Doc

Write or update the documentation the caller needs, grounded in the current repository and its accepted intent. A small explanation needs no interview, coverage ledger or separate report. Select only the mode relevant to the task.

Modes

Need	Scope and reference
Explain an API, command, code-map or architecture	Inspect its consumers and source; use code/API guidance or architecture guidance when useful.
Create or improve a README	Lead with the user's problem and a working first-use path; preserve useful depth. See README craft.
Audit or scaffold OSS documentation	Compare existing docs with the requested pack. Create missing files; revise existing files only within the authorized request. See OSS pack.
Initialize missing entry documents	Create only explicitly requested missing files; report existing paths as skipped. See setup examples.
Preserve a session for another context	Fill the handoff template and deliver it as described there.

These are optional task shapes, not successive phases. Detailed references supply techniques and formats; they do not add interviews, approval checkpoints, reports or files beyond the accepted request. Existing authorization to revise specified documents is sufficient.

Grounded writing

1. Identify the audience, question and existing document owner. Reuse accepted intent; ask only for missing content that materially changes the document.
2. Read the relevant declarations and verify them against code, configuration, command help or executable behavior. Use the caller's domain terminology. For a larger surface, retain enough source references to disclose what was inspected and what remains unknown; do not imply whole-repository coverage.
3. Make the smallest useful edit. Explain non-obvious rules, ordering and tradeoffs when they help the reader; a reference page need not manufacture a lesson. Preserve operator policy and history outside the authorized scope.
4. Check links, examples and the repository's applicable documentation build or validator. Remove empty claims and redundant prose; prose guidance can help when the requested output is substantial.
5. Return changed paths and check results, plus unresolved factual gaps. Write a separate report only when the caller requests one or an existing consumer requires it.

Missing-document setup

Create only the requested missing documents, such as PRODUCT.md, GOALS.md or AGENTS.md; a collision is skipped, not overwritten by setup. Verify the created paths and report created, skipped and failed writes. Setup does not install tools, run ao session bootstrap, initialize Git or trackers, start a runtime, add hooks, or infer a repository workflow. AgentOps verdict storage is created only on explicit request; see AgentOps internals.

Session handoff

A requested handoff records end-state facts another context can verify. Fill every field. Write unknown with the reason for any fact you did not observe; record a caller's unobserved claim as "stated, unverified", never as fact.

# Handoff: <goal, one line>
- Goal and acceptance: <accepted goal>; acceptance <met | not met | unknown>
- Done: <change or artifact> (<exact path, commit or command>) -> <observed result>
- Failed or withdrawn: <attempt> -> <observed failure or reason> | none
- Open: <unmet acceptance, findings, causal gaps> | none known
- Stop state: <native state and where it was read> | unknown
- Remaining allowance: <measured time, cost or turns left; helper use for the current incident when it matters> | unknown
- Identities: <repository and commit; runtime, session or context IDs and resume links as observed> | unknown
- Continuation: <caller-supplied next step> | none supplied

• IDs: record only observed identities. A remembered, approximate or reconstructed ID is unknown; at most quote it as the caller's unverified claim.
• Stop state: a note or report saying HOLD, paused or done is only a note. Read the state from its native owner (tracker, runtime, goal controller) or write unknown.
• Allowance: compaction, a new session or a handoff resets no budget, allowance or helper incident. Carry the measured remainder or unknown.
• Failures: keep informative failures and withdrawn claims so the next context does not repeat them.
• Sessions: do not assign a whole multi-work session to one task. Follow session associations for startup and resume links; end-state notes cannot replace missing startup evidence.

Destination. A new CDLC handoff, draft or proof goes only to the selected protected external non-Git destination; with none selected, report the missing routing and create no fallback file. For any other handoff a location the caller names wins: write there, read it back and return the exact path. With no named location, return the handoff in the response and create no file. Check source, recipient/model and destination authorization before copying metadata; an opaque locator grants no access. AgentOps evidence routing and the ao session handoff commands are in AgentOps internals.

Writing a handoff changes no tracker, Git, runtime or verdict state. The native caller keeps owning the authorized outcome; this mode does not select work or decide continuation for it.

Reference menu

Load these only for the document being written. They supply examples and techniques under the kernel's accepted scope, not additional workflow gates.

• Formats and examples: generation templates, project types.
• OSS scope: documentation tiers, OSS project types.
• Writing and checks: prose workmanship, validation techniques.
• Explicit context configuration: context routing.
• Behavior scenarios: documentation, README, OSS pack.
• AgentOps itself (vocabulary, evidence routing, handoff commands): AgentOps internals.