Swain Init

Project Onboarding

One-time setup for adopting swain in a project. This skill is not idempotent — it migrates files and installs tools. For per-session health checks, use swain-doctor.

Run all phases in order. If a phase detects its work is already done, skip it and move to the next.

Phase 1: CLAUDE.md → AGENTS.md migration

Goal: establish the @AGENTS.md include pattern so project instructions live in AGENTS.md (which works across Claude Code, GitHub, and other tools that read AGENTS.md natively).

Step 1.1 — Survey existing files

cat CLAUDE.md 2>/dev/null; echo "---SEPARATOR---"; cat AGENTS.md 2>/dev/null

Classify the current state:

Step 1.2 — Migrate

Fresh state: Create both files.

# CLAUDE.md
@AGENTS.md

# AGENTS.md
(empty — governance will be added in Phase 3)

Already migrated: Skip to Phase 2.

Standard state:

1. Copy CLAUDE.md content to AGENTS.md (preserve everything).
2. If CLAUDE.md contains a <!-- swain governance --> block, strip it from the AGENTS.md copy — it will be re-added cleanly in Phase 3.
3. Replace CLAUDE.md with:

@AGENTS.md

Tell the user:

Migrated your CLAUDE.md content to AGENTS.md and replaced CLAUDE.md with @AGENTS.md. Your existing instructions are preserved — Claude Code reads AGENTS.md via the include directive.

Split state: Both files have content. Ask the user:

Both CLAUDE.md and AGENTS.md have content. How should I proceed?

1. Merge — append CLAUDE.md content to the end of AGENTS.md, then replace CLAUDE.md with @AGENTS.md
2. Keep AGENTS.md — discard CLAUDE.md content, replace CLAUDE.md with @AGENTS.md
3. Abort — leave both files as-is, skip migration

If merge: append CLAUDE.md content (minus any <!-- swain governance --> block) to AGENTS.md, replace CLAUDE.md with @AGENTS.md.

Phase 2: Verify dependencies

Goal: ensure uv is available and the vendored tk script is accessible.

Step 2.1 — Check uv availability

command -v uv

If uv is found, skip to Step 2.2.

If missing, install:

curl -LsSf https://astral.sh/uv/install.sh | sh

If installation fails, tell the user:

uv installation failed. You can install it manually (https://docs.astral.sh/uv/getting-started/installation/) — swain scripts require uv for Python execution.

Then skip the rest of Phase 2 (don't block init on uv, but warn that scripts will not function without it).

Step 2.2 — Verify vendored tk

tk (ticket) is vendored in the swain skill tree — no external installation is needed.

TK_PATH="$(find . .claude .agents -path '*/swain-do/bin/tk' -print -quit 2>/dev/null)"
test -x "$TK_PATH" && echo "tk found at $TK_PATH" || echo "tk not found"

If found, verify it runs:

"$TK_PATH" help >/dev/null 2>&1 && echo "tk works" || echo "tk broken"

If tk is not found or broken, tell the user:

The vendored tk script was not found at skills/swain-do/bin/tk. This usually means the swain-do skill was not fully installed. Try running /swain update to reinstall skills.

Step 2.3 — Migrate from beads (if applicable)

Check if this project has existing beads data:

test -d .beads && echo "beads found" || echo "no beads"

If .beads/ exists:

1. Check for backup data: ls .beads/backup/issues.jsonl 2>/dev/null
2. If backup exists, offer migration:

   Found existing .beads/ data. Migrate tasks to tk? This will convert .beads/backup/issues.jsonl to .tickets/ markdown files.

3. If user agrees, run migration:

   TK_BIN="$(cd "$(dirname "$TK_PATH")" && pwd)"
   export PATH="$TK_BIN:$PATH"
   cp .beads/backup/issues.jsonl .beads/issues.jsonl 2>/dev/null  # migrate-beads expects this location
   ticket-migrate-beads
   

4. Verify: ls .tickets/*.md 2>/dev/null | wc -l
5. Tell the user the results and that .beads/ can be removed after verification.

If .beads/ does not exist, skip this step. tk creates .tickets/ on first tk create.

Phase 3: Swain governance

Goal: add swain's routing and governance rules to AGENTS.md.

Step 3.1 — Check for existing governance

grep -l "swain governance" AGENTS.md CLAUDE.md 2>/dev/null

If found in either file, governance is already installed. Tell the user and skip to Phase 4.

Step 3.2 — Ask permission

Ask the user:

Ready to add swain governance rules to AGENTS.md. These rules:

• Route artifact requests (specs, stories, ADRs, etc.) to swain-design
• Route task tracking to swain-do (using tk)
• Enforce the pre-implementation protocol (plan before code)
• Prefer swain skills over built-in alternatives

Add governance rules to AGENTS.md? (yes/no)

If no, skip to Phase 4.

Step 3.3 — Inject governance

Read the canonical governance content from the swain-doctor skill's references/AGENTS.content.md file. Locate it by searching for the file relative to the installed skills directory:

find .claude/skills .agents/skills skills -path '*/swain-doctor/references/AGENTS.content.md' -print -quit 2>/dev/null

Append the full contents of that file to AGENTS.md.

Tell the user:

Governance rules added to AGENTS.md. These ensure swain skills are routable and conventions are enforced. You can customize anything outside the <!-- swain governance --> markers.

Phase 4: Finalize

Step 4.1 — Create .agents directory

mkdir -p .agents

This directory is used by swain-do for configuration and by swain-design scripts for logs.

Step 4.2 — Run swain-doctor

Invoke the swain-doctor skill. This validates .tickets/ health, checks stale locks, removes legacy skill directories, and ensures governance is correctly installed.

Step 4.3 — Onboarding

Invoke the swain-help skill in onboarding mode to give the user a guided orientation of what they just installed.

Step 4.4 — Summary

Report what was done:

swain init complete.

• CLAUDE.md → @AGENTS.md include pattern: [done/skipped/already set up]
• tk (ticket) verified: [done/not found]
• Beads migration: [done/skipped/no beads found]
• Swain governance in AGENTS.md: [done/skipped/already present]

Re-running init

If the user runs /swain init on a project that's already set up, each phase will detect its work is done and skip. The only interactive phase is governance injection (Phase 3), which checks for the <!-- swain governance --> marker before asking.

To force a fresh governance block, delete the <!-- swain governance --> ... <!-- end swain governance --> section from AGENTS.md and re-run.