two-track-operation

slug	two-track-operation
name	Two-Track Operation
description	Maintain a Directed queue (CEO/team-assigned) and a Curiosity queue (self-seeded). Default 60% directed / 40% curiosity. Director never overrides Curiosity.
version	0.1.0
metadata	{"sources":[{"mode":"port-original","author":"Jannes Stubbemann","added_in":"0.1.0"}]}

Two-Track Operation

Port-original skill. Hand-authored for this Agent Company; not from upstream. Shared researcher core skill — referenced by every researcher agent.

When to fire

At the start of every planning cycle, immediately after hallway-traversal completes. This skill determines which item the researcher works on next. It is not advisory — running it is mandatory before any action is taken.

Inputs

• The agent's agents/<role>/queue.md file. Created on first use by the researcher themselves. Template:

  # <Role Name> Queue
  
  <!-- rolling-10-cycle-counter: directed=0 curiosity=0 -->
  
  ## Directed
  
  <!-- Items written by CEO (via intake-triage) or Director (via instigation-question as suggestion). -->
  <!-- Format: - [ ] YYYY-MM-DD | <description> | source: <hallway-entry or instigation file> -->
  
  ## Curiosity
  
  <!-- Items written ONLY by this researcher. No other agent may add to this section. -->
  <!-- Format: - [ ] YYYY-MM-DD | <description> | seed: <MISSION.md section or prior TM or Hallway entry> -->
  

• The current 10-cycle rolling counter embedded in the queue file's HTML comment on line 3. This tracks the balance between Directed and Curiosity cycles taken in the last ten cycles.

• MISSION.md — used when seeding the Curiosity queue from scratch.

Outputs

• One item selected from either ## Directed or ## Curiosity and marked with a pick date: - [x] YYYY-MM-DD | <description> | picked: YYYY-MM-DD.
• The 10-cycle rolling counter updated in the queue file.
• If the Curiosity queue was empty and needed seeding, one or more new Curiosity items appended under ## Curiosity.
• The selected action proceeds to execution.

Procedure

1. Read agents/<role>/queue.md in full. Note the current rolling 10-cycle counter values for directed and curiosity.

2. Apply the selection rule:

   • If ## Directed has unfinished items (- [ ]), the default is to pick the next Directed item in listed order.
   • Exception: if the rolling counter shows the curiosity ratio is currently below the configured threshold (default 40%; configurable under agents.<role>.metadata.curiosity_ratio in manifest.yaml), pick from ## Curiosity instead, regardless of what is in ## Directed. The curiosity ratio must be honored, not deferred indefinitely.
   • If ## Directed is empty, pick from ## Curiosity.
   • If both queues are empty, see step 3.

3. If both queues are empty: seed the Curiosity queue first. Read MISSION.md and identify one to three threads that the agent's archetype would naturally probe — questions that are plausibly on-mission but have not yet been assigned. Write these as new Curiosity items under ## Curiosity. Then pick the first one. Do not add items to ## Directed during this step; that section is for CEO and Director routing.

4. Mark the chosen item with the pick date and update the rolling 10-cycle counter in the HTML comment on line 3. The counter format is directed=N curiosity=M where N and M are counts within the last 10 cycles (values 0–10, always summing to ≤10).

5. Proceed to the action. The selected item is now the agent's current work item for this cycle.

Invariants

• agents/<role>/queue.md has both ## Directed and ## Curiosity sections. A queue file missing either section fails make check. Both sections must be present even if empty.

• Only the researcher agent has written to the ## Curiosity section. make check examines git log -p on the queue file and verifies that every diff to lines under ## Curiosity (between ## Curiosity and the next ## heading or EOF) carries the researcher's own author signature in git. Any diff to that section from another agent's author signature is a policy violation. The Curiosity section is writable only by the researcher.

• Default cycle balance is 60% Directed / 40% Curiosity. This is configurable per researcher in manifest.yaml under agents.<role>.metadata.curiosity_ratio (a float in [0.0, 1.0] representing the curiosity fraction). A curiosity_ratio of 0.4 is the default. The ratio is tracked via the rolling 10-cycle counter embedded in the queue file.

• Curiosity items can be promoted to Directed only with the researcher's own consent, captured as a one-line addendum in the queue file. The addendum format is: <!-- promoted to Directed: YYYY-MM-DD by <researcher-role> consent --> appended directly below the Curiosity item. A Curiosity item appearing under ## Directed without this addendum is a policy violation.

Anti-patterns

• "CEO writes to Curiosity to nudge a researcher." The CEO routes requests through intake-triage to ## Directed, or surfaces them to the Director as candidate instigation. The CEO never touches ## Curiosity. This is the most important protection in the two-track system.

• "Director writes to Curiosity in an instigation-question." Director instigation goes to ## Directed as a suggested item (not an assignment — the researcher may decline). It never goes to ## Curiosity. The instigation-question skill enforces this routing; this skill enforces the invariant on the receiving end.

• "Promote Curiosity to Directed without an explicit researcher-signed addendum line." Silent promotion — moving an item from ## Curiosity to ## Directed without the consent addendum — is indistinguishable from a policy violation and will be treated as one by make check.

• "Let the Directed queue drain entirely without filing a consult-request/ or escalating." An empty Directed queue is an operational signal, not a vacation. If the queue drains because all assigned work is complete, the researcher files a brief status note in the Hallway and surfaces the gap to the Director. Picking indefinitely from Curiosity without flagging the empty Directed queue is a communication failure.

• "Ignore the curiosity_ratio because nobody's watching." The rolling counter is in the queue file and make check reads it. The balance is enforced. Monotonically picking Directed items while the Curiosity ratio falls below threshold is a violation even if it happens one cycle at a time.