for the maintainer/contributor to paste:

  gh pr edit <N> --repo ansible/apme --body-file path/to/body.md
  

• Keep the description accurate: list what changed and how to verify (tests, manual steps).

5. Pushing to the contributor's branch

• Only push to the contributor's fork/branch if you have permission and the user has asked you to (e.g. "push our updates to djdanielsson:fix_errors").

• Before pushing:

  1. Rebase onto the resolved upstream base ref so the PR is up to date.
  2. Push the rebased or corrected head, then wait for and review its hosted CI checks (see §3).
  3. Use --force-with-lease when pushing a rebased branch: git push <remote> <local-branch>:<their-branch> --force-with-lease.

• After pushing, the PR will update automatically. Optionally update the PR description to mention the new commits.

5a. Comment on review threads

When you push fixes that address a review comment, reply on that thread so the resolution is visible. Follow the pr-address-feedback skill for the full procedure (finding thread IDs / Node IDs and using the GraphQL-based thread workflow).

5b. Track all deferred work as issues

When reviewing a contributor PR, any concrete work that is intentionally deferred to a follow-up PR — whether from you, the contributor, or another reviewer — MUST be captured as a GitHub issue immediately. Do not leave "TODO for later" or "out of scope, will address separately" without creating an issue. Untracked follow-ups are invisible debt.

gh issue create --repo ansible/apme \
  --title "<type>(scope): <description from review>" \
  --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
## Context

<What was deferred and why>

Flagged during review of PR #N: <link to comment>

## Proposal

<What should be done>

EOF
)"

Include the issue URL in the PR comment thread so reviewers can verify tracking.

6. What not to include in the skill

• Local-only or environment-specific issues (e.g. commit signing, SSH config, IDE settings) should not be part of the contributor-PR review checklist unless they are project policy (e.g. DCO). Document those separately or in maintainer docs if needed.

Checklist (quick reference)

When reviewing or preparing a contributor PR:

• Fetched PR and know base/head and remotes.
• Branch is up to date with the PR's upstream base branch (rebase if needed before push).
• Every applicable required hosted CI check passes for the latest PR head; missing, pending, and failing checks block a ready assessment unless an explicit maintainer exception is recorded.
• PR description has Summary, Changes, and Test plan (pr-new style).
• If pushing to their branch: rebase onto the resolved upstream base ref, push with git push <remote> <local>:<their-branch> --force-with-lease, then wait for and review hosted CI on the new head.
• If you addressed a review comment: follow the pr-address-feedback skill to reply on the thread with explanation + commit SHA and resolve it.

References

• tox skill (/tox): Full tox environment reference.
• pr-new skill: PR body template and commit conventions.
• pr-address-feedback skill: Responding to review comments and resolving threads.
• CONTRIBUTING.md: PR template, testing, security checklist.
• CLAUDE.md: Quality gates (tox -e lint, tox -e unit).