Capture

Produce and approve launch assets with take-a-repo

This skill is the browser-specific path. When completing a product with native, CLI or API evidence, use the bundled launch-proof skill and docs/evidence.md; do not force the product into a web page.

take-a-repo drives the repo's built extension with Playwright and writes assets into the config's outDir (default store-assets/). A successful run doubles as a real-bundle smoke test — a screenshot or clip only appears if that feature rendered from the shipped code. By default, it also writes a handoff pack: storyboard.json, captions.json, and take-a-repo-manifest.json.

Autonomous workflow

1. Translate intent into targets — infer channel profiles from the user's campaign request. Supported targets are cws-youtube, x, and youtube-shorts. Do not ask the user to choose viewport, codec, duration, thumbnail timing, or editor.

2. Preconditions — the repo has a take-a-repo.config.js; Chromium is installed (npm exec -- playwright install chromium, one-time); the config's build command succeeds.

3. Create or update one story — keep product actions and captions in one demo and declare channel variants through targets:

   demo: {
     name: 'skillbridge',
     targets: ['cws-youtube', 'x'],
     captions: [
       { at: 0.5, text: 'Translate the lesson in place' },
       { at: 18, text: 'Restore the original anytime' },
     ],
     async run({ page, env, demo, target }) { /* one reusable story */ },
   }
   

   take-a-repo expands target-specific names, viewport, H.264 MP4, 30-second cap, poster frame, and caption treatment. The youtube-shorts profile uses three-word outline focus chunks with an animated current-word highlight and a visual-guide-safe left/bottom placement. Use targetOptions.<id> only when the shared story genuinely needs target-specific framing or caption tuning. If a desktop UI does not reflow at 720×1280, give Shorts a focused run override and fixture layout that removes secondary panels and enlarges the action/result. Never squeeze the complete desktop story into the vertical frame. For every localized campaign variant, declare captionOptions.typography with the exact locale and project-local licensed font files. Prefer a font family designed for that script; include fallback faces until glyph QA is complete. Do not rely on the operator machine's system fonts for a publishable multilingual asset.

4. Run attempt 1 (from the repo, or pass its path):

   take-a-repo --json --attempt 1
   take-a-repo <path> --json --attempt 1
   

   If repeated composition fixes remain unresolved and the repo declares config.calibration, start take-a-repo --calibrate. Keep adjustments inside its authored presets, bounded framing/caption controls, and three protected regions. Save the profile, trigger the real recapture, and continue only from its resulting publish-ready or structured needs-fix state. Do not ask the user to diagnose composition or operate the controls. Once technical QA passes, open take-a-repo --campaign for the user's final media decision.

   Before npm publication, run the source checkout with node bin/take-a-repo.js --json --attempt 1, or use a project wrapper such as npm run capture:store -- --json.

   Useful flags: --scene <name> (one story, expanded variant, static scene, description, or privacy), --target <id> (one channel target), --no-video (skip the screencast), --mp4 (also emit an H.264 mp4 of the demo — needs ffmpeg on PATH or TAKE_A_REPO_FFMPEG), --no-build (reuse an existing build).

5. Read the result — stdout is exactly one JSON object: { "ok": true, "status": "awaiting-approval", "machineStatus": "publish-ready", "outDir": "...", "manifest": "/abs/path/take-a-repo-manifest.json", "produced": [...] }. Progress logs go to stderr in --json mode. Read handoff.automation for technical repair work and handoff.approval for the user decision. Do not use the legacy compatibility review summary.

6. Fix, review, and publish through the gate:

   • needs-fix: apply every automation.actions[] item whose owner is agent, edit the config, then rerun automation.retryScenes[] with --attempt 2. Repeat through automation.maxAttempts.
   • blocked: automated attempts are exhausted. Report only the concrete technical blocker and attempted fixes; ask for technical input.
   • Before presenting any video, inspect the final composite against its audience, objective and beat intent: evidence, composition, legibility, pacing and continuity. Caption pixels and codec checks cannot judge those. In evidence/production configs, author editorial and run production review-context, then production review --report <json> with inspected frame references and timestamped findings. editorial-review-required means agent work remains; another identical render does not resolve it. See docs/evidence.md for the report contract and detail sampling.
   • awaiting-approval: technical QA and agent critique passed. Open the Campaign Dashboard and present the rendered candidate to the user. Keep the Calibrator under Advanced for agent-owned composition work. Do not approve on the user's behalf.
   • changes-requested: read the digest-bound decision note, implement it as the next agent-owned edit, recapture, and return the new candidate for another decision.
   • approved: the exact recorded digest passed user review. An authorized uploader may publish that digest; any recapture or profile edit invalidates the decision.
   • not-requested: legacy capture mode; no channel target was configured.

7. On runtime failure — exit code 2 = usage/no config found, 1 = runtime failure; stdout still carries the single JSON payload { "ok": false, "error": … }. Common causes: build failure, Chromium not installed, an unknown --scene, or a scene's wait timing out (feature didn't render).

Notes

• Runs the full-Chromium channel; headless works (TAKE_A_REPO_HEADED=0 take-a-repo … — verified, video included) and is the mode to use in CI. Headed-under-xvfb is unreliable on CI runners — don't use it.
• Scenes are the repo's own config — to change what is captured, edit take-a-repo.config.js, not take-a-repo.
• description.from may point to STORE_LISTING.md for copy only or to product.manifest.json for shared listing + privacy disclosure inputs. privacy-disclosure.md is a worksheet for store review, not legal policy text.
• CWS assets and SNS demo clips have different jobs. For X/SNS clips, prefer demo.preset: 'sns-video' (1280×720), demo.mp4: { crf: 18 }, 20-40 seconds, short captions, first-result-within-3-seconds, and a story that demonstrates the requested behavior. These are recommendations; do not pad short cuts or force safety/restore copy without a visible reason. Use sns-twitter (1200×675) for static X card images.
• Demo configs can use timed demo.captions plus the helper passed to demo.run: demo.caption(text), demo.step(text, async () => { ... }), demo.wait(ms), demo.click(selectorOrLocator, { moveMs, beforeMs, holdMs }), and demo.select(selectorOrLocator, value, { openMs, holdMs }). Captions, arrow-pointer clicks, and mirrored native-select options render as DOM overlays during recording and avoid the top-left disclaimer badge. Always use demo.select() for a native <select> because its OS popup is not part of the Playwright page screencast.
• For short-form focus captions, prefer authored timed captions and captionOptions: { mode: 'focus', appearance: 'outline', wordsPerChunk: 3, wordMs: 360 }. take-a-repo animates those words deterministically even when the product demo is silent; do not add speech transcription solely to create caption motion. Shorts enables this mode by default, while CWS and X stay static unless overridden. The resolved style is recorded in both caption and storyboard handoff docs; captions.json also carries the trim-relative rendered timeline[]. Treat a dense-focus-caption lint as an agent-owned timing fix, never drop words. Keep short complete captions on screen with focusChunks:[caption.text]; never separate a modifier from its noun across successive caption cards. A spatial line break is different from replacing one part with another. If needed, measure wrapping/font size or rewrite the full sentence. Keep the Shorts animation on every word in reading order; do not select only important words when fixing sentence boundaries. Omit focusCues for automatic wordMs timing. Optional cues adjust timing while preserving every word highlight; word:null releases emphasis only after the complete phrase. Choose a stable caption lane from actual frames, not an arbitrary universal bottom offset.
• Locale typography is a harness contract, not a prompt-only suggestion. Set typography.locale, family, minFontSize, maxFontSize, maxLines, and one or more fonts[].from paths. take-a-repo preserves authored separators, verifies glyph coverage, embeds and waits for those fonts, then records the resolved size and line balance. Fix caption-locale-missing, caption-font-not-embedded, caption-missing-glyph, caption-font-load-failed, caption-typography-not-applied, caption-type-fit-failed, and caption-unbalanced-lines before presenting the candidate.
• Runtime caption QA measures the actual DOM frames for bounds, overflow, line count, outline stroke, missing frames, and timing drift. Treat every resulting storyboard warning as an agent-owned config fix and rerun the target.
• storyboard.json carries structured lint (code, severity, message, fix) for agents. Treat those warnings as the edit list for the next take-a-repo.config.js pass.
• Use demos: [] for multiple campaign cuts. Each entry needs a unique name because it becomes <name>.webm and optional <name>.mp4; --scene <name> reruns just that clip.
• Use thumbnail: { at: 1.2 } for poster frames, zoom: { scale: 1.04 } or a small crop when the UI is too small. Keep storyboard lint on for every channel target; storyboardLint:false is only for legacy, non-publishing smoke clips and produces needs-fix for a target.
• take-a-repo is not a timeline editor. It automates the repeatable channel work (capture, trim, framing, captions, encode, poster frame, QA) and leaves manual editors disabled by default. Use manifest roles instead of guessing files.
• Target workflows default to automation.manualFallback:false; manual editor recommendations are omitted. Never suggest iMovie, Screen Studio, Canva, or manual recapture unless the user explicitly requests a manual fallback.
• Machine publish-ready means the final file passed take-a-repo's caption timing, codec, pixel-format, actual-dimension, actual-duration, full-video decode, thumbnail-dimension, nonblank-frame, integrity, and channel-profile checks. It is not user approval. Publication additionally requires handoff.approval.publishable:true and an authorized connector.
• Validate a received pack through handoff.schemaFiles; schema paths are relative to the manifest directory. On partial runs, compare each asset's runId with manifest.run.id and inspect state before assuming it was refreshed.