proto-change

name	proto-change
description	Change source proto contracts through owners and never edit generated code directly.

proto-change

This skill records repository policy for Claude. Use repoctl as the authority for graph, ownership, affected analysis, task routing, and final hand-off verification, but keep repoctl out of the inner coding loop unless the graph or boundaries are changing.

When this fires

• The user changes .proto files, generated clients, API contracts, event schemas, or service package ownership.
• A generated file appears in the diff and it is unclear whether it should be regenerated or left untouched.
• A PR may break consumers of a foundation service or cross-language client.

Source of truth

The source contract lives under protos/ unless a project.yaml explicitly declares another proto source root. Generated code is consumer-local output and should not be edited to change behavior.

Workflow

1. Find owners and consumers:

   repoctl proto owners <package-or-path>
   repoctl proto consumers <package-or-path>
   

   If ownership is missing, update the owning project manifest before changing the contract.

2. Read the package context:

   • package name and versioning convention,
   • service and message consumers,
   • generated language targets,
   • backwards-compatibility rules in the owning project docs.

3. Edit source only:

   Change protos/** or the manifest-declared source root. Do not patch generated/, gen/, checked-in language clients, or build output as a substitute for changing the contract.

4. Preserve compatibility unless the user explicitly requests a breaking change:

   • Add fields instead of renaming or reusing numbers.
   • Reserve removed field numbers and names.
   • Keep package names stable.
   • Check JSON names and language-specific reserved words when adding public fields.

5. Run proto verification once at hand-off:

   repoctl proto check --base origin/main --head HEAD
   repoctl affected --base origin/main --head HEAD --tasks check,test
   

   Run repoctl proto check at hand-off and run affected analysis once to select consumer verification. Do not recompute affected after source-only proto fixes. If the repo has a declared generation task, run it through repoctl run for affected consumers.

Review checklist

• Owner and consumer lists are included in the PR summary.
• Breaking changes are explicit, justified, and routed to consumers.
• Generated output is either absent from the diff or produced by the repo's generation task.
• Affected app/framework/foundation tasks cover every consumer repoctl reports.

Hand-off

State the package changed, owners, consumers, compatibility impact, generation status, and commands run. If a consumer cannot be tested locally, name it as a residual risk.