Task Orchestration

Task Orchestration

Use this skill to drive work through a single authoritative YAML todo file: .copilot-todo.yaml.

Source of truth

• .copilot-todo.yaml — only status tracker.
• .copilot-todo.md — legacy/migration only (do not update by hand).

Getting Started with Templates

Creating a new plan from template

# Copy the template to your repo root or session folder
cp .github/skills/task-orchestration/template/plan.md.template plan.md

# Edit plan.md with your tasks (use Markdown checkboxes: - [ ] Task name)

# Generate .copilot-todo.yaml from your plan
python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py \
  --plan-md plan.md \
  --plan-mode regen \
  init

Creating a .copilot-todo.yaml from scratch

# Copy the template
cp .github/skills/task-orchestration/template/copilot-todo.yaml.template .copilot-todo.yaml

# Edit the tasks section, then initialize
python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py init

Template locations:

• template/plan.md.template — Markdown plan with task checkboxes
• template/copilot-todo.yaml.template — YAML structure with example task

Loop (plan → execute → iterate)

Repeat until no runnable tasks remain:

1. Sync / migrate state

• Reuse existing .copilot-todo.yaml (default):

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py init

• (Optional) Seed/regenerate tasks from plan.md using Markdown task list items (- [ ] ... / - [x] ...).
  • If an item starts with an explicit ID prefix like A1. ... or T-001: ..., that ID is used.
  • Otherwise a stable-ish P-XXXXXXXX ID is generated from the text.

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py \
  --plan-md plan.md \
  --plan-mode regen \
  init

2. Start next task

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py next

3. Plan (short bullets, only for the chosen task)

4. Execute (minimal diff; run smallest relevant existing build/test)

5. Update status

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py update <ID> completed --note "..."
# or
python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py update <ID> blocked --note "..."

5b) Commit (required when using ralph_loop.py --require-commit)

git add -A
git commit -m "<ID>: <short summary>"

6. Iterate / expand If you discover missing work, add follow-up tasks (don’t silently expand scope):

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/task_orchestrator.py add "Title" --deps <ID1,ID2> --priority Medium --goal "..."

Ralph-style multi-session loop (Copilot CLI)

To run one fresh Copilot run per task (uses copilot -p, consuming Copilot requests accordingly):

python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/ralph_loop.py \
  --non-interactive \
  --max-steps 10

# or: derive tasks from plan.md
python3 .github/skills/task-orchestration/scripts/ralph_loop.py \
  --non-interactive \
  --plan-md plan.md \
  --plan-mode regen \
  --max-steps 10

Notes:

• This does not bypass quotas; it just splits work into multiple sessions.
• By default ralph_loop.py enforces one commit per finished task (use --no-require-commit to disable).
• Keep --max-steps small to avoid burning requests if a task gets stuck.