publish

name	publish
description	Publish a private guideline to a configured write-scope repo.

Publish a Guideline

Overview

Publish one or more private guidelines from .evolve/entities/guideline/ into a configured write-scope repo. The entity is stamped with visibility: public, owner, published_at, and source, moved into the local clone of the write repo, and committed / pushed to the remote.

The same local clone is also what /evolve-lite:sync pulls from — so you and anyone else publishing to the same repo stay in sync.

Workflow

Step 1: Require a write-scope repo

Read evolve.config.yaml. If no entry has scope: write, tell the user:

"You need at least one write-scope repo to publish to. Run /evolve-lite:subscribe with --scope write to set one up, then come back."

Then stop.

If identity.user is missing, ask for it and add it to the config.

Step 2: First-time setup

Ensure .evolve/ is gitignored at the project root:

grep -qxF '.evolve/' .gitignore 2>/dev/null || echo '.evolve/' >> .gitignore

Step 3: Pick the target write-scope repo

Filter repos: to entries with scope: write (Step 1 already aborted if there were zero, so at least one exists here).

• Exactly one entry → use it as default.
• Multiple entries → show a numbered list with notes and ask which to publish to.

Let {repo} be the chosen repo name and {branch} its configured branch (default main).

Step 4: List and select entities

List files in .evolve/entities/guideline/ and ask the user which to publish.

Step 5: Run publish script

For each selected file, run:

sh -lc 'real_home="$(python3 -c "import os,pwd; print(pwd.getpwuid(os.getuid()).pw_dir)")"; config_home="${CLAW_CONFIG_HOME:-$real_home/.claw}"; script=".claw/skills/evolve-lite:publish/scripts/publish.py"; [ -f "$script" ] || script="$config_home/skills/evolve-lite:publish/scripts/publish.py"; python3 "$script" --entity "{filename}" --repo "{repo}" --user "{identity.user}"'

Step 6: Commit and push

Build {names} as a comma-joined list of selected filenames, and {guideline_paths} as a space-joined list of the corresponding guideline/{filename} paths inside the clone (the files the publish script just wrote).

git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" add -- {guideline_paths}
git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" commit -m "[evolve] publish: {names}"
git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" push origin "{branch}"

On push success, continue to Step 7.

Step 6a: Recover from non-fast-forward rejection

If the push fails and stderr mentions rejected / non-fast-forward / fetch first, another writer pushed to {branch} in between. Rebase the local commit and push once more:

git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" fetch origin "{branch}"
git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" rebase "origin/{branch}"

• Rebase clean → retry git push origin "{branch}" once, then Step 7.

• Rebase conflicted → attempt to resolve, then hand off for user review. Do not git rebase --continue or git push without an explicit user confirmation.

  1. git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" status --porcelain lists the conflicted paths. If any are UD, DU, or binary, skip to the abort step — those aren't safe to auto-resolve.

  2. For each UU/AA file, read the conflict markers. During a rebase, <<<<<<< HEAD is the remote's version and the section under the commit sha is the publish change being replayed (opposite of a regular merge). Write an intent-preserving resolution; don't git add yet.

  3. Show the user the diff (git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" diff HEAD -- {file}) per resolved file with a one-line strategy summary, and ask whether to continue (stage + rebase --continue + push) or abort (roll back for manual resolution).

  4. On continue:

     git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" add {resolved-files}
     git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" rebase --continue
     git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" push origin "{branch}"
     

     Then Step 7. If rebase --continue surfaces a new conflict, loop from step 1.

  5. On abort — user declined, conflict isn't safely resolvable, or the proposed merge feels unsafe:

     git -C ".evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}" rebase --abort
     

     The local publish commit is preserved at .evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo} but not on the remote. Tell the user to either (a) resolve manually in that directory (git fetch origin {branch} && git rebase origin/{branch}, fix conflicts, git add + git rebase --continue, git push origin {branch}) or (b) re-run /evolve-lite:publish with a different filename if the conflict is a shared name.

If the push fails for any other reason (auth, network, missing remote ref), surface git's error and stop — rebase will not help.

Step 7: Confirm

Tell the user what was published and to which repo.

Notes

• Published entities are moved from .evolve/entities/guideline/ into the write-scope clone at .evolve/entities/subscribed/{repo}/guideline/, with visibility: public, owner: {user}, published_at, and source stamped in frontmatter
• The original private entity is deleted after successful publication
• All publish actions are logged to .evolve/audit.log