Wayfinder

A loose idea has arrived, too big for one agent session, and wrapped in fog: the way from here to the destination isn't visible yet. Wayfinding is about finding that way, not charging at the destination. This skill charts the way as a shared map on the repo's issue tracker, then works its decision tickets (questions whose resolution is a decision, not slices of a build to execute) one at a time until the route is clear.

Non-invasive operation

Do not require /setup-matt-pocock-skills or write configuration into the repository. At the start of each invocation, determine where this map should live from an explicit URL or the user's instruction. If no location is supplied, keep the map in chat for this session and ask where to persist it only when persistence becomes necessary. Never default to .scratch or any other project path.

Before creating or changing tracker items, show the exact map, ticket titles, relationships, labels, assignments, comments, and closures proposed for this invocation. External mutations require explicit approval of that proposal. Approval is limited to the named map and proposed operations; it does not authorize repository edits, branches, commits, pushes, pull requests, deployments, project settings, or unrelated tracker changes.

The destination varies per effort, and naming it is the first act of charting: it shapes every ticket. It might be a spec to hand off and iterate on, a decision to lock before planning starts, or a change made in place like a data-structure migration. The map is domain-agnostic: engineering work, course content, whatever fits the shape.

Plan, don't do

Wayfinder is planning by default: each ticket resolves a decision, and the map is done when the way is clear, with nothing left to decide before someone goes and does the thing. The pull to just do the work is usually the signal you've reached the edge of the map and it's time to hand off. An effort can override this in its Notes, carrying execution into the map itself, but absent that, produce decisions, not deliverables.

Refer by name

Every drafted or published map and ticket has a name: its title. In everything the human reads (narration, the map's Decisions-so-far), refer to it by that name, never by a bare id, number, or slug. A wall of #42, #43, #44 is illegible; names read at a glance. When published, the id and URL don't vanish; a name wraps its link, but they ride inside the name, never stand in for it.

The Map

While drafting, the map lives in chat. When the user explicitly approves publication, it becomes a single item on the confirmed issue tracker, optionally labelled wayfinder:map, with its tickets represented as child or linked issues where the tracker supports that relationship.

The map is an index, not a store. It lists the decisions made and points at the tickets that hold their detail; a decision lives in exactly one place, its ticket, so the map never restates it, only gists it and links.

Where the map, its child tickets, blocking, and frontier queries physically live is tracker-specific. Use the destination confirmed for the current invocation. If none is confirmed, maintain a read-only draft in chat. Never infer permission to create local files or external issues from the presence of a Git remote.

The map body

The whole map at low resolution, loaded once per session. Open tickets are not listed: they are open child issues, found by query.

## Destination

<what reaching the end of this map looks like: the spec, decision, or change this effort is finding its way to. One or two lines; every session orients to it before choosing a ticket.>

## Notes

<domain; skills every session should consult; standing preferences for this effort>

## Decisions so far

<!-- the index: one line per closed ticket, enough to judge relevance, then zoom the link for the detail the ticket holds -->

- [<closed ticket title>](link): <one-line gist of the answer>

## Not yet specified

<!-- see "Fog of war": in-scope fog you can't ticket yet; graduates as the frontier advances -->

## Out of scope

<!-- see "Out of scope": work ruled beyond the destination; closed, never graduates -->

Tickets

Each ticket is first a draft associated with the map. If publication is approved, create it as a child or linked issue where supported; the tracker's issue id then becomes its identity. Its body is the question, sized to one agent session:

## Question

<the decision or investigation this ticket resolves>

Each ticket carries a wayfinder:<type> label, one of research, prototype, grilling, task (see Ticket Types).

A session claims a ticket by assigning it to the dev driving the map, first, before any work, so concurrent sessions skip it. That assignee is the claim: an open, unassigned ticket is unclaimed.

Blocking uses the tracker's native dependency relationship: essential because it renders the frontier visually in the tracker's own UI, so the human sees what's takeable without opening the map. Only a tracker that lacks native blocking falls back to a body convention. A ticket is unblocked when every ticket blocking it is closed; the frontier is the open, unblocked, unclaimed children, the edge of the known.

The answer isn't part of the body; it's recorded on resolution (see Work through the map). Assets created while resolving a ticket are linked from the issue, not pasted in.

Ticket Types

Every ticket is either HITL (human in the loop, worked with a human who speaks for themselves) or AFK, driven by the agent alone. A HITL ticket only resolves through that live exchange; the agent never stands in for the human's side of it (a grilling agent that answers its own questions has broken this).

• Research (AFK): Reading documentation, third-party APIs, or local resources like knowledge bases to surface a fact a decision waits on. Resolved by a subagent that calls the Skill tool with "research". Use when knowledge outside the current working directory is required.
• Prototype (HITL): Raise the fidelity of the discussion by making a cheap, rough, concrete artifact to react to (an outline, a rough take, a stub, or UI/logic code) by calling the Skill tool with "prototype". Links the prototype as an asset. Use when "how should it look" or "how should it behave" is the key question.
• Grilling (HITL): Conversation. The default case. Always call the Skill tool twice, for "grilling" and "domain-modeling".
• Task (HITL or AFK): Manual work that must happen before a decision can be made: nothing to decide, prototype, or research, but the discussion is blocked until it's done. Any signup, provisioning, credential, data movement, or external-state change requires separate explicit approval before execution. Otherwise provide a precise checklist. Resolve the ticket only after the work is actually completed and the corresponding tracker mutation is approved.

Fog of war

The map is deliberately incomplete: don't chart what you can't yet see. Beyond the live tickets lies the fog of war: the dim view of decisions and investigations you can tell are coming but can't yet pin down, because they hang on questions still open. Resolving a ticket clears the fog ahead of it, graduating whatever's now specifiable into fresh tickets, one at a time, until the way to the destination is clear and no tickets remain.

The map's Not yet specified section is where that dim view is written down: the suspected question, the area to revisit later. It's the undiscovered frontier toward the destination: everything here is in scope, just not sharp enough to ticket. Write as loosely or as fully as the view allows; it doubles as a signpost for collaborators reading where the effort is headed.

Fog or ticket? The test is whether you can state the question precisely now, not whether you can answer it now.

• Ticket when the question is already sharp, even if it's blocked and you can't act on it yet.
• Not yet specified when you can't yet phrase it that sharply. Don't pre-slice the fog into ticket-sized pieces: it's coarser than a ticket, and one patch may graduate into several tickets, or none, once the frontier reaches it.

Not yet specified excludes what's already decided (Decisions so far), what's already a live ticket, and what's out of scope (the next section).

Out of scope

Fog only ever gathers toward the destination. The destination fixes the scope, so work beyond it is out of scope: it isn't fog, and it doesn't belong in Not yet specified. It gets its own Out of scope section on the map: work you've consciously ruled out of this effort. Scope, not sharpness, lands it here.

Out-of-scope work never graduates (the frontier stops at the destination), so it returns only if the destination is redrawn, and then as a fresh effort, not a resumption.

Ruling something out of scope is a scoping act, not a step on the route. When a ticket that already exists turns out to sit past the destination (mis-scoped in while charting, or exposed by a resolution), close it (a closed ticket is unambiguously off the frontier) and leave one line in the Out of scope section: the gist plus why it's out of scope, linking the closed ticket. It stays out of Decisions so far, which records the route actually walked; a scope boundary isn't a step on it.

Invocation

Two modes. Either way, never resolve more than one ticket per session, with the exception of research tickets.

Chart the map

User invokes with a loose idea.

1. Name the destination. Call the Skill tool twice, for "grilling" and "domain-modeling", to pin down what this map is finding its way to: the spec, decision, or change. The destination fixes the scope, so it's settled first.
2. Map the frontier. Grill again, breadth-first this time: fan out across the whole space rather than deep on any one thread, surfacing the open decisions and the first steps takeable now. If this surfaces no fog (the way to the destination is already clear, the whole journey small enough for one session), you don't need a map. Stop and ask the user how they'd like to proceed.
3. Draft the map: Destination and Notes filled in, Decisions-so-far empty, the fog sketched into Not yet specified.
4. Draft the tickets you can specify now and their blocking edges. Present the complete proposed tracker mutation and wait for explicit approval before creating anything.
5. Research without repository writes. For each approved research ticket, a subagent may use the research skill, returning findings in chat or at a separately approved output path. Do not create a branch or commit.
6. If publishing was approved, create only the approved map and tickets. Otherwise stop with the draft in chat.

Work through the map

User invokes with a map (URL or number). A ticket is optional: without one, you pick the next decision, not the user.

1. Load the map: the low-res view, not every ticket body.
2. Choose the ticket. If the user named one, use it. Otherwise take the first frontier ticket in order. Do not assign or claim it without explicit approval.
3. Resolve it. Zoom as needed: fetch the full body of any related or closed ticket on demand; call the Skill tool for whichever skills the ## Notes block names. If in doubt, call the Skill tool twice, for "grilling" and "domain-modeling".
4. Draft the resolution comment, closure, map update, and any assignment change. Apply them only after explicit approval.
5. Draft newly surfaced tickets and map changes. Do not create, update, close, delete, label, assign, or rewire tracker items until the user approves the exact operations.

The user may run unblocked tickets in parallel, so expect other sessions to be editing the tracker concurrently.