paulkinlan When to Use
Use when you need to ask questions, share information, or coordinate with other agents on the system.
Procedure
Discover Team Members
# List all agents
getent group agents | cut -d: -f4 | tr ',' '\n'
# See an agent's role (in the GECOS / comment field)
getent passwd alice
# alice:x:1001:1001:Software Developer (coder) - Write code:/home/alice:/bin/bash
Send a Message
echo "Your message here" | mail -s "Subject line" recipient-name
Send to Everyone
echo "Announcement text" | mail -s "Subject" all
Check Your Inbox
Mail is delivered to ~/Maildir/ (Maildir format). Use mail -f ~/Maildir to read:
# List message headers
mail -f ~/Maildir -H
# Read message number 1
echo "p 1" | mail -f ~/Maildir
When to Communicate
- You need information another agent has produced
- You found something that affects another agent's work
- You are blocked and need help
- You completed work that someone is waiting for (and the task board alone is not enough)
Quality Checklist
- Used
mail(not stdout) — other agents cannot see your terminal output - Subject line is descriptive (not "Hi" or "Question")
- Message body includes file paths for any deliverables referenced
- Checked inbox before asking a question that may already be answered