journaling

name	journaling
description	Write structured session notes, retrospectives, and lessons learned. Triggers on "write a retro", "document what happened", "journal this session", "lessons learned", "what went wrong". NOT for technical documentation — use documentation.
allowed-tools	Read, Write, Glob, Grep

When to Use

• After a debugging session to capture what was learned
• Writing a retrospective on a completed feature or incident
• Documenting a production issue and its resolution
• Capturing lessons learned for the team
• Recording decision rationale for future reference

When NOT to Use

• Writing code documentation or READMEs — use documentation
• Creating implementation plans — use plan
• Tracking project status — use project-management

Instructions

1. Gather Context

Review the session or incident by checking:

• Recent git history: git log --oneline -20
• Changed files: git diff --stat HEAD~5
• Any error logs, test outputs, or debug reports from the session
• Plan files if working from a plan

2. Identify Key Events

Build a timeline of what happened:

• What was the initial goal or trigger?
• What approaches were tried?
• What worked and what did not?
• What was the root cause (if debugging)?
• What was the final resolution?

3. Extract Lessons

For each significant event, note:

• What was surprising or unexpected?
• What would be done differently next time?
• What patterns or anti-patterns were discovered?
• What tools or techniques proved useful?

4. Write the Journal Entry

Save to docs/journal/ or docs/retros/ (create the directory if needed). Use the filename format YYYY-MM-DD-topic.md.

Output

## [Retro/Journal]: [Topic]
**Date:** YYYY-MM-DD
**Duration:** [time spent]
**Participants:** [who was involved]

### Context
[What was being worked on and why]

### Timeline
1. [Event 1 — what happened]
2. [Event 2 — what was tried]
3. [Event 3 — resolution]

### What Went Well
- [Positive outcome or practice]

### What Went Wrong
- [Problem encountered and impact]

### Lessons Learned
- [Actionable insight for future work]

### Action Items
- [ ] [Specific follow-up task]

Keep entries concise and actionable. Focus on insights that help future work, not just a log of events.