| name | demerzel-halt |
| description | Pause every /auto-optimize loop across the GuitarAlchemist ecosystem (GA, ix, Demerzel, tars) by writing the cross-repo HALT-ALL marker per the contract in ga/docs/contracts/2026-05-16-overseer-halt-marker.contract.md. Use halt/resume/status subcommands. Implementation is scripts/demerzel_halt.py. |
/demerzel-halt
Operator skill for halting every autonomous loop in every sibling repo at once. Wraps scripts/demerzel_halt.py which writes ~/.demerzel/HALT-ALL per the cross-repo contract.
Subcommands
| Subcommand | What | Example |
|---|
halt | Write the marker. Required: --reason. Optional: --scope, --expires-at, --exempt-agents, --halted-by, --issue-ref. | python scripts/demerzel_halt.py halt --reason "Investigating cost burn" |
resume | Remove the marker. Archives the prior marker to ~/.demerzel/halts/<stamp>-resumed.json. | python scripts/demerzel_halt.py resume |
status | Report whether HALT-ALL is in effect. Honors expires_at. | python scripts/demerzel_halt.py status |
When to use
- A loop is producing unexpected output across multiple repos and you want one button to pause everything while you investigate
- Cloud-cost burn is climbing faster than expected
- You're cutting a release branch and want zero autonomous churn during the freeze
- An operator on another machine pushed something you need to investigate before agents react
Effect
Consumers (per-repo /auto-optimize Step 0, GA's Scripts/dev-process-overseer.ps1, ix's loop runner, tars's loop runner — as they each adopt the contract) read ~/.demerzel/HALT-ALL before every cycle. If present and valid:
- The cycle prints the halt reason and exits 0
- No commits, no PRs, no cost-bearing tool calls happen until the marker is removed
If the file is unreadable / missing / expired / the agent is in exempt_agents, consumers fall through to their per-repo state/.loop-halted killswitch.
Contract reference
Schema: ga/docs/contracts/overseer-halt-marker.schema.json
Doc: ga/docs/contracts/2026-05-16-overseer-halt-marker.contract.md
Operator runbook: ga/docs/runbooks/halt-resume.md
Time-limited halts
Use --expires-at to schedule an automatic unhalt:
python scripts/demerzel_halt.py halt \
--reason "Mobile release branch cut — freeze through Sunday" \
--expires-at 2026-05-19T00:00:00Z
Consumers check expires_at and treat the marker as absent after that time. No human intervention needed to lift the halt.
Exempting specific agents
Halt everyone EXCEPT one debugging session:
python scripts/demerzel_halt.py halt \
--reason "Debugging chatbot-qa loop in isolation" \
--exempt-agents auto-optimize/chatbot-qa-debug
The named agent ignores the marker; everyone else pauses.
What this skill does NOT do (yet)
- No HTTP / ACP endpoint — Demerzel does not currently ship an HTTP server. The CLI fills the role of the planned
POST /halt endpoint until the ACP server lands.
- No audit-log append — Phase 2 of the strategic plan adds
~/.demerzel/audit.jsonl with every halt event recorded. This skill will be updated to write that event when Phase 2 lands.
- No trust-score interaction — Phase 3.
Future phases
- Phase 2: every halt writes an audit event (
~/.demerzel/audit.jsonl).
- Phase 3: halts contributed by agents with low trust scores get a confirmation prompt.
- Phase 4: CI-side enforcement so a halted ecosystem can't accept auto-loop merges.
Tracked in ga/docs/plans/2026-05-16-arch-demerzel-overseer-extension-plan.md.
Related
ga/docs/contracts/2026-05-16-overseer-halt-marker.contract.md — the wire format this skill produces.ga/.claude/skills/auto-optimize/SKILL.md Step 0 — the canonical consumer.ga/docs/runbooks/halt-resume.md — operator one-pager covering both this Demerzel CLI and the hand-edit fallback for when this script is unavailable.ga/Scripts/dev-process-overseer.ps1 — per-repo policy engine that should also consult the marker (added in a follow-up).
