| name | decision-capture |
| kstack | true |
| description | Capture the decision when a spike, prototype, or investigation concludes. Use when a prototype or spike wraps up, the user makes a go/no-go call after de-risking, or an investigation answers its question — prompts "what did you decide?" and writes the decision + rationale to the task tracker. |
Decision Capture
Record the outcome as a durable artifact — decision, rationale, and evidence links.
When to Run
- A prototype concludes — regardless of outcome (proceed, pivot, or kill)
- A planning spike answers (or fails to answer) its question
- The user makes a direction call after any de-risking work
- An investigation ends with "we're not doing this" — capturing the no prevents relitigating later
Workflow
1. Gather evidence context
Collect what exists before asking the user anything:
- Current branch and diff stats (
git branch --show-current, git diff --stat)
- Artifacts produced: mockup files (
scratchpad/mockups/*.mock.html), POC branches, benchmark results
- The original question — from the spike plan's frontmatter, the linked Kestral task, or session context
2. Prompt for the decision
Ask the user (use the AskQuestion tool where options are discrete):
- Decision — proceed / pivot / kill
- Rationale — why this direction, what trade-offs were accepted (1-2 sentences)
- Code disposition — keep the prototype code (promote the branch) or discard it
- Evidence — confirm which artifacts support the decision (pre-fill from step 1)
Don't interrogate — pre-fill everything inferable from context and ask only what's missing.
3. Write the decision to your task tracker
Record the decision on the linked task (see context.md for project-specific sync instructions):
- If a task exists for the spike/prototype → post a Decision Comment and update status (
done for proceed/kill with
no follow-up; keep open if work continues on the same task)
- If no task exists → create one from the prototype context, then post the Decision Comment
- Link artifacts: mockup file path, POC branch name, benchmark numbers
4. Route the outcome
- Proceed, large scope → offer the planning pipeline (full plan informed by the validated approach)
- Proceed, small scope → offer handoff-to-implementation
- Proceed, code kept → suggest promoting the prototype branch into the implementation pipeline
- Pivot → offer to re-frame the question and start another round
- Kill → close the task with the rationale documented; no further action
Rules
- Always capture, even for "kill" decisions — the absence of a path taken is valuable context
- Plain language: outcomes and trade-offs, not implementation details
- One Decision Comment per conclusion — don't duplicate if the decision was already posted (dedup check)
Project Context
Read context.md and apply it as additional project-specific constraints layered on top of this
workflow. If it does not exist, skip this section.
