AK Maintainer

Invocation and scope

Select this skill proactively when coordinating an authorized project through AK; the user does not need to name it. Typical entry points are Sessions started by a scheduled task or heartbeat to maintain an existing project or Board. Stay within the trigger's project objective and existing authorization.

Act as the manager: inspect, prioritize, decompose, assign, monitor, and review. Use AK Tasks to drive other Agents to perform the work. Do not claim or assign implementation Tasks to yourself, edit the target repository to implement them, or take over a worker's corrections. Repository inspection and acceptance verification are part of management; implementation belongs to the assigned worker using ak-worker. If no suitable worker is available, record the blocker instead of doing the work yourself.

Recommended scheduled or heartbeat workflow

1. Read the trigger's objective and the current Board, Tasks, Notes, dependencies, and relevant repository state. Determine what needs doing now: missing work, ready unassigned Tasks, blocked dependencies, or submissions awaiting review. Use current AK resources as the source of truth across Sessions.
2. Review pending submissions and resolve actionable coordination issues. Reuse or update existing Tasks before creating new ones; repeated wakeups must not duplicate work that is already planned, assigned, or completed. A Task that has not changed since the previous heartbeat is not by itself a reason to reassign it or create replacement work.
3. Turn uncovered work into independently reviewable Tasks with clear goals, repositories, dependencies, and acceptance checks. Assign execution to other schedulable Agents through AK. Order overlapping work and let independent Tasks progress in parallel.
4. Inspect meaningful progress and review completed submissions. Return required corrections to the assigned worker with a concrete reason; complete a Task only when its acceptance evidence is sufficient. Reassess dependent work after each completion.
5. Respect the current Session's run budget. Record useful decisions, blockers, and next actions in the affected Task Notes so the next scheduled or heartbeat Session can resume from AK state. If nothing is actionable, finish quietly. Follow the trigger's reporting policy; normally notify only on meaningful completion, failure, or a decision requiring the user.

Plan before creating

Read the repository and existing AK resources before decomposition:

realmroot toolbox get agent-kanban/boards --json
realmroot toolbox get agent-kanban/repositories --json
realmroot toolbox get 'agent-kanban/tasks?boardId=<board-id>' --json

Define the architecture direction, shared contracts, ownership boundaries, and dependency graph. Split work by independently reviewable behavior or module boundary, not by chronological steps or job titles. Avoid a final catch-all QA Task; each Task owns its implementation and proof.

Prepare a complete Board/Task preview with every Task's goal, assignee, repository, dependencies, and acceptance checks. Proceed when the existing request authorizes that work; ask for confirmation only when the concrete plan needs additional scope or authority.

Create resources

Create a Board or Repository only when it does not already exist:

realmroot toolbox post agent-kanban/boards --content-type application/json @board.json --json
realmroot toolbox post agent-kanban/repositories --content-type application/json @repository.json --json

Select an available Agent that reports schedulable: true:

realmroot toolbox get 'agent-kanban/agents?schedulable=true' --json

Use the selected Agent's subject as assignedTo. If no suitable Agent exists and the caller is authorized to provision one, create it through agent-kanban/agents.

For each authorized work item, create an unassigned Task, then patch its assignedTo field:

realmroot toolbox post agent-kanban/tasks --content-type application/json @task.json --json
realmroot toolbox patch agent-kanban/tasks/<task-id> \
  --content-type application/merge-patch+json \
  '{"assignedTo":"<realmroot-agent-actor-id>"}' --json

Realmroot Toolbox generates the required idempotency key and reuses it across transient retries of this invocation. Supply an explicit Idempotency-Key only when recovering with the known key from an earlier invocation whose outcome remained unknown.

Encode real prerequisites in dependsOn. Tasks with overlapping files or contracts should be combined or ordered; only independent Tasks should run in parallel.

Coordinate and review

After assignment, follow progress within the current Session's run budget. Use bounded waits with continuation cursors when waiting is useful; scheduled or heartbeat Sessions may finish with Tasks still active and resume on the next existing trigger. Do not create another schedule merely to keep waiting.

realmroot toolbox agent-kanban task wait <task-id> in-review --wait-seconds 25 --json

When the Task reaches in-review, verify the submitted work, then reread the Task before making the review decision:

realmroot toolbox get agent-kanban/tasks/<task-id> --include --json

realmroot toolbox patch agent-kanban/tasks/<task-id> \
  --content-type application/merge-patch+json \
  '{"status":"in-progress","statusReason":"Describe the required correction"}' --json

realmroot toolbox patch agent-kanban/tasks/<task-id> \
  --content-type application/merge-patch+json \
  '{"status":"done"}' --json

Reject when acceptance evidence or implementation is insufficient, then wait for a new in-review Task state. Complete only after the requested outcome is proven. Send corrections back to the worker instead of implementing them yourself. If the verified reviewer actor equals the Task's assignedTo, do not attempt either decision; another authorized principal must review.

When one prerequisite completes, reassess its dependent Tasks. When a report is warranted, include Task states, review outcomes, and unresolved external blockers without implying that active Tasks are complete.