Spawn

Spawn

You are the lead. A spawned peer is a full Claude Code session — its own context window, its own permission prompts, its own lifetime, steerable by the user in a visible pane (a split of the terminal window the user can watch and type into). That makes it a third kind of delegate, above the two the library already has:

When to spawn — and when not

Fire on any one signal:

• the work must survive this session or run long beside it
• it needs its own git worktree (a separate working copy of the repository on its own branch, so nothing it edits collides with yours) — large parallel edits where sessions would otherwise keep touching the same files
• the user should be able to watch and steer it live in its own pane
• it needs different permission settings or a different model than your session (say, allowed to edit files without asking)

Do not spawn for a bounded consult (advisor), mechanical bounded work (a fast-worker subagent), or a read-only question (a claude -p one-shot). A peer costs a worktree, a pane, and a merge — spend that only when the lifetime, the pane, or the isolation is the point.

Detect the environment

Spawn a peer — herdr, the verified path

Each command emits JSON carrying the ids the next one needs. worktree create returns the workspace id, the checkout path, and a root pane already open at a shell prompt, so a fresh spawn needs no tab create at all (herdr tab create --workspace <WS_ID> --cwd <WT_PATH> --no-focus is for additional tabs, each with its own root pane). If you lose an id, re-find it with herdr worktree list, herdr agent list, or herdr api snapshot. Parse the JSON — never scrape human-readable output, since the CLI drifts across stable and preview channels. Each Bash call is also a fresh shell: $slug and captured ids do not persist between calls, so redeclare them per call or substitute literally.

slug=fix-ingest    # short dashed name, 2–4 lowercase words, e.g. fix-ingest — names the branch, the workspace label, and the agent
herdr worktree create --cwd "$PWD" --branch "spawn/$slug" --label "$slug"   # JSON — workspace_id, checkout path, root pane_id
# write the brief before starting the agent (next section) → <WT_PATH>/.spawn/brief.md
herdr agent start "$slug" --kind claude --pane <PANE_ID> || true # the root pane; agent flags go after --  (e.g. -- --model opus)
                                                                  # on 0.9 this exits 1 with agent_not_ready when the trust dialog blocks startup; the peer is running and named anyway
herdr agent read "$slug" --lines 20                              # expect "Is this a project you created or one you trust?"
herdr agent send-keys "$slug" Down Enter                         # select "Yes, I trust this folder"; agent prompt cannot clear a dialog
herdr agent explain "$slug"                                      # wait for state: idle — the agent record lags the screen by a few seconds; prompt returns agent_blocked until then
herdr agent prompt "$slug" "Read .spawn/brief.md and begin. Reply here when the acceptance checks pass."

--cwd "$PWD" is not optional. herdr resolves the repository from the calling workspace, not from the shell's directory, and every Bash call is a fresh shell, so without --cwd it branches and checks out whatever repository the workspace is associated with. Verified 2026-09-02: from a scratch repo, the bare form created a worktree of an unrelated repository. Check repo_root in the JSON before going on. --base <ref> pins the baseline when main is moving under you.

Permissions match yours, not a hardcoded default. Before starting the peer, read your own pane to see your live mode, and read wide enough to actually find it:

herdr agent read "$HERDR_PANE_ID" --lines 30 | grep -iE "bypass permissions|accept edits|plan mode|auto|manual|don.t ask" | tail -1

The status line names the mode directly (for example, ⏵⏵ bypass permissions on (shift+tab to cycle)). Match whichever mode phrase the status line shows — the six modes render as distinct phrases and the exact strings beyond the verified ones may differ by version, one more reason never to guess. A tight read such as --lines 3 is unreliable here: it works only when the status line is the last thing rendered, and this skill is routed to from leads with background subagents running — exactly the state whose task list pushes the status line out of the last few rows. If the grep returns nothing, widen it with --source visible before concluding anything. Do not pass a mode you did not actually read — guessing reintroduces the default-fallback bug this self-read exists to prevent. Pass the matching flag after --, --permission-mode <mode>, one of acceptEdits | auto | bypassPermissions | manual | dontAsk | plan. Skip this and the peer falls back to Claude Code's own configured default (~/.claude/settings.json's permissions.defaultMode), which can silently diverge from what you're actually running. This very session, for instance, is configured to auto but its live status line currently reads bypassPermissions, because the mode was cycled mid-session — only the self-read catches that gap. The visible pane is still the safety net either way, since herdr surfaces blocked the moment the peer asks for something its mode doesn't cover. If your own mode already grants broad access, the peer inherits that same exposure: worktree isolation confines its file edits, never its shell commands.

Write the brief first

The brief is a file (<WT_PATH>/.spawn/brief.md), not an inline prompt. A real brief is too long to pass on the command line, survives the peer's own compaction for re-reading, and sits in the worktree at merge-review time as the audit record. The kickoff prompt is one line pointing at it.

Use the delegation contract the library already runs on — the same fields you would give any delegate: Objective · Inputs and authoritative paths · In scope · Out of scope · Constraints and invariants · Write ownership · Expected artifact · Acceptance checks · Return format (conclusion, evidence, changed files, residual risk). Then three spawn-specific lines:

Branch etiquette — commit to spawn/<slug>; never merge, never push; do not commit .spawn/.
Suggested skills — the /oss: skills the peer should invoke, so it does not rediscover them.
Baseline — the commit this worktree was cut from. Reference artifacts by path at that commit; never paste secrets into the brief.

Once per repo, add .spawn/ to .git/info/exclude — worktrees share it, so every peer's brief stays untracked with no .gitignore churn.

Monitor without babysitting

One Bash call with run_in_background: true — you are notified when it exits, and your context never grows from polling:

herdr agent wait "$slug" --until working --timeout 15000 || true   # confirm launch; times out harmlessly if the peer already finished
herdr agent wait "$slug" --timeout 3600000                         # settles on idle | blocked | done

When the notification fires, judge the true state — the agent's word is not the artifact:

herdr agent explain "$slug"                 # what herdr thinks the state is and why (hook-reported vs. screen-inferred)
herdr agent read "$slug" --lines 60
git -C <WT_PATH> status --porcelain && git -C <WT_PATH> log --oneline -3

agent explain prints five plain-text lines, not JSON: agent, state (blocked | idle | working), manifest, rule (the detection rule that fired, with its screen region and priority), and evidence (the captured text). Observed on 0.8.0: the trust dialog is live_blocked_form, a settled prompt box is live_prompt_box, and a running turn is osc_title_working. integration status tells you whether the hook is current; explain tells you which rule fired. A current hook registers the peer's agent_session id (visible in agent get), which is what makes wait reliable; the state itself is usually resolved by a screen rule either way. herdr agent get "$slug" returns the agent's ids and pane when you have lost them.

A blocked peer: agent read first. A question you can answer → herdr agent prompt. A TUI dialog (a permission menu) → herdr agent send-keys. A judgment call → herdr agent focus and tell the user which pane and why. Spot-check anytime with agent read and a small --lines; do not stream panes into your context.

Fold back in

Run this checklist per peer, in order. Skipping the last two steps is how orphaned checkouts accumulate under ~/.herdr/worktrees/<repo>/.

1. Peer commits and stops. It commits on spawn/<slug> and never merges (the brief says so). Confirm: git -C <WT_PATH> status --porcelain is empty and git -C <WT_PATH> log --oneline -3 shows its work.
2. Review from the main checkout. git log main..spawn/<slug> and git diff main...spawn/<slug>; worktree branches are visible with no fetch. Substitute the repo's integration branch when it is not main.
3. If main moved, the peer rebases and re-runs its acceptance checks: herdr agent prompt "$slug" "Rebase onto main, re-run the acceptance checks, and report." It holds the conflict context; you do not.
4. Merge from the main checkout and run the acceptance checks yourself. You retain integration ownership, of correctness and of rigor.
5. Remove the checkout. herdr worktree remove --workspace <WS_ID>. --force only when the agent is idle or done AND the checkout is clean, or the work is deliberately abandoned. A checkout that holds submodules cannot be removed by git worktree remove; delete the directory and run git worktree prune in the main checkout.
6. Delete the branch. git branch -d spawn/<slug> from the main checkout, after the worktree is gone (the same branch cannot be checked out twice, and -d refuses an unmerged branch, which is the safety you want).
7. Confirm nothing is left, in three places. git worktree list in the main checkout shows only the main checkout and any peers still running. ls ~/.herdr/worktrees/<repo>/ shows no directory for this slug (on 0.9 the checkout is named after the branch, spawn-<slug>; on 0.8 it was worktree-<adjective>-<noun>-<hex>); rmdir the parent if it is now empty, since worktree remove leaves it. herdr worktree list and herdr workspace list show no workspace for this spawn; worktree create also opens a workspace for the source checkout, which nothing else closes, so herdr workspace close <id> (positional, not --workspace) when the spawn opened one. Since 0.9 that close is refused with workspace_group_close_required while any worktree workspace of the repo is still open; --group closes the source and every linked worktree workspace at once but leaves their git checkouts on disk, so remove the checkouts first and close the source last.

With several peers, merge one at a time and rebase the next between merges: worktrees prevent write collisions, not merge collisions.

Sweep orphans

Run at the start of a spawn session, or whenever ~/.herdr/worktrees/ looks crowded:

for wt in ~/.herdr/worktrees/*/*/; do
  b=$(git -C "$wt" branch --show-current 2>/dev/null) || { echo "$wt: not a checkout"; continue; }
  main=$(git -C "$wt" worktree list --porcelain | head -1 | sed 's/^worktree //')
  echo "$wt  branch=$b  dirty=$(git -C "$wt" status --porcelain | wc -l | tr -d ' ')  unmerged=$(git -C "$main" log --oneline main..$b | wc -l | tr -d ' ')"
done

A checkout with dirty=0 and unmerged=0 is done: remove it (herdr worktree remove, or git worktree remove from the main checkout) and delete its branch. A checkout with dirty files or unmerged commits is not yours to delete; put it to the user with the branch name and the counts. A directory that is no longer a checkout at all (.git file pointing at a pruned worktree) is a leftover: git worktree prune in the main repo, then delete the directory. Finish with herdr worktree list and herdr workspace list so herdr's own records agree with git; empty per-repo directories under ~/.herdr/worktrees/ are leftovers of worktree remove and can be removed with rmdir.

Fallbacks — tmux, then claude --bg

tmux ($TMUX set): same brief, manual lifecycle.

git worktree add "../$(basename "$PWD")-spawn-$slug" -b "spawn/$slug"
pane=$(tmux split-window -P -F '#{pane_id}' -c "<WT_PATH>")   # or new-window -n "$slug"
tmux send-keys -t "$pane" 'claude' Enter
# wait for the REPL to draw, then:
tmux send-keys -t "$pane" 'Read .spawn/brief.md and begin.' Enter

Monitor with tmux capture-pane -p -t "$pane" | tail -30. There is no agent-state detection — the pane is your agent read, and the human is your blocked detector.

Plain terminal (neither): same worktree, no pane.

git worktree add "../$(basename "$PWD")-spawn-$slug" -b "spawn/$slug"
( cd <WT_PATH> && claude --bg --name "$slug" "Read .spawn/brief.md and begin." )

Manage with claude agents — coarser steering, same brief, same merge-back.

Gotchas

• agent prompt --wait from an idle agent demands an observed state change within 5000 ms or returns agent_prompt_stalled — and it matches states, not turns, so an already-working agent's current turn can satisfy it. Use the two-step wait idiom instead.
• agent wait (and agent prompt --wait) are indefinite without --timeout. Always bound them.
• A worktree sees only committed state. Uncommitted lead-side edits are invisible to the peer — commit first, or copy the file into the worktree, and name the baseline commit in the brief.
• A peer whose mode still prompts (e.g. manual, dontAsk, plain auto) sits blocked at its first permission prompt until someone answers. Attend its first minute, or pass the lead's own live mode (see Permissions above) so the peer starts already matched to what you're running.
• Forgot to pass a mode? The peer used Claude Code's configured default, not yours — check with herdr agent read <name> --lines 30 (grep for the mode string as above) and restart it with the right --permission-mode if the two diverge.
• agent prompt submits a turn; TUI dialogs need agent send-keys.
• A fresh peer's first state is blocked, on Claude Code's workspace-trust dialog, because the worktree path is new. On 0.9 agent start reports this as an error (agent_not_ready, exit 1) while the peer is running with launch_pending: true in agent list; treat that exit as the expected block, not a failed start. Clear it with agent send-keys "$slug" Down Enter; no --permission-mode skips it. For a few seconds after the dialog clears, agent wait returns the stale blocked record at once and agent prompt fails with agent_blocked; poll agent explain for state: idle before prompting. In auto permission mode the lead's own classifier may refuse agent send-keys, workspace close, and worktree remove --force; hand those to the user rather than retrying.
• wait can settle on done while a follow-up explain reports idle; done is transient. Judge from git, not from either word.
• worktree remove --workspace <id> succeeds without --force even while a peer is still running in the pane, and takes the agent and pane down silently. Check agent explain first.
• A peer starts on the user's default model and effort, not yours — pin with -- --model … --effort … when the tier matters (observed 2026-08-06: a Fable lead spawned a Sonnet-default peer).
• Lost an id → herdr worktree list, herdr agent list, herdr agent get <name>, herdr api snapshot.
• Reattaching after a restart. A peer's checkout survives a herdr or terminal restart; its pane and agent do not. herdr worktree open --cwd <REPO_ROOT> --path <WT_PATH> (or --branch spawn/<slug>) reopens the checkout as a workspace with a fresh root pane (the checkout must still exist; after worktree remove there is nothing to reopen); then herdr agent start again and prompt it to read .spawn/brief.md and continue from the last commit.
• HERDR_* variables exist only inside herdr — and spawned tabs inherit them, so peers can themselves spawn.
• The same branch cannot be checked out in two worktrees. Merge from the main checkout; delete the branch only after worktree remove.

Troubleshooting

• agent start times out — the pane was not at an interactive shell prompt, or the agent binary is not on PATH in that shell. herdr pane read <PANE_ID> to see what the pane shows; raise --timeout (default 30000, max 300000) for slow cold starts.
• worktree create fails — usually an existing branch of the same name (git branch --list 'spawn/*') or a repo state that cannot branch; create from a clean HEAD or pass --base.
• Socket errors on every herdr command — you are not inside herdr (HERDR_ENV unset) or the server restarted. Check herdr status, then fall back to tmux or claude --bg.

Notes

• The library's other cross-model calls (fable-advisor.sh, codex-peer.sh, the committee members) are deliberately isolated one-shots with session persistence off; a spawned peer is the opposite — persistent, steerable, resumable. Choose by whether the work needs a lifetime.
• A Codex peer is one flag: herdr agent start "$slug" --kind codex --pane <PANE_ID> — same brief; the contract is Codex's own from orchestrate. herdr detects 21 agent kinds, so the same move spawns other agents too. State detection for a kind depends on its integration hook being current (herdr integration status; install or update with herdr integration install <kind>), otherwise wait falls back to screen inference.
• Heritage: generalizes Matt Pocock's claude-handoff (MIT, mattpocock/skills) — handoff compacts one conversation into a document for one claude --bg successor; spawn adds environment detection, worktree isolation, directed contract briefs, and lifecycle management for N peers. See RECOMMENDED.md.
• Routed to by orchestrate routing row 8; standalone via /oss:spawn.
• Remote machines. herdr 0.9 aggregates SSH-reachable herdr servers into one client (herdr machine add <ssh-host> --label <name>; the remote needs herdr on its non-interactive PATH). The agent, worktree, and workspace CLI groups still address only the local server, so spawn peers stay on the machine the lead runs on; a remote machine is for viewing and driving long-running sessions from the sidebar, not for agent start.
• herdr surface verified 2026-08-06 by live run on herdr 0.7.5; re-verified 2026-09-02 by a live dry run on herdr 0.8.0 (protocol 19, Claude and Codex integration hooks v7), which added agent explain, agent get, worktree open, and integration; re-verified 2026-09-08 by a live dry run on herdr 0.9.0 (protocol 22, Claude hook v9, Codex hook v8) in an isolated named session. 0.9 changed four things recorded above: agent start exits 1 with agent_not_ready on the trust dialog, the agent record lags the screen after the dialog clears, checkouts are named spawn-<slug>, and closing a source workspace with open worktree workspaces requires workspace close --group. worktree create|open|remove|list also gained --trust-repository for repositories git refuses as untrusted, and create|open take --focus|--no-focus. The 0.8 dry run is what established the --cwd requirement, the trust-dialog block, and the explain output shape above. Flag names above match the 0.9.0 schema (worktree create: --branch --label --base --path --cwd --focus --no-focus --trust-repository; worktree remove: --workspace --force --trust-repository; agent start: --kind --pane --timeout; agent wait: --until --timeout; workspace close: <id> --group). The fold-back checklist and orphan sweep were written after a sweep found ten orphaned checkouts across three repos.