Ainb Fleet:fleet Needs

ainb fleet:fleet-needs — workflow-backed cockpit

The session "face" of the sensor-fusion hybrid. The deterministic brain is the hangar workflow (verb=needs); this skill renders its output and handles the irreducibly-interactive last mile (HUD + AskUserQuestion + routing).

fleet-needs vs needs — which skill?

This skill (fleet-needs) is the workflow-backed "Jarvis" cockpit. It runs the deterministic hangar workflow (verb=needs) for the batched discover→enrich→prioritize chain, and adds key-route ASK answering (presses the target's picker keys via tmux for an already-open AskUserQuestion). It requires the workflow gate CLAUDE_CODE_WORKFLOWS=1.

/ainb-fleet:needs is the plain control panel — prompt-driven, no gate, works everywhere. It is the canonical fallback: if the gate is off, this skill stops and hands off to needs (see Step 0).

Both read the same underlying ainb fleet needs data — same panel content, same materialized current_state source (below). The difference is purely the machinery: workflow-batched cockpit (here) vs plain prompt panel (needs).

SESSION (this skill) ──Workflow({name:'ainb-fleet:jarvis', args:{verb:'needs'}})──▶ brain
   render HUD ◀──{banner,cards,asks}──────────────────────────────────────────┘
   AskUserQuestion per ask  ──answer──▶  tmux send-keys (write leg)

Read/write split — architectural principle

Reads are hooks-primary: a Claude session's ASK/ERR/WAIT/IDLE is learned from the event-sourced current_state table (materialized per session, keyed by cwd), not by scraping panes. The pane/transcript scan is the fallback for sessions the hooks don't cover — chiefly non-Claude agents (Codex/Gemini fire no Claude hooks) and any session notifyd hasn't materialized (daemon down / hooks not installed). Each card carries a source ("hook" | "tmux") telling you which path produced it.

This skill does NOT install hooks. It consumes the materialized state. The global Claude Code hooks are installed by ainb fleet atc setup (into ~/.claude/settings.json).

All write routing below uses tmux first. Broker is a last resort, not the default. This matches the binary's default AINB_FLEET_TRANSPORT=tmux-first; set tmux-only to disable the broker fallback entirely, or peers to restore the legacy broker-first order.

Step 0 — gate check (fallback if workflows off)

[ -n "$CLAUDE_CODE_WORKFLOWS" ] && echo "gate on" || echo "gate off"

If gate off → stop and invoke /ainb-fleet:needs (the prompt-skill). The workflow path only works when CLAUDE_CODE_WORKFLOWS=1 is set.

Step 0.5 — choose the enrich locus (hybrid, token-efficient)

The Rust read already does the expensive part for free: each card carries enrich_key, an enriched string when a fresh cached suggestion exists, and need_enrich: true only when it has no cache entry. Decide how to draft the missing ones by COUNT — never one subagent per session.

out=$(ainb --format json fleet needs)            # 0 tokens — cards pre-attached
stale=$(echo "$out" | jq '[.[] | select(.need_enrich==true)] | length')

stale == 0  ─▶ render straight from $out          (0 tokens — all cached/--no-enrich)
stale ≤ 6   ─▶ draft inline in THIS session        (0 subagents)
stale  > 6  ─▶ run the jarvis workflow (Step 1)     (exactly 1 batched agent)

Cutoff is AINB_FLEET_ENRICH_INLINE_MAX (default 6).

Inline draft (≤6): for each need_enrich card, you draft the suggestion yourself (ASK → best option label; ERR → retry|skip|investigate; IDLE → resume|close; else empty) and persist it so the next read is free:

ainb fleet enrich-cache put --key "<card.enrich_key>" --suggestion "<text>"

Then render from $out, substituting your drafted suggestions. No workflow, no subagent. For stale == 0, skip drafting entirely.

0-token mode: ainb fleet needs --no-enrich (or AINB_FLEET_ENRICH=0) returns cards with no need_enrich flags — render cached suggestions only.

Step 1 — run the jarvis workflow with verb=needs (only when stale > 6)

hangar is the single multi-verb workflow under ainb-fleet. The needs verb runs the Discover ▸ Enrich ▸ Prioritize chain and returns the render-ready panel data. Other verbs (standup, sequence) are wired into the same workflow.

Workflow({ name: 'ainb-fleet:jarvis', args: { verb: 'needs' } })

It runs in background; wait for completion. The result is render-ready:

{ "banner": { "need", "err", "ask", "idle", "wait", "top": {session,kind} },
  "cards":  [ { "emoji", "kind", "session", "line", "enriched", "options?" } ],
  "asks":   [ { "question", "header", "options[{label,description}]",
               "multiSelect", "suggestion", "route": {target,hint} } ] }

Step 1.5 — handle a read failure

If the result has a non-empty error field, the fleet read genuinely failed (e.g. an API throttle that persisted across the workflow's retries) — this is NOT an empty fleet. Render the error, do not show "0 NEED YOU":

╔════════════════════════════════════╗
║  ⚠ FLEET READ FAILED               ║
║  <result.error>                     ║
║  retry in a moment                  ║
╚════════════════════════════════════╝

Then stop (offer to re-run). Only proceed to Step 2 when error is absent.

Step 2 — render the Jarvis HUD

From banner + cards, render this exact layout in chat:

╔════════════════════════════════════╗
║  ⚡ FLEET STATUS · N NEED YOU ⚡    ║
║  🔴 X err  🟡 Y ask  ⚪ Z idle      ║
║  top: <banner.top.session> (<KIND>) ║
╚════════════════════════════════════╝

▸ <emoji> <session> ─ <line>
    [suggest: <enriched>]
    ① <option>  ② <option>  ③ <option>      (ASK only)

Rules:

• Banner always present (0 → "0 NEED YOU", skip top line).
• One ▸ card per cards[] entry, in order (already priority-sorted).
• [suggest: …] line only when enriched is non-null.
• ASK cards show options as ① ② ③ ④ ⑤.
• Cap at 10 cards; if more, render 10 then + N more.

Step 3 — fire AskUserQuestion (batched ≤ 4)

asks[] are AskUserQuestion-ready. The tool caps at 4 questions per call — batch in groups of 4 (highest-priority first, asks[] is already sorted):

for batch of up to 4 asks:
  AskUserQuestion({ questions: batch.map(a => ({
    question: a.question, header: a.header,
    options: a.options, multiSelect: a.multiSelect })) })

When suggestion is set, mention it ("recommended: ") so Stevie can one-tap the drafted choice.

Step 4 — route answers back

Two routes, picked by ask kind:

4a — ASK kind → key-route (click the target's picker)

The target session already has its own AskUserQuestion picker open and is waiting for Down/Enter. Sending the answer as TEXT would land as a fresh user message the target then has to re-interpret. Worse, the broker-delivery path has a known gap. So for ASK answers, press the picker keys directly via tmux send-keys — the same UI keystrokes the human would use:

# idx = 0-based index of the option Stevie picked in asks[].options
# target = the ask's route.target (the target's tmux_session)
for _ in $(seq 1 "$idx"); do tmux send-keys -t "$target" Down; done
tmux send-keys -t "$target" Enter

The picker explicitly advertises Enter to select · Tab/Arrow keys to navigate in its footer — that's the contract.

Caveats:

• The picker must still be the active surface in the target pane. If the target moved on (Esc'd / scrolled away), arrow-Enter lands somewhere unintended. route.hint == 'broker' doesn't help — the underlying race is the same.
• Option ordering matters and is preserved by the workflow (the target's context.options[] is returned verbatim).

4b — ERR / IDLE / WAIT kinds → text-route via tmux send-keys

No picker on the target; the answer is a normal prompt. Per the read/write principle, prefer tmux directly — it lands reliably and is verifiable via capture-pane. Broker is fallback only.

# default: write via tmux, verify via capture-pane
tmux send-keys -t "$target" -l "<answer text>"
tmux send-keys -t "$target" Enter

# verify it landed in the pane (the matching read)
tmux capture-pane -t "$target" -p -S -40 | grep -F "<answer text>" && echo "✓"

Only when tmux_session is unknown (rare — bg jobs, dead tmux), fall back to:

ainb fleet broadcast "<answer>" --filter "<route.target>"   # broker — last resort

Verify the write landed (capture-pane is the matching read)

# the read leg that matches the write
tmux capture-pane -t "$target" -p -S -50 | grep -F "<answer>"
# slower confirmation: target's JSONL transcript records the user message
ls -t ~/.claude/projects/<cwd-slug>/*.jsonl | head -1 | xargs grep -F "<answer>"

Caveats

• AskUserQuestion is session-only — the workflow cannot fire it; that's why this skill exists. The workflow only produces the asks[] shape.
• Enrich cost — one Haiku agent per blocked session, unbounded. A 17-session fleet measured ~920k tokens / ~175s on a cold run; resume is ~0 tokens.
• Race window — a just-answered session may reappear once before its tail moves; always-fresh discover re-reads live each invocation.
• unknown session targets — sessions ainb can't name (bg jobs, dead tmux) surface with route.target: "unknown"; those can't auto-route — tell Stevie.