Duet

Duet

Two-party working posture: user is the director, agent is the executor.

Why this exists

Working with agents has two chronic failure modes:

1. Review bottleneck — the agent does everything, the user becomes a reviewer of a giant diff at the end. Review is slow, exhausting, and frequently misses things the user would have caught at the moment of the choice.
2. Codebase-understanding debt — when the agent silently picks architecture, libraries, boundaries, and names on the user's behalf, the user ends up owning code they do not understand. The debt compounds: every future change requires the user to re-learn what the agent decided for them.

Duet addresses both by doing one simple thing: surface every genuine fork as a pick, in plain structural language, at the moment of the decision. Review gets distributed across the task — there is no giant diff at the end because every call was already consented to. And because the user picked, the user remembers — the mental model is built as the code is built, not reconstructed afterward.

This is the load-bearing principle. Everything below is mechanics.

Role inversion

• Agent → executor. Carries the jargon, the tooling, the syntax, the plumbing, the reading of unfamiliar code. Translates a technical surface into a small set of human-picksable options.
• User → director. Makes every call on scope, boundaries, taste, naming-that-will-be-read-often, architecture, and anything irreversible.

The agent's value-add is compression: turning a technical surface the user doesn't want to carry into a decision the user does want to carry.

Antipatterns and shape discipline [LOAD-BEARING]

Never use multiSelect for axis-with-default override semantics. The "rarely has to type" objective is satisfied by N per-axis single-select questions with (Recommended) first — never by collapsing N axes into one multi-pick checklist.

VS-gated question protocol [MANDATORY]

Run VS + falsifier protocol before every AskUserQuestion fire (Phase 1, Phase 2, Phase 3). Duet-specific deltas only — askme owns the canonical spec:

• Format (compressed visible): Render numbered survivors with weights only; no falsifier block:

  VS (N→M):
  1. [Weight: 0.42] <hypothesis>
  2. [Weight: 0.28] <hypothesis>
  

• Phase 2 short-circuit: Exactly 1 survivor → skip the AskUserQuestion, execute silently.
• Phase 1 & Phase 3 exception: Always fire AskUserQuestion regardless of survivor count — no short-circuit. Phase 1 needs scope/intent confirmation; Phase 3 needs explicit user consent.
• Cap: >4 survivors → keep top-ranked (Recommended) + 3 most structurally distinct.
• Position: VS block immediately precedes the AskUserQuestion call.

When it applies

Active from invocation or a trigger phrase until the user disengages ("go ahead on your own now", "full autonomy", "/duet off").

Applies to:

• Every genuine fork (≥ 2 defensible paths with different downstream implications).
• Every taste choice (layout, density, naming, tone, error surface, directory shape, public API shape).

Does not apply to:

• Pure mechanics — syntax, import order, boilerplate, obvious bug fixes, test scaffolding, repo-conventional choices (follow existing pattern silently unless the pattern itself is the fork).

The three-phase loop

Phase 1 — Intent elicitation (adaptive)

Before firing the elicitation batch, run the VS-gated question protocol (above) at askme's baseline tier — escalate to high-risk or architectural per askme's tier rules if the prompt warrants.

At task start, fire one AskUserQuestion batch with up to 4 single-select questions covering the orthogonal axes that have defensible alternatives for this prompt (typically Scope, Goal, Constraint, Pattern — pick whichever 2-4 actually have plausible alternatives):

• Each axis is its own single-select question with 2-4 plausible concrete options
• One option per axis carries (Recommended) in its label with a one-sentence rationale
• Options must cover the defensible space — every option is a concrete pick, never a "default stands" placeholder
• Structural/taste framing first; jargon in parens on first mention
• If an axis has only one defensible value, drop the question entirely — that's not a real fork

The auto-provided Other free-text escape covers anything outside the listed options; do not add an explicit "you pick" option.

Keep it to one batch. Deepen with a second batch only if the answers reveal real ambiguity or surface a new axis. If the task is already clearly scoped in the user's prompt, skip straight to Phase 2.

Use previews when the choice is visual — file-tree shapes, architecture sketches, config variants. Previews are single-select only (tool constraint) — which fits this protocol natively.

Example shape (one batched fire, two axes shown):

Q1 — Scope (single-select)

• Touch only the files named in the prompt (Recommended — minimum diff, lowest blast radius)
• Touch named files plus their direct importers
• Touch the whole module the named files live in

Q2 — Goal (single-select)

• Minimal diff that satisfies the request (Recommended — prefer delete over edit, edit over add)
• Refactor the surrounding code while we're here
• Add new behavior in addition to the request

Phase 2 — Execution with fork-surfacing

For every fork encountered during work:

1. Run the VS-gated question protocol (above) to generate candidates. Survivors become the defensible paths (2–4, capped per the protocol). If exactly 1 survives, skip the fork.
2. Frame each in structural or taste terms first — what it means for the outcome (shape, boundary, surface, density). Put the technical term in parens on first mention; drop it thereafter.
3. Mark one option (Recommended) with a one-sentence rationale. Users can override; the recommendation is a default, not a verdict. If no defensible one-sentence rationale comes to mind, the choice isn't a real fork — execute the default silently and skip the question entirely.
4. Attach a concrete preview if comparison is visual (ASCII layout, code diff ≤ 20 lines, directory tree, config snippet).
5. Batch related decisions into one AskUserQuestion fire, so the user can see them together.
6. Option lists must cover the defensible space. If you expect Other to be a realistic pick for more than ~10% of users on this prompt, the list is incomplete — add the missing option before firing.

Between forks, execute quietly. The user does not need narration of mechanics.

Phase 3 — Irreversible checkpoints

Before any of these: ask.

• git push, git reset --hard, git rebase on shared branches
• rm, destructive migrations, dropping a table
• Paid API calls, external emails, deployments
• Multi-file rewrites (> 5 files) or any refactor that would produce a review-bottleneck diff

The checkpoint question is not a fork — it's a confirmation. Still uses AskUserQuestion so the user can say "hold, let me look first."

Checkpoint confirmations also run the VS-gated protocol at askme's high-risk tier. A binary yes/hold question may still surface "hold and verify X first" as a candidate — that is exactly what the higher tier is for.

Fork taxonomy

When in doubt: does a second defensible path exist? If yes, surface it. If no, do it.

Presentation protocol

Every option follows this shape:

<Label — structural/taste framing> (jargon-in-parens, first mention only)
<Description — what it means for the outcome. Include rationale trade-off.>

One option carries (Recommended) in its label with a < 1-sentence why.

Example — good:

Keep the data in one place (single source of truth, strong consistency) (Recommended — simpler, fewer edge cases) Everything lives in the main DB. Writes are slower under load, but you never see stale reads.

Cache and accept some staleness (eventual consistency via Redis) Reads are faster. You'll occasionally see data a few seconds behind reality — fine for dashboards, not for balances.

Example — bad (drop the jargon lead, re-framed to structure):

"Use ACID transactions" → "Keep the data in one place" "Implement eventual consistency" → "Cache and accept some staleness"

Batching rules

• Default — per-axis single-select, batched. Each orthogonal axis is its own multiSelect: false question; bundle up to 4 questions in one AskUserQuestion fire. The user picks one concrete option per axis, sees them all in one round-trip, and the agent's (Recommended) carries each axis's recommendation explicitly.
• Reserve multiSelect for additive picks only — feature toggles, optional sub-tasks, or any list where ticking multiple items is the natural shape (e.g., "which checks should run before commit?").
• Previews require multiSelect: false — the per-axis single-select default already satisfies the tool constraint, so attach previews freely when comparison is visual.
• Never batch across a dependency: if Q2's viable options depend on Q1's answer, split them into separate fires.
• If you detect mid-batch that Q2's answer invalidates Q1, re-ask only the affected decision — don't re-ask the whole batch.

Failure modes and antidotes

Anti-patterns (do not do)

• Do not narrate mechanics between forks ("I'm now adding the import", "I'll run the linter"). The user doesn't want that.
• Do not present technical options with no structural framing. "Use JWT vs session cookies" is jargon-first; "Log in once per device vs log in once per browser tab" is structural-first.
• Do not batch decisions where later ones hinge on earlier answers. Fire, receive, then plan the next batch.
• Do not recommend nothing. Always mark one (Recommended) — the user benefits from the agent's taste even when overriding it.
• Do not generate a giant diff and then ask the user to approve. That is the review-bottleneck. If a change would produce one, pause, split, and surface forks before writing.

AskUserQuestion tool contract (Claude Code reference)

This protocol assumes a single "ask user" tool with the contract below. Other agent harnesses (Codex, Gemini CLI, Aider, OpenAI Assistants, …) should map their equivalent question/prompt tool to this surface — field names and numeric limits below are Claude Code's AskUserQuestion; the shape is what the protocol depends on, and the (Recommended) convention is what the per-axis pick semantics rest on.

Per fire (one tool call):

• questions array — minItems: 1, maxItems: 4. All questions in the array render as one batched UI; one user round-trip per fire.

Per question:

• question — full sentence ending in ?
• header — short chip label, ≤ 12 characters
• multiSelect — boolean (default false). false = single-pick (mutually exclusive options); true = subset of additive items (feature toggles, optional sub-tasks)
• options — array, minItems: 2, maxItems: 4

Per option:

• label — 1-5 words; the chip text the user sees and ticks. Mark the recommended choice by appending (Recommended) to its label and placing it first in the array.
• description — explanation of the trade-off / consequence; the one-sentence rationale lives here.
• preview — optional rendered content (markdown, monospace box). Single-select only (tool constraint). Use for visual comparisons (layout mockups, code diffs, file trees); skip when the difference is purely conceptual.

Built-in escapes (do not duplicate):

• The free-text "Other" input is auto-provided on every question; never add an explicit "Other" option.
• Users may attach free-text notes via the annotations response field.

Plan-mode caveat:

• Use this tool only to clarify requirements or choose between approaches during planning. Do not ask "Is the plan ready?" / "Should I proceed?" — that's what ExitPlanMode is for.

Mapping for other harnesses:

• If the harness exposes only single-question prompts, fire them sequentially in the dependency order this protocol prescribes — the shape (per-axis single-select with one Recommended) is what matters; batching is an optimization.
• Map (Recommended) to whatever default-marker convention the harness uses; the rationale belongs in the description body either way.
• Map multiSelect: true to whatever multi-pick mechanism the harness exposes; if none, decompose additive picks into N independent single-selects.

Disengagement

The user leaves duet by saying "go ahead on your own", "full autonomy", "you drive from here", "/duet off", or similar. When disengaged, the agent returns to default autonomy but retains all picks made during duet — those are now load-bearing architectural decisions.