| name | tower-ask |
| description | Actually deliver a message to a human/group from a task terminal (the "send" half of unattended messaging). Use whenever the intent is to send/notify/tell/report something to a person or group — "send to X", "notify the backend group", "tell the boss", "report progress to X". tower-goal calls this internally. |
tower-ask — deliver a message to a human
Tower's ask_human / notify_human tools only record + park inside Tower; they never send anything out. To actually reach a person you must send first. For configured Hermes/OpenClaw channels, prefer Tower's push_to_human tool: it sends through the gateway first and only then records/parks.
When to use
Any time the intent is to get some content to a real person/group: "send X to the backend on-call group", "tell the boss…", "report progress to…". tower-goal pushing a blocker off-hours also goes through here.
Not this skill: writing to code/files, leaving a PR comment, terminal-internal actions — don't trigger.
Three steps
1. Pick the scope, then get ready-to-follow send instructions
Channels come in two classes — decide which this is:
| scope | when | behavior |
|---|
work | You're at the keyboard (working hours), the user explicitly tells you to send to a group/person to discuss ("send to Feishu group A… tell me the outcome") | Destination given by the instruction; after sending don't park, don't close the terminal — wait for the user to reply in the terminal |
unattended | You're away (tower-goal off-hours run), you need the owner to decide | Destination = the owner; if a reply is needed to continue, ask_human parks and waits for a bridge-injected reply |
Rule of thumb: user named a specific group/person → work; nobody named, you need the owner to decide → unattended.
Call list_notify_targets (always pass the current taskId = env TOWER_TASK_ID):
- User explicitly named a group/person → pass
scope: "work" (overrides the default).
- Nobody named, you just need the owner → omit
scope and let the tool derive it from the task's goal-mode flag: goal mode on (set_goal_mode was set) → unattended (reach the owner); otherwise → work. This keeps you correct even if your context was compacted and you forgot whether you're looping.
It reads the active channel of that scope from Tower's DB and returns assembled instructions — real gateway (OpenClaw / Hermes), downstream platform, destination guidance, the [[tower:task=<id>]] token filled with your taskId, and whether to park. Just do what instructions says.
If the active gateway is Hermes or OpenClaw, use:
push_to_human({ taskId, message, scope, to, expectReply })
It sends first, then records:
-
expectReply: true → ask_human + park.
-
expectReply: false → notify_human + keep working.
-
If it returns { noChannelConfigured: true } → don't pretend you sent it. For work, pass the group/person name from the user's request as to; for unattended, follow the instructions to tell the user to configure a channel under Settings → Notifications and mark it active, then stop.
2. Resolve the destination
The destination (group/person name) comes from the triggering context ("send to the backend on-call group"). For work, pass that name/id as to to push_to_human; Tower resolves exact ids, harness.destinations aliases, and gateway directory entries where available. If the gateway cannot resolve it, it will fail clearly.
Inbound Replies
When the bridge receives a platform message that contains or quotes [[tower:task=...]], call:
relay_channel_reply({ text, taskId, platform, chatId, platformMessageId, quotedText })
Pass platform and chatId whenever the bridge has them (for Feishu, chatId is usually oc_xxx). Pass the replied-to platform message id when available. Tower uses message id first, then chat id, to distinguish "this answers an unattended ask" from "this is a work-channel discussion reply", even when both messages belong to the same task.
3. Send per instructions, then record
Send via the gateway named in instructions; the body must contain the token verbatim. Only after the send succeeds, call a Tower tool to record:
- Need a reply to continue (decision / missing info / sign-off on a risky action) →
push_to_human(..., expectReply: true) sends + records + parks in the right order.
- Just a heads-up / progress / FYI, no reply needed →
push_to_human(..., expectReply: false) sends + records, no park, keep working.
Keep the recorded content the same as what you sent (the token may be omitted in the record) so the /harness panel shows "what was asked" accurately.
Hard rules
- Unattended (
unattended) messages start the body with 【task title】. The [[tower:task=id]] token is for machines, but when several goals run in parallel the human can't tell which task a WeChat message belongs to; the 【title】 prefix lets them tell at a glance and reply without crossing wires. list_notify_targets's instructions fills in the concrete title — just follow it. Work-scope group messages don't need it.
- Always send directly, no double-confirming. Once you recognize a "send to X" intent, send it — don't ask "should I send?".
- If the platform send fails, never call
ask_human (else the task parks but nobody got the message — dead forever). Retry, or leave the message in the /harness panel and stop.
- Order is fixed: send + confirm success → then
ask_human/notify_human. Those tools do not send. For Hermes/OpenClaw, push_to_human enforces this order.
- One pending ask per task at a time (
ask_human auto-cancels the previous OPEN ask); [[tower:task=<id>]] is the idempotency key.
One-line contract
Hermes/OpenClaw: push_to_human does send + record. The [[tower:task=<id>]] token is the portable attribution key.
