| name | faff-wtf |
| description | Where to focus — what shipped, what's stuck, what to work on next, and what an overnight beep-boop run parked. Trigger for: 'wtf' / 'what should I work on' / 'catch me up' / 'what happened' / 'what's blocked' / 'what's next', 'Where to focus', 'what's happening', 'where are we', 'where we at', 'whats up', 'the 411', 'lowdown'. |
Faff — WTF (Where To Focus)
Next steps: /faff-prep ISSUE-XX to prep an issue · /faff-graft ISSUE-XX to start building
Pull current state from your issue tracker and git, figure out what matters, tell you what to do.
Configuration
Load the gateway first. If faff/SKILL.md isn't in context this turn, Read it now — it holds the shared rules + fixed contracts faff applies. wtf displays the fixed automation-routing + spec-readiness contracts; it falls back to git-only mode if no tracker MCP is available.
Ordering is delegated. Anywhere this skill suggests, ranks, or recommends work (Coming Up, Today's Focus, Ready to pick up, build-queue independents, parked-overnight triage), it renders the order the configured methodology slot's pick-ordering returns (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation). /faff-wtf states no ordering of its own; the thematic default supplies priority + chainable unlock value when no methodology is set.
Reflect newly unlocked potential. When summarising recently completed work, explicitly call out what each shipped issue unblocked — issues whose blockers cleared in the last 24-48 hours and are now ready (or one step closer to ready). This belongs in "Recently Completed" alongside the ship list, and these unlocked issues are flagged as just-realised potential (annotated "just unlocked by …") so the human/automation notices them — where they land in "Coming Up" / "Today's Focus" / "Ready to pick up" is the methodology's pick-ordering call, not wtf's.
Always pull fresh
Every invocation re-fetches the whole picture live per the shared Always pull fresh rule (gateway): every milestone, every In Progress / Blocked / Recently Completed / Coming Up issue, every blocker link, status field, and recent-activity timestamp. A briefing built on a partial or cached fetch is silently wrong, and the human acts on it.
What it does
Rendering rules. Every issue surfaced in any section below uses the synthesis contract (gateway → Rendering → rendering_adaptor) — tracker ID + plain-English gloss + unlock-chain consequence when non-trivial. Build-queue and prep-queue sections render as the queue partition grid (rendering_adaptor slot, default faffidavit-rendering — form (c)). Cycles render as the cycle bracket / cycle box form. Structural diagnostics findings and calibration signals are pulled from the most recent .faff/logs/YYYY-MM-DD/HHMMSS-tidy*.md files; if none exists in the current pass, wtf runs the structural-diagnostics computation inline (same logic, same output location). When a methodology slot is configured, a ### Methodology findings section sits after ### Today's Focus (display convention: gateway → The methodology slot).
Two lanes, daily-driver first. Sections 1–7 are the L1 answer: what shipped, what's stuck, your parked loose ends, and the 2–3 things to do today, plus a backlog-health read (methodology, structural diagnostics, calibration) drawn from tidy's cache. One section, the automation preview (§5b), answers a different question: is it worth handing the queue to /faff-beep-boop? It renders after the focus answer and never displaces it.
Run through these sections in order:
1. Timeline Check
- Read tracker/project config from
.faffrc (tracking); milestones are always fetched live, never from config
- Always re-fetch milestones and their completeness live — never rely on cached snapshots or values written into
.faffrc. Source of truth is the tracker. Call whichever tracker MCP is configured (use its list-milestones equivalent — autodetect from the available MCP, don't hardcode) per project / workstream id to pull current milestone target dates and progress percentages.
- Calculate where we are relative to milestone target dates
- Flag if any milestone is at risk based on remaining work vs time
- Render one table per project with columns
Milestone | Target | Progress (see Output Format)
2. Issue Tracker State
- In Progress: Issues currently being worked on
- Blocked: Issues that are blocked and why
- Recently Completed: Issues closed since last briefing (last 24-48 hours). For each, list any issues it just unblocked (dependents whose last remaining blocker was this one). These newly-unlocked issues are the freshly-realised potential of the recent shipping.
- Coming Up: Next unstarted issues to surface, ordered per the configured methodology's
pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation). Issues unblocked in the last 24-48 hours are annotated as just-realised potential so they're easy to spot.
Query using the project/team details from .faffrc (tracking.project_id / tracking.team_key). Exclude cancelled and archived per the shared rule.
3. Git Activity
- Recent Commits: Last 24-48 hours of commits on active branches
- Open PRs: Any PRs awaiting review or merge
- Branch Status: Active feature branches and their state
- CI Status: Any failing builds or checks
4. Parked work (any source)
Surface every issue faff has parked — whether by an overnight /faff-beep-boop run or interactively (a manual /faff-prep / /faff-graft that hit low confidence, an unresolved punt the user chose to leave, or a build-time ambiguity). The manual user parks too (L1 prep, L2 build), and that work must resurface here — not only beep-boop's.
The faff-parked label is the spine of this section, not the run logs. Every park — autonomous or interactive — applies the faff-parked label per the shared Park / Unpark protocol (gateway), so the tracker query catches them all regardless of how they were parked:
- Tracker query for issues tagged
faff-parked (or the tracker's equivalent label) — the authoritative source; covers interactive and autonomous parks.
- The most-recently-modified
.faff/runs/*/summary.md (if any run logs exist) — used only to enrich autonomous parks with a log path. Pick by mtime, not name — run-id mint formats vary and are not load-bearing here. Use Bash(ls -t "$PWD/.faff/runs/" 2>/dev/null) to check for existence — do not use Glob, which silently misses dot-prefixed directories in some environments (e.g. Docker containers). A missing or unreadable run-log directory never suppresses this section — the label query still runs.
For each parked issue, surface:
- Issue id and title
- One-line cause summary pulled from the tracker park comment (or the log, when present)
- How to unpark it — re-run the relevant skill per the gateway Unpark protocol (re-
/faff-prep for a spec-level park, re-/faff-graft for a build-level park)
- Path to the full log in
.faff/runs/… when the park was autonomous
Skip this section entirely if there are no parked issues (no faff-parked-labelled issues and no parked items in run logs).
4b. On hold — awaiting human release
Surface every issue that is not automation-eligible and notable (gateway → Automation eligibility) — an explicitly-held ticket (faff-automation-hold), or an otherwise-ready ticket not yet cranked up with faff-automate under the opt-in default. (Do not list every unlabelled backlog ticket — under opt-in that's most of the backlog; scope to held + would-be-ready-but-not-cranked-up.) Distinct from Parked work above: parked = automation tried and stopped (auto-clearable when the blocker resolves); these are human-blocked pre-emptively, no auto-clear, changed only by a human. Keep them in separate sections so the two signals don't blur.
Render each issue with the shared On-hold-entry form — rendering_adaptor slot → Canonical visual forms → (f) On-hold entry (default faffidavit-rendering). That single shared form is the canonical definition; /faff-tidy §4a renders the same form, so the two stay DRY — do not re-specify the fields here. It carries, per issue: the grounded synthesis gloss, then the three release-decision signals (reversibility tier — coarse/advisory low-risk / higher-risk from the gateway side-effect-outside-PR taxonomy · standalone-ness — independent / blocks N / blocked by N from the relation graph · unlock value — unlocks N direct+transitive dependents), then the ineligibility reason + how to make it eligible (add faff-automate — or for a held ticket, remove faff-automation-hold — via /faff-jot ISSUE-XX crank up/crank down or interactive /faff-tidy). The signals are mechanical reads of state /faff-wtf already pulls fresh (the relation graph, the chainable-unlock metric — an objective graph fact). Order the section via the configured methodology's pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation) over these issues — /faff-wtf states no risk/unlock ordering of its own; the thematic default surfaces the best crank-up candidates first. These issues remain in all counts and read-views — they are not excluded the way cancelled/archived are. This section is read-only: /faff-wtf never changes eligibility. Skip the section if none.
5. Today's Focus
Based on the above, recommend 2-3 specific things to focus on today, selected and ordered per the configured methodology's pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation; the thematic default orders by priority → chainable unlock value):
- Never suggest cancelled or archived issues or projects as candidates (shared rule)
- Surface issues unblocked in the last 24-48 hours as freshly in play — recent shipping has just put them in reach (their order is the methodology's
pick-ordering call)
- Flag if something blocked needs attention first
- Note any dependencies that are about to unblock downstream work — call out the size of the chain that would open up
(The value-chains view — which ready issue ships the most downstream value if delegated — lives in the automation preview, §5b, not here. Today's Focus stays the L1 answer: a short, ordered list of what you pick up next.)
5a. Methodology findings (rendered only when a methodology skill is configured)
Request the standup-digest output from the configured methodology skill and render what it returns. The digest carries a WIP status, an optional sequencing diagnosis, and the top structural findings — the methodology decides their content; faff-wtf only places and trims them.
- WIP coupling. When the digest reports WIP at cap,
### Today's Focus recommends completion of in-flight only — no new starts. Below cap, allow up to the digest's remaining-headroom count of new starts.
- Highlight, not firehose. Render at most two structural findings here, ordered by the digest's severity. If more exist, end with "(more in
/faff-tidy)".
Skip the entire ### 5a subsection if no methodology skill is configured.
5b. Automation preview — is it worth firing /faff-beep-boop? (always render)
The L3 delegation view: which lever ships the most downstream value, and what an unattended run would pick up right now (computed per the Automation-routing verdict (fixed), gateway). It answers a different question from Today's Focus above and never displaces it. Always present — even with empty queues, render the headers with "(none)" so the human can see at a glance whether a run is worth kicking off.
Value chains to unlock (rendered when any ready issue has chainable unlock value ≥ 2). Surface the chains so you can see which lever ships the most downstream value. For each ready (or about-to-be-ready) issue that gates others, render the chain it opens, not just a count:
SHF-12 add auth-token service → unlocks SHF-18 → SHF-19 → SHF-23 (3 issues, all currently blocked only by SHF-12)
SHF-40 extract the billing client → unlocks SHF-41, SHF-42 (2 issues, parallel once SHF-40 ships)
Render the head issue (the one to build now), an arrow, then the transitive dependents in dependency order (a chain A → B → C) or as a flat set when they fan out in parallel. Note how many of the chain are blocked only by the head (would all become ready the moment it ships) versus still gated by other work. Order the chains via the configured methodology's pick-ordering over the chain heads (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation). Skip the block when nothing has unlock value ≥ 2 (an objective render-gate on a fact).
Crank-up-set proposals (read-only; rendered when a methodology slot answers crank-up-set). Request the crank-up-set output from the configured methodology (gateway → The methodology slot) — ranked batches of not-automation-eligible issues worth cranking up for the next unattended run. Render each as a card, beside the value-chains: the root via the On-hold-entry form and the slice via the value-chain arrow render (rendering_adaptor), adding per-member badges (would-build / would-need-prep / would-still-need-decision, from each member's faff next --if-eligible), the one-line hypothetical-verdict distribution, the stop-reason, and any deferred-with-reason members. This is strictly read-only — /faff-wtf never cranks up; the action is interactive /faff-tidy's batch crank-up. Omit the block when no methodology is configured, no items are not-eligible, or no root qualifies (degrades to the flat On-hold list, §4b).
Build queue (verdicts admitted: fire-and-forget + likely-fire). Renders as the queue partition grid (rendering_adaptor slot, default faffidavit-rendering — form (c)). Independents are ordered per the configured methodology's pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation). Collision groups are serialised within themselves and placed by their lead issue's position in that same pick-ordering.
Needs your call before automation can pick up. Renders the four non-admitted verdicts in this order: needs-decision-first, gap-blocked, circular-blocked, repeat-parked. Each issue carries the synthesis gloss + a one-line diagnosis (the Punt being asked, the named gap, the cycle visualised, or the repeat-park count and root-cause class). needs-decision-first has two causes — name which one in the diagnosis: a spec **Punt:** (show the decision being asked), or a retained confidence: medium rating (prep attached the spec for review rather than auto-building — show the rating explicitly and the area the spec was thin on). A medium-confidence spec with no open punt would otherwise render with an empty diagnosis; surfacing the rating is the whole point — it tells the human "give this a once-over" even when there's no single decision to make. Group needs-decision-first by the punt's (decides: <owner>) tag (gateway → Spec readiness → Punt ownership) so each reader sees their own decision queue: closed-vocab tokens (architecture, product, qa, security) alphabetically, then free-form handles alphabetically, then (unowned) last; within each group preserve the methodology pick-ordering. Untagged punts, any-tagged punts, and retained confidence: medium items fall into (unowned); an issue carrying multiple punts that span different owners repeats under each relevant group, showing the specific punt for that group. repeat-parked ⚠ is rendered prominently — pattern parks are the strongest signal the human needs to act.
Prep queue (drained by default /faff-beep-boop full pipeline). Backlog/pre-Todo issues unblocked (or blocked only by in-queue work), with no discoverable spec or a stale/superseded spec flagged by tidy. List as flat bullets — no conflict analysis needed at prep stage. Apply the synthesis contract for the gloss.
5c. Structural diagnostics (always render — at least the status line)
Read the most recent tidy log (.faff/logs/YYYY-MM-DD/HHMMSS-tidy.md) for backlog-diagnostics findings. If no tidy ran this pass, request the backlog-diagnostics output from the configured methodology skill (default faffter-noon-methodology-thematic). Render a one-line status if all clean (Structural diagnostics: clean ✓); otherwise render the findings in the format that output defines.
Repeat-parks, orphaned+repeat-parked, and chain-gap findings (any sub-type — sub-ticket / upstream / downstream / peer) additionally surface in ### Heads up so the user sees the urgent patterns prominently, not just in the diagnostics dump. Chain gaps are first-class Heads-up material: when a ticket's spec references work no ticket tracks, picking up the ticket leaves the broader purpose unfulfilled with no breadcrumb for what's next. Tag each Heads-up chain-gap entry with the sub-type so the human can scan-read.
5d. Calibration signals (rendered only when threshold crossed)
Read .faff/calibration/ summary (computed by tidy if it ran, otherwise inline) and surface any signals that crossed the threshold (≥4 events of the same root-cause class in the last 14 days). See gateway → Autonomous Mode Contract → Calibration log.
Each signal renders as a paragraph with the count, pattern, period, and three suggested next actions. Signals are advisory — the user decides whether to act.
Skip this section entirely if no signals crossed the threshold.
6. Risks and Flags
- Anything overdue or slipping
- Approaching milestone deadlines
- Items that have been in progress too long without movement
7. Ready to pick up (lightweight tidy)
Quick scan for backlog issues that are now unblocked, well-prepped, and ready to pick up. Order via the configured methodology's pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation) and mention the top 1-2 candidates. Issues unblocked within the last 24-48 hours by recent shipping are annotated as just-appeared leverage.
Chaining
All hand-offs are yes/no gates (or short-choice where a real branch exists). No passive "run /faff-*" language.
After presenting the output:
- Picked a focus item: "Picking up ISSUE-XX. Prep now via
/faff-prep? (y/n)" — on confirm, invoke the faff-prep skill via the Skill tool (resolve per gateway → Sibling-skill invocation). If the issue already has a spec, the gate becomes "Start building now via /faff-graft? (y/n)".
- Multiple picked: invoke the
faff-prep skill (or faff-graft if already prepped) via the Skill tool on the first; note the rest for later.
- "Done" reported by user: move the issue to Done (no further chain).
- "Blocked" reported by user: mark blocked, ask the blocking reason.
- "Reprep" or "update the spec": yes/no "Re-prep via
/faff-prep? (y/n)".
- Full groom: "Run a full groom via
/faff-tidy? (y/n)".
- Parked overnight issue: for each, offer three-way choice "open log / re-run
/faff-prep / leave parked (log/reprep/leave)". On log, print the log file contents. On reprep, invoke the faff-prep skill via the Skill tool. On leave, move on.
- Ready to pick up candidate: yes/no "Promote to Todo? (y/n)".
- Build queue non-empty: yes/no "Build queue has N issues (M independents, K collision groups), plus P prep candidates. Run
/faff-beep-boop (full pipeline — tidy + prep + build)? (y/n)". On confirm, invoke the faff-beep-boop skill via the Skill tool. On deny, move on.
- Prep queue non-empty with build queue empty: yes/no "Nothing ready to build, but N prep candidates. Run
/faff-beep-boop (default full pipeline) to drain the prep queue (will also build anything that lands at confidence: high)? (y/n)".
Keep the tracker in sync with reality. No one starts building without a spec.
Output Format
Tabular output follows the rendering_adaptor slot's table-vs-definition-list rule (gateway → Rendering → rendering_adaptor; default faffidavit-rendering).
Keep it concise and scannable. Use this structure:
(when a methodology skill is configured, the first line is)
Methodology: [skill-name]
(followed by the standard layout below)
## What's up — [date]
**[Y] days to [next milestone]**
### Milestones
Source of truth is the configured issue tracker. Snapshot below — re-query via the tracker MCP's list-milestones equivalent per project / workstream id for the live view.
#### [Project Name]
| Milestone | Target | Progress |
|-----------|--------|----------|
| [ID · Name] | YYYY-MM-DD | NN% |
(Repeat one table per project.)
### Shipped
- ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss for the shipped issue] · unlocked: ISSUE-AA, ISSUE-BB ([synthesis gloss for the unlocked issues])
### In progress
- ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss] — [brief status note]
### Blocked
- ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss] — blocked by [reason]
### Parked overnight
- ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss] — parked: [cause summary] (log: .faff/runs/…/ISSUE-XX/)
### Do this
Ordered by the configured methodology's `pick-ordering`. Items freshly unblocked by recent shipping are annotated as just-appeared leverage.
1. ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss + unlock-chain consequence in plain English]. (Priority source: issue/ancestor; "just unlocked by ISSUE-YY" if applicable.)
2. ISSUE-YY …
3. ISSUE-ZZ …
### Methodology findings (rendered only when a methodology skill is configured)
WIP at 2 (cap 3). Below cap — recommending one new start.
Sequencing: current order would ship value at week 6. Value-aware ordering (ISSUE-A → ISSUE-B first) would ship at week 3. ISSUE-X (currently first) creates no standalone value; ISSUE-A unlocks the same downstream and ships value itself.
Workstream "Bugs Q2" is activity-named — sequencing inside it has no shared outcome. Consider regrouping by user-facing change.
(more in /faff-tidy)
### Heads up
- Repeat-park ⚠: ISSUE-VV [gloss] — parked 4 runs same root cause; demoted to Backlog (decide via /faff-prep --refresh)
- Orphaned + repeat-parked ⚠: ISSUE-ZZ [gloss] — parent project cancelled; parked 3 times; is this still wanted?
- Chain gap ⚠ (sub-ticket): ISSUE-AA [gloss] — umbrella In Progress; spec enumerates 8 deliverables, 3 covered (2 PRs direct + 1 carved sub-ticket), 5 un-ticketed. No actionable next-step sub-ticket — /faff-graft can't advance it. (auto-carves the missing sub-tickets at default appetite; low appetite surfaces them to file.)
- Chain gap ⚠ (upstream): ISSUE-CC [gloss] — spec assumes "auth refresh has shipped" prereq, but no ticket exists for that work. (auto-files the prereq + blocker link at default appetite; low appetite offers "file gap issue".)
- Chain gap ⚠ (peer): ISSUE-EE [gloss] — spec references "consumer-side changes in billing-events service", no peer ticket in workstream. (auto-files the peer at default appetite; low appetite offers "file gap issue".)
- [Any risks, approaching deadlines, or flags]
### Automation preview — fire `/faff-beep-boop`?
**Value chains to unlock** (when any ready issue gates ≥ 2)
SHF-12 add auth-token service → unlocks SHF-18 → SHF-19 → SHF-23 (3, blocked only by SHF-12)
**Build queue** (4 ready · 2 fire-and-forget · 2 likely-fire serialised)
fire-and-forget
ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss] · unlocks 3 alerting tickets
ISSUE-YY [synthesis gloss]
likely-fire [ISSUE-A → ISSUE-B] (both touch src/auth/)
ISSUE-A [synthesis gloss]
ISSUE-B [synthesis gloss]
**Needs your call before automation can pick up:**
needs-decision-first
(architecture)
ISSUE-ZZ [synthesis gloss] — Punt in spec: [decision asked] (decide in N min)
(product)
ISSUE-PP [synthesis gloss] — Punt in spec: cron vs queue-driven send
(unowned)
ISSUE-YY [synthesis gloss] — Punt in spec: pino vs winston (no decides: tag)
ISSUE-QQ [synthesis gloss] — confidence: medium (spec thin on [area]); prep attached for review
gap-blocked
ISSUE-WW [synthesis gloss] — spec assumes [named gap]; [recommended fix]
circular-blocked
ISSUE-AA [synthesis gloss] — sits in cycle [AA → BB → CC → AA]; recommend [break-edge]
repeat-parked ⚠
ISSUE-VV [synthesis gloss] (parked N runs with same root cause: [class]). Decide.
**Prep queue** (N candidates, drained by default `/faff-beep-boop`)
- ISSUE-ZZ [synthesis gloss] — [no spec | stale spec | superseded spec]
(Render "(none)" under any empty subsection rather than omitting it.)
### Structural diagnostics
Structural diagnostics: clean ✓
(Or, when findings exist, render the full block in the format the methodology slot's `backlog-diagnostics` output defines.)
### Calibration signals
(Skipped when no signals threshold-crossed; otherwise render each signal as a paragraph.)
### Ready to pick up
- ISSUE-XX [synthesis gloss] — [why it's ready now; flag "(just unlocked by ISSUE-YY)" if applicable, "(unlocks N)" if it gates downstream work]
Skip any section that has nothing to report — except the automation preview (§5b), which is always rendered. If both queues are empty, write "Build queue: (none)" and "Prep queue: (none)" so the human can see the run would have no work.
Autonomous Mode
When invoked autonomously (by /faff-beep-boop), follow the shared autonomous contract (see the sibling faff/SKILL.md) and these specifics:
Output: a plain ready-queue list — issue id, title, readiness flag (ready or needs-prep). No focus recommendation, no "Do this", no "Heads up", no chat-style prose.
Return to caller (beep-boop): { ready: [...], needs_prep: [...], blocked: [...], verdicts: { fire_and_forget: [...], likely_fire: [...], needs_decision_first: [...], gap_blocked: [...], circular_blocked: [...], repeat_parked: [...] }, structural_diagnostics_findings: N, calibration_signals: N }.
No chaining gates in autonomous mode — beep-boop decides what to do with the queue. No remediation offers for parked issues either; triage is the human's job, not beep-boop's.
Log the query results and the returned lists to .faff/logs/YYYY-MM-DD/HHMMSS-wtf.md. This narrative HHMMSS-wtf.md write is subject to the gateway logging gate (skip the narrative write when logging: essential).
Notes
- Don't over-query — pull what's needed, synthesize, present
- If the project's ambient context (e.g.
CLAUDE.md) states working-pattern or scheduling preferences, respect them when timing recommendations — faff keeps no separate config channel for this; the human's stated preference is the source.
- Ordering everywhere is delegated to the configured methodology's
pick-ordering (gateway → Ordering & judgement delegation); /faff-wtf states no ordering of its own.
- Recent ships unlock latent potential — surface what each shipped issue unblocked and annotate just-unlocked issues; the methodology's
pick-ordering decides where they land
- Every surfaced issue uses the synthesis contract — plain-English gloss + unlock-chain consequence when non-trivial. Tracker IDs are breadcrumbs, not the load-bearing handle.
- Build-queue and prep-queue sections render as the queue partition grid per the visualisation contract — never as long prose lists.
- Structural diagnostics and calibration signals are pulled from the latest tidy log (or computed inline if tidy didn't run this pass). Repeat-parks, orphaned+repeat-parked, and chain gaps (any sub-type — sub-ticket / upstream / downstream / peer) always surface in
### Heads up, not just in the diagnostics dump — a chain gap means a focus pick on the ticket leaves the broader purpose unfulfilled with no breadcrumb for what's next, and the human needs that visible before picking it up.
- When a
methodology slot is configured, wtf adds a ### 5a. Methodology findings section after Today's Focus (display convention: gateway).
- WIP recommendations are human-facing only. Autonomous in-flight work (issues
/faff-beep-boop is currently building or has a PR open for) does not count against the human's WIP cap — the human reviews one PR at a time.
- The Methodology findings section is the highlight, not the firehose. At most two structural findings;
/faff-tidy surfaces the full set.
