Hunt

Compose a shift for the host-opened project: settle the work, the ending, and the hours, then either show it for approval or cut it and start.

Resolve the installed plugin root to an absolute $NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT — ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT} on Claude Code, $PLUGIN_ROOT on Codex when set, otherwise the absolute path this skill was attached from (skills/hunt/SKILL.md). Run every command below through "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" — native Windows: & "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT\runtime\windows\ns.ps1" in the PowerShell tool, same verbs — which resolves the host and the workspace; ns help lists the verbs, and ns bind prints the six resolved facts (TASK_ROOT, NIGHTSHIFT_WORKSPACE, NS, NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT, HOST, SOURCE); $NS below is that NS. Never a bare relative path: the working directory persists between calls.

Read $NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/skills/nightshift/references/compose/execution-modes.md before composing: it carries the state map, who selects work, when the clock starts, direct-mode authority, the tooling policy, and how several entries become one shift. If $NS/ does not exist yet, tell the owner to run Setup, then return.

0. Read the sentence first

The owner's sentence is binding intent. There is no keyword list.

A time budget, an actionable objective, and clear direct-execution intent — regardless of wording — are a complete prompt: compose it and run it. Examples of a complete prompt: "use the next 20 hours adding features and enhancing existing ones"; "8 hours clear lint and test debt"; "make checkout less ugly, run it".

• Complete → Automatic, run directly. Do not offer catalog cards. Do not ask who selects, when to start, or "same as last time." Write the shift policy from existing tools, no new elevation, and remembered verification, unless the sentence already granted a policy or allowance.
• Incomplete → Ask only a field that is still missing, then continue.
• The owner asked to pick from the menu, or named Guided → section 1.

1. Ask who selects

Entries live one per file in $NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/skills/nightshift/references/compose/shifts/. Start with what the catalog holds, not with every contract in it:

"$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" catalog-index

One line per entry — slug, ending, title, purpose — read straight from the files. An entry added today is discovered today, and one that was deleted stops being offered. There is no second list to keep in step, and the helper ranks nothing: which entries suit the objective is your judgement.

Then read in full only the entries you are actually going to use. A complete objective needs the two or three contracts it names, not thirty. Read a contract before you compose it — its ending, refusals, verification and supported stacks bind the shift, and none of that is in the index line. shift-catalog.md beside the folder explains the two endings and carries the Maintainer night preset; it does not list the entries.

If the helper is missing or fails, list the directory and read the entries yourself: discovery is the point, and a job that exists in the folder but never reaches the owner is the failure to avoid.

Offer two first-class modes when the prompt did not already choose:

• Guided — one offer line per entry, with its ending marked, plus one line for any preset shift-catalog.md names. The index gives you every one of them; read a contract in full when the owner picks it, not before.
• Automatic — inspect the work target per execution-modes.md (in artifact mode that includes $NS/receipts/, not a git log) and compose the entries that support the stated objective. Quality, coverage, and dependency work do not hijack a feature or design objective. Show evidence only in review-first mode; run-direct does not pause.

More than one may be chosen — a night can clear the lint backlog and then hunt coverage until the whistle. Respect every entry's compatibility restrictions when combining; never combine entries that claim the same single-writer state.

Compose, cut and arm only through the Start preflight; it refuses, and names the repair, when the work target cannot be resolved, work-mode is missing or malformed, or $NS/receipts exists but is not a usable directory. Never git init a notes folder to get past a refusal.

The GitHub issue-hunt entry is offered with the rest of the catalog. It consumes only drafting-table entries the Import issues skill created (canonical Source URL and Status: proposed); list them by reading $NS/drafting-table.md. Promote a selection by cutting the item — never a copy — with "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" import-issues --promote …, or do the cut here when that helper cannot parse the file. It does not replace defect hunt or product evolution, and never searches or writes back to GitHub. Never select it when work mode is artifact.

The other repository-shaped jobs are out of scope there too: Never select defect hunt when work mode is artifact. Never select documentation drift when work mode is artifact. Never select TODO and FIXME debt when work mode is artifact. Never select coverage hunt when work mode is artifact. Never select tooling quality-debt entries when work mode is artifact.

ns normalize-output and ns inventory are read-only reports a shift may lean on when the host carries them — if present, optional, never required. The first turns a supported tool format into one compact summary for the receipt and the ledger; the second lists each workspace package's manager, lockfile, declared scripts, configs, and which named tools are runnable. Automatic composes and works a shift without either.

2. Ask when execution starts

When the prompt did not already carry clear direct-execution intent, ask review first, or run directly? — a choice independent from Guided or Automatic.

• Review first — discovery stays read-only and the clock starts only after approval.
• Run directly — start the clock once the tooling policy is settled and do not pause after discovery, under the direct-mode decision policy in execution-modes.md. Review-missing holds the clock until that plan is approved.

3. Ask the tooling policy and confirm tonight's shift policy

This is composition's one question for tonight's policy — Start never asks it. On a complete Automatic prompt, skip the question and write the safe defaults from execution-modes.md, parking any elevation gap. The tooling policy is the owner's standing answer, not a default to re-pick: read the resolved value and carry it. Only when the owner has no explicit persistent choice does a complete prompt run under existing tools. A saved auto-add or review-missing survives an objective that says nothing about tooling; a tonight-only existing-tools in the prompt overrides it for that shift alone and changes nothing persistent. Carrying a policy forward grants no new elevation — an allowance is still the owner's to give. Otherwise ask before scanning, and before any compose, cut, or arm.

Read $NS/work-mode and the remembered project default with "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" shift-policy defaults-get, and run the permission preflight "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" preflight-needs against the entries this compose would select. Ask the single prefilled question in execution-modes.md, folding every capability gap into it, then write the resolved policy with "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" shift-policy set --from-json -. Persist a change as the new project default only when the owner says to remember it (defaults-set). In review-first mode that policy is the only file written before approval; in run-direct mode, arm as soon as it lands.

Artifact mode refuses repository-tool policies (auto-add, review-missing) and explains why — a notes folder has no repository toolchain to add. Only existing-tools is valid there; if the remembered default holds a repository-tool policy, keep existing-tools.

Under auto-add, capture the write surface before writing with "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/runtime/ns" provision baseline --surface <rel> [<rel>...] (one flag takes several paths, or repeat --surface per path), then install, smoke, diff, and rollback when smoke or the tooling commit fails.

Then inspect, compose, cut, or arm. Under existing-tools, skip unavailable contracts even when Guided selected them.

4. Establish the ending

Per the entry's declared ending:

• Open-ended — hours are REQUIRED. These have no natural end but the clock; a walkthrough may not start without a deadline. The entry's declared open-ended title is the source of truth.
• Finite — when hours were not already given, ask the ending as an explicit either/or: until every finding is clear, or capped at N hours? Both are valid; the work ends when the list is empty either way, and hours are only a safeguard against a backlog bigger than the night.

One deadline governs the whole shift, and Automatic always requires hours. On a mixed selection say so in one line: the finite work runs first, and the open-ended job soaks up whatever time is left.

5. Ask for guided scope

Anything specific about scope or approach?

Ask this in Guided mode; in Automatic the owner's sentence is the scope. Free text is skippable and is where the useful shift is made: "only packages/api/", "use getTestInstance() from the test package", "one module — this becomes a single reviewable PR". If a selected entry declares Owner instructions required, it is not skippable: ask, and refuse to compose, cut, or arm that entry until the owner supplies a non-empty answer. Those entries are Guided-only and are never selected in Automatic mode. Never edit the entry's own contract to fit it; the owner's words become their own sub-bullet:

 - **Owner instructions:** <verbatim, as written>

The entry's rules stay above it untouched. They enforce the shift contract — assert behaviour rather than counts, gate green at every commit or artifact receipt, never silence instead of fixing — and owner text adds constraints rather than replacing them.

6. Review or cut

In review first, print the items exactly as they will be written, with evidence, order, hours, and ending, then ask for one approval. The preview is model prose: a no-write, no-clock simulation of the resolved workspace and work target, the shift policy, why each entry serves the stated objective, overlaps removed, rejected alternatives, and the stopping rule. This is the last look before anything is armed. Write nothing before approval.

In run directly, do not ask again: write the order and immediately cut it into the active shift. Record significant discovery and selection decisions in $NS/parking-lot.md.

On approval, append to $NS/work-orders.md — hunt's own file; the drafting table stays the owner's room. Never clobber orders already sitting there — append below them:

## Work order — <ISO date time>
Hours: <N, or "none — finite">

- [ ] **<entry item, verbatim>**
 - **Owner instructions:** <if any>

The hours are inert while a review-first order sits here — the clock starts only at the cut, after approval. In run-direct mode the order is cut immediately, so its clock starts now.

7. Start or park after review

After review-first approval, ask start now, or park it for later? Run-direct skips this question and always starts now; choosing it was already explicit authorization.

On now — start the shift yourself, here, without making the owner type another command. Follow the Start skill exactly, including its whole preflight and the unsupported-permission report described in execution-modes.md. Then clear the stale markers and cut the whole ## Work order section out of $NS/work-orders.md (heading, hours, and item — do not leave an empty order heading behind), put only the item under ## Items in the punch list (a cut, never a copy — it must not exist in two places), and:

• write $NS/deadline as a UNIX epoch from the recorded hours — date +%s plus hours3600 on POSIX, or Get-NSUnixTime plus hours3600 after Import-Module "$NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT\lib\Nightshift.psm1" -Force on native Windows;
• arm the gate with touch "$NS/.shift-armed" on POSIX, or New-Item -ItemType File -Force "$NS\.shift-armed" in native Windows PowerShell;
• log the start and run the binding probe (: nightshift-binding-probe on POSIX, $null = 'nightshift-binding-probe' on native Windows);
• classify Codex $NS/.shift-session line 1 with ns_codex_identity_kind from $NIGHTSHIFT_PLUGIN_ROOT/lib/lib.sh, or Get-NSCodexIdentityKind after importing Nightshift.psm1 on native Windows, before arming the watchman or beginning item work;
• arm the watchman as the Start skill requires, with ns watchman, which resolves to this host's own.

An empty ## Items section still keeps the Shift contract and Gates; they bind the cut item. Record leftover campaign rules in $NS/parking-lot.md when they are not this order's.

On later — the order stays parked in $NS/work-orders.md with its hours, costing nothing. It arms nothing and the gate stays inert. Start (/nightshift:start on Claude Code, or ask Nightshift to start on Codex) will offer it when the owner is ready.