# Dryad > de-novo Dryad — one seat per worker on Grove's ground. A seat is a Git worktree, an overlay env when the project has overlays, and a task. Dryad launches no agent: the human picks the launcher (a terminal, a worktree app, tmux, an ACP client) and which worker sits where. Use when you wake up with DRYAD_ID set; when planning parallel work across worktrees; when counting who sits where and what they reported; when the user runs /dryad. Project values live in .agents/dryad-profile.yml. Launching, mailboxes, DAGs, and merging are out of scope. - Skill: `de-novo/dryad` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 5 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add de-novo/dryad` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/de-novo/dryad/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: AI & ML - Author: de-novo (https://skillmd.com/u/de-novo) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/de-novo/dryad --- # Dryad Grove is the ground. Dryad puts one seat on one tree: a worktree, an overlay env when the project has one, and a task. It counts who sits where and what they reported, and clears the seat when the work is done. Dryad never starts an agent process; the launcher and the assignment stay with the human. This file owns the pattern. Values live in `.agents/dryad-profile.yml` next to Grove's `runtime-profile.yml`; with Grove present, Dryad reads the project slug and overlay mode from Grove's profile and keeps none of its own. A project without Grove declares only its slug and gets seats without envs. Schema and CLI reference: [references/seats.md](references/seats.md). Grove pattern: [grove](../grove/SKILL.md). ## You are a dryad when `DRYAD_ID` is set in your environment. Then: ```bash cat "$DRYAD_SKILL" # this file, wherever the catalog lives de-novo skills dryad seat "$DRYAD_ID" --json # your worktree, branch, env, task de-novo skills dryad seat "$DRYAD_ID" --task # the task text alone ``` `DRYAD_PROJECT` is the baseline checkout; every Dryad command you run from the worktree resolves the project through it. `DRYAD_ENV` is empty when the project has no overlays. `DRYAD_EVIDENCE` is the file your done report reads. If `DRYAD_ID` is unset, this section does not apply. Run each of these as its own command, and keep doing so: a launcher's allow list matches one command, and a line that chains several with `;` or `&&` stops you on a prompt a person has to answer. So does a `$VARIABLE` in the line: your handoff names your seat id and your paths literally; use them as written. ## Rules for a seated worker 1. Change no source outside your worktree: not the baseline checkout, not another seat's worktree, not a shared engine. Reading elsewhere is fine. Writing through an owner's own verb is not "outside": `report`, a Mycelium `propose`, an `overlay attach` on your own env, and the journal those write are the seat's voice, and the owner keeps the file. 2. Verify through the Grove procedure. Your env already exists; you `attach` your changed services, and `finish` destroys the env later. Shared-only services stay on baseline. 3. Report your own state. `report --status blocked --note …` when stuck, `report --status working --note …` at three moments at least: before the first edit (what you are about to change), before verification (what you will run), and before the commit (what changed). One line each, present tense. When Forester's `serve` holds your session, the person also sees your tool stream ("now Edit app/api/server.mjs"); your notes say *why*, which the stream cannot. 4. When done: commit on your branch, then hand in your evidence with the report and stop: `report --status done --evidence -` with the YAML on stdin (each check you ran with command, cwd, exit, observed count; each boundary you did not measure with its reason). Writing it to the seat's evidence file first and reporting without `--evidence` is the same thing with one file write a launcher may ask about. Done records your head and holds the paths you touched against the seat's scope, so a change outside it is refused until a person accepts it. Only what is committed reaches anyone else. Do not push, merge, or call `finish`. Those belong to the human. 5. Before `report --status done`, check whether your tool exposes a session id or transcript path (Claude Code and Codex both do). If it does, include `--session ` so a person can open the native log later. `report done` without one prints a reminder; it is not an error. Completion is your report, not your process exit. A seat with no `done` report is not done. **Your done report is a handoff.** The next reader is a fresh agent or a person who was not here, so the note says what now works and what is open, in the fewest words that let them continue. Do not repeat what already lives in a commit, a PR, a spec, or the plan; name it by path or id. A fact that outlives the seat (a locked decision, a verified cause, an approach that failed) is not a note: propose it to Mycelium when the project has the log (Call the Skill tool with "mycelium"), and let the note carry the id. Redact any secret before it reaches the journal. ## Seating others Before planning a seat, write a brief the worker can complete independently. Use [Writing a seat brief](references/seats.md#writing-a-seat-brief) for its shape, rejection checks, and examples. It points back to the worker rules above for reporting and completion; a task does not replace those rules. For the human or an orchestrator, in order: 1. `de-novo skills dryad plan --task … --owns … --by