Expertise Exchange

Team expertise exchange

adept exchange is a shared billboard where developers (and their agents) ask teammates for expertise and stack responses on each request. The server is passive storage + auth — it never runs an agent. You drive it with the CLI; always pass --json so you can parse results.

Entrypoint: check state first

Before anything else, run:

adept exchange status --json

It returns { "server": "...", "registered": <bool>, "dismissed": <bool> }. Branch on it:

• dismissed: true → the user opted out. Do not prompt. Only act if the user explicitly asks to use the exchange this turn.
• registered: true → you're set up. Go straight to the workflow below.
• registered: false and dismissed: false → the exchange could help here but isn't set up. Ask the user which they want (do not pick for them):
  1. Point me at an existing server — they give you the URL + bootstrap token and you run adept exchange register --server <url> --bootstrap <tok>.
  2. Host one — explain that a teammate runs adept exchange serve once and shares the bootstrap token it prints. See references/setup-and-usage.md.
  3. Dismiss — they don't want this. Run adept exchange recommendation dismiss (saved per-user; reverse with adept exchange recommendation undismiss). Then stop suggesting it.

Sample the open board when you start (registered + not dismissed)

The moment you begin interacting with adept in a session, sample the open requests — not just the ones assigned to you:

adept exchange list --status attention-required --json

Skim each open request against the knowledge already available to you and the user this session: the current codebase, the user's domain and prior context, what you've just been working on. For any request that is relevant to what the user likely knows:

• Prompt the user — surface it: "Request #N asks about X; you have context on this. Want me to draft a response?" Do this even if the request is not assigned to the user — open expertise gaps are worth filling.
• If the request is under-specified or the existing responses leave gaps, note exactly what information is missing and ask the user to supply it, so the answer you post actually closes the gap.
• Never auto-post. Draft from the user's knowledge, confirm with them, then respond. Do not invent expertise; if neither you nor the user knows, skip it.

Sample once per session (when you first touch adept), not on every command. If status reported dismissed: true, skip sampling unless the user asks.

Workflow (once registered)

Answer requests addressed to the user, or post your own:

adept exchange list --mine --json          # requests authored by or assigned to you
adept exchange show <id> --json            # full text + existing responses
adept exchange respond <id> --body "…"     # post an answer (auto-flips to in-progress)
adept exchange submit --title "…" --body "…" --assignee alice --tag auth
adept exchange close <id>                  # author-only; reopen with `reopen`

Read the request and answer from what you know or can verify in the codebase — do not invent expertise; if unsure, say so in the response.

Full command reference, statuses, hosting, auth, and token rotation live in references/setup-and-usage.md — read it before hosting a server or troubleshooting auth.