Something is running and you are stuck waiting on it — CI checks on a PR you
just pushed, a deploy going out, a container image build, a slow migration or
a long reindex. This skill puts a watcher on the wait and spends the wait on
the next piece of work, instead of watching a spinner or calling `sleep`. Also
use it for a wait already in flight: "is the watcher running?", "did it
notify?", "if I close my laptop does the wait just evaporate?", "I want my
phone to buzz when it finishes or when it dies".
Invoke it on the wait alone. You do NOT need the PR number, the URL, the
branch, or the polling command first — locating the target is the skill's own
first step, not a precondition for loading it. Asking the user which PR /
which command / which watcher instead of invoking is the known failure mode
here, and it is never the right move.
Not for a wait nobody is waiting on any more — checks already landed, run
already finished, PR already merged, a red result handed to you cold to
debug. A failure your own watche
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name
p9
primitive
P9
category
orchestration
description
Something is running and you are stuck waiting on it — CI checks on a PR you
just pushed, a deploy going out, a container image build, a slow migration or
a long reindex. This skill puts a watcher on the wait and spends the wait on
the next piece of work, instead of watching a spinner or calling `sleep`. Also
use it for a wait already in flight: "is the watcher running?", "did it
notify?", "if I close my laptop does the wait just evaporate?", "I want my
phone to buzz when it finishes or when it dies".
Invoke it on the wait alone. You do NOT need the PR number, the URL, the
branch, or the polling command first — locating the target is the skill's own
first step, not a precondition for loading it. Asking the user which PR /
which command / which watcher instead of invoking is the known failure mode
here, and it is never the right move.
Not for a wait nobody is waiting on any more — checks already landed, run
already finished, PR already merged, a red result handed to you cold to
debug. A failure your own watcher reported is NOT that; it is still this
skill. And not for general advice about waiting — answer that directly.
when_to_use
Triggers on "watch the checks", "watch the deploy", "waiting on CI", "while
that runs", "let me know when it finishes", "notify me when", "buzz my
phone", "is the watcher running", "did it notify", "don't make me watch a
spinner", "productive wait", "p9" — and automatically after any `git push`
that opens or updates a PR.
P9 — Productive Wait (Wait-Optimizer Skill)
Cardinal rule
Never sleep on a blocking wait. Whether you're waiting on PR CI,
a push-triggered deploy, a long build, or an index sync — convert the
wait into productive work on the next priority. For PR CI, p9 watch <pr>
spawns the observer in the background and the agent pulls work from the
wait-queue. For non-PR waits, p9 wait-for <name> --cmd '<predicate>'
gives the wait the same lifecycle (state row, heartbeat, termination
report, re-arm). Sleep is a footgun — it burns clock time the agent could
be using to validate definitions, refresh the knowledge graph, or draft
the next slice.
When to invoke
Trigger
Action
git push opens or updates a PR
p9 watch <pr> --background immediately
run_in_background task notification fires for the watcher
Fresh session picking up after a kill/crash/reboot
p9 report to read state + next action; p9 rearm to re-arm dead watchers
A watcher/wait looks wedged
p9 stuck-scan — structured dump + notification
About to sleep
Don't. Pull from p9 wait-queue pop instead
Parallel agent sessions (BRO-1529)
P9 state lives in one shared dir (~/.config/broomva/p9/). Concurrent agents
stay collision-free by scoping every record to a session id.
Contract: each parallel agent session/worktree/wave-plan MUST export
BROOMVA_P9_SESSION=<stable-unique-id> before calling p9. Fanout (P5)
worktrees, bstack wave plans, and autonomous runs each set their own.
If unset, p9 falls back to a single persisted id () —
i.e. backward-compatible behavior, isolation. No env var ⇒
no parallel safety.
session-default.id
global
not
What the session id buys you:
Dimension
Behavior
Concurrency ceiling
max_concurrent_prs is counted per session, and over the scope ci_watch.max_concurrent_prs_scope names (repo, the default, or global). A session's own second watch in the same scope still blocks.
PR identity
Keyed by (repo, pr) — the same PR number in two repos never collides, in the state table and in the ceiling count.
Wait-queue
pop/list/clear default to the current session's view (its items + legacy-unowned). --all crosses sessions. This is what "context-scoped" finally means in code.
Watcher de-dup
A second p9 watch on a PR that already has a live watcher is refused (--force to supersede). A dead watcher is superseded automatically once aged, or now via --adopt.
Repo identity (BRO-1988)
Every lifecycle command (watch, merge-ready, merge-status, auto-merge,
abandon) resolves the repo once, before it reads state, and uses that one
answer for both the read key and the write key. Resolution order:
--repo OWNER/REPO
BROOMVA_P9_REPO — the deterministic hook for tests and for harnesses that
already know the target. - pins "no repo"; an empty value means unset
(shell convention), so export BROOMVA_P9_REPO=$(cmd_that_failed) degrades
to normal detection instead of silently dropping into repo-less state. A
value that does not reduce to OWNER/REPO gets a stderr notice.
gh repo view → git remote get-url origin from cwd (memoized per process).
The git fallback matters wherever gh is absent or unauthenticated (CI).
Any spelling normalizes to owner/name — https://host/o/r.git,
git@host:o/r.git, ssh://git@host/o/r.git, trailing slashes — and comparison
is case-insensitive, so one logical repo never splits into two keys. Host
parsing is generic, not a github.com allowlist: an allowlist made every repo on
a GHE/GitLab host collapse to a single key. The host is stripped rather than
keyed on, matching gh --repo (which takes a bare OWNER/REPO and gets its
host from GH_HOST).
Ceiling scope — ci_watch.max_concurrent_prs_scope: repo | global
(default repo). repo counts in-flight PRs per (session, repo); global
is the pre-BRO-1988 cross-repo count — one bounded merge train across every
repo, which is what the design spec describes. repo is the default because a
global count let an in-flight PR in one repo refuse p9 watch in an unrelated
one, and since watch is the only transition into GREEN that made the whole
lifecycle unreachable there. The tradeoff is real and is why the knob exists:
at max_concurrent_prs: 1 across N repos a session holds N watchers, and the
defer-into-wait-queue discipline stops firing cross-repo. Spec reconciliation
is tracked separately. With no resolvable repo the count falls back to global —
an ambiguous identity must not silently disable the ceiling.
Rows with no recorded repo. Rows written before repo stamping carry
repo: "", and p9 does not migrate them.
It keeps that key: "" is the row's true identity and a perfectly good one —
it collides with no real repo, so it can neither shadow one nor (under a
repo-scoped ceiling) hold its slot. current_pr_state(pr, "") still reaches
such a row, and reap / rearm still drain it. Nothing is discarded; p9
simply declines to invent the one thing it does not know.
Attributing them to the ambient repo was tried and reverted, because:
it put a gh repo view call on every state read;
it let p9 rearm re-watch the PR against the ambient repo — and omitting
--repo from the child argv does not help, because the child calls
resolve_repo(None) itself and, sharing cwd and env, resolves the same
value. The observed chain ended in gh pr merge on a PR nobody targeted;
and when the ambient repo genuinely had a PR of the same number, the guess
shadowed the real row — recreating the exact defect BRO-1988 fixes.
So a row with no recorded repo is folded and not re-armed. There is no
correct repo to re-arm against; that is the whole content of "no repo
recorded". Folding frees the concurrency slot, and recovery is an explicit
p9 watch <pr> --repo <owner/name> --adopt — a human naming the repo p9
could not.
Lifecycle / self-healing
p9 reap — reconcile dead-watcher rows (pid gone) to ABANDONED,
freeing the concurrency slot a crashed/closed session would otherwise hold
forever. --now ignores the grace window; --no-reconcile skips the gh
enrichment query. watch and status run a liveness-only reap as a cheap
preflight, so the ceiling self-heals without manual cleanup.
p9 watch <pr> --adopt — re-watch a PR whose prior watcher pid is gone
(orphan recovery after a session ends mid-watch).
Queue TTL — items are pruned once their PR reaches a terminal state, or
after BROOMVA_P9_QUEUE_TTL_DAYS (default 14).
p9 heal <pr> --apply — run the classified heal_command under
heal.lock (serialized workspace-wide, so a heal in a parallel session can't
race on shared codegen/cache). Auto-classifiable failures only; --dry-run
prints the command. --classify stays read-only.
Wait-time work selection (priority order)
When the watcher is running, drain work from these sources in priority order
(higher = pulled first):
session — TODOs already on the agent's TaskList tagged wait_ok=true.
memory — items from ~/.claude/.../memory/MEMORY.md flagged "needs
follow-up" within the last 24h.
graph — knowledge-graph entities adjacent to files-touched-in-PR
(BFS depth 1 via bookkeeping.py query).
docs — cross-refs from the current PR's diff (mentioned files not
yet updated).
linear — tickets in the current cycle, label-matched to PR's Linear ID.
Isolation tier (per spec §5.5)
Each pop returns the inferred isolation tier:
Work type
Tier
Where it happens
research, docs, knowledge-graph mutations, Linear updates
1. p9 status --pr <n> --json
2. parse `to_state`:
- GREEN → p9 merge-ready <n>; defer to control metalayer
- RED_CLASSIFIED → p9 heal <n> --classify; if classified+evaluator-positive,
apply heal_command (in PR scope only); push amend; loop
- RED_UNCLASSIFIED, ESCALATED → notify user via Linear ticket; stop healing,
keep watcher alive in case human pushes a fix
- ABANDONED → surface failure to user; remove watcher; skip cleanup
The watcher exit code is necessary-not-sufficient (BRO-1489)
GREEN only means gh pr checks --watch exited 0 — which it does on a subset
of checks (required-only) and before async bot reviews (CodeRabbit) settle.
Observed three times on bstack PR #78: exit 0 while the PR was UNSTABLE / had a
pending review.
p9 merge-ready therefore verifies the real merge predicate before marking
MERGE_READY: it queries gh pr view --json mergeable,mergeStateStatus,reviewDecision
plus a best-effort gh api graphql unresolved-thread count, and is ready iff
mergeStateStatus ∈ {CLEAN, UNSTABLE} with no CHANGES_REQUESTED and zero
unresolved review threads. BLOCKED/DIRTY/BEHIND/DRAFT/UNKNOWN, an open
thread, or any gh error → refused (fail-safe). Pass --no-verify to skip
(test/offline only).
Query it directly without transitioning state:
p9 merge-status <n> [--json] # exit 0 iff merge-ready; prints the verdict + reason
evaluator returned stalled=true for two consecutive cycles
user interrupt (Ctrl-C in terminal, or chat message)
session ends (the Stop hook leaves watchers running for next session pickup)
Examples
Example 1 — Green on first try (happy path)
$ git push origin feat/my-change
$ gh pr create ... ; PR=42
$ p9 watch $PR --background
watcher_id=ab12cd34ef56 pid=78901 pr=42 repo=broomva/workspace
# Run watcher in foreground/background; meanwhile drain queue
$ p9 wait-queue pop
{"id": "...", "source": "graph", "item": "verify entities adjacent to ...", "isolation_tier": "none"}
# ... agent does the work ...# bg task notification fires; check terminal state
$ p9 status --pr 42 --json
{"open_prs": [{"pr": 42, "to_state": "GREEN", ...}]}
$ p9 merge-ready 42
PR #42 marked MERGE_READY (control metalayer authorizes merge)# control-gate-hook authorizes; agent runs `gh pr merge`
Example 2 — Lint-failure self-heal
$ p9 status --pr 42 --json
{"open_prs": [{"pr": 42, "to_state": "RED_CLASSIFIED", "attempt": 0}]}
$ p9 heal 42 --classify
{"failure_type": "lint", "classified": true, "confidence": 0.8, "heal_command": "bun run lint:fix", "rationale": "matched lint at confidence 0.80"}
# agent runs heal_command, scoped to PR diff files
$ bun run lint:fix
$ git commit -am "fix(lint): heal CI"
$ git push --force-with-lease # only if existing P6 policy permits
$ p9 watch 42 --background # new WATCHING cycle; attempt=1
Example 3 — Unclassified-failure escalation
$ p9 heal 42 --classify
{"failure_type": "unclassified", "classified": false, "confidence": 0.0, "heal_command": null, "rationale": "no rubric pattern matched"}
# Agent does NOT attempt to heal. Creates a Linear ticket via MCP:# title: "[P9 ESCALATION] PR #42: feat/my-change"# body: failure signature + log excerpt# label: ci-heal-escalation# Watcher stays running — if a human pushes a fix, watcher resumes and# the next green check transitions to MERGE_READY.
Background-work visibility (BRO-1701)
Termination invariant (hard rule)
On watcher termination — success, failure, OR kill — P9 always reports
state + next action. Killed watchers must not die silently.
Every exit path of p9 watch and p9 wait-for (green, red, timeout,
SIGTERM/SIGINT/SIGHUP, unexpected exception) folds a state event, prints a
P9-TERMINATION-REPORT {json} line to stderr (stdout stays
machine-parseable), and pushes through the notify channels. The report
carries state, cause, and a concrete next_action (e.g. ABANDONED →
"re-arm: p9 watch --adopt"). SIGKILL and machine death can't be
trapped — that path is covered by p9 reap (emits the same report shape
when it reconciles a dead row) and p9 rearm.
Read-side: p9 report [--pr <n>] [--json] renders the latest report for
every tracked watcher/wait — this is what a fresh session (or the Tier-1 #1
post-notification reconcile rule) consumes to learn what happened and what
to do next. Report fields are additive-only.
gh pr checks --watch output now lands in $P9_HOME/logs/watch-<id>.log
(not the void): the log's mtime is a progress signal for stuck-scan and
its tail rides along in reports — full details to understand why, not
just that, something died.
Notify channels (push-to-phone)
p9 notify <title> [--body ...] and every termination/stuck event fan out
to channels in $P9_HOME/notify.json:
ntfy — reaches a phone with zero infra (install the ntfy app,
subscribe to the topic). Quick-config without a file:
export BROOMVA_P9_NTFY_TOPIC=<topic>.
webhook — generic JSON POST ({title, body, payload}).
command — JSON on stdin to any hook script; this is the seam for
Omnara, Telegram, Discord, or claude-remote-sessions relays.
Escalation-class events (termination:escalated, stuck, and any kind
containing escalat) additionally fire the policy's
ci_heal.escalation_channel.notify_hook (previously dead config — now
invoked).
Delivery is best-effort and per-channel isolated: a failing channel is
recorded and skipped, never raised — a notification must never take down
the watcher it reports on. Every attempt (even with zero channels) appends
an audit row to $P9_HOME/notify.jsonl; that audit floor is what makes the
termination invariant verifiable after the fact.
In-session protocol (PushNotification/Omnara): when an agent session
receives a termination report or stuck dump while the user is off-terminal,
it MUST surface it through the harness PushNotification tool (or the
Omnara session surface) — the file-level channels cover the no-session
case; the harness tool covers the live-session case.
Polls the predicate command until exit 0 (SUCCEEDED), deadline
(TIMED_OUT), first-poll exit 126/127 (FAILED fast), or signal
(KILLED) — each terminal state folds + reports + notifies exactly like a
PR watch. State lives in $P9_HOME/waits.jsonl (its own stream — PR-state
consumers never see wait states); every poll touches a heartbeat file that
stuck-scan reads. Presets are convenience templates over --cmd —
deploy-CLI output shapes drift, so verify against your installed CLI and
fall back to an explicit --cmd when they do.
Re-arm after kill — p9 rearm
p9 rearm [--dry-run] [--now] scans for dead-but-unfinished work: PR rows
whose watcher pid is gone re-enter via a detached p9 watch --adopt; dead
waits are folded ABANDONED and re-spawned from their recorded argv (with
rearmed_from lineage). This closes the loop the July-1 leverage audit
flagged: watchers killed before their notification fires now leave a
report AND come back.
Stuck-detector — p9 stuck-scan
p9 stuck-scan [--threshold-min N] [--json] flags live watchers/waits
with no progress (state event / watch-log mtime / heartbeat) inside the
threshold (default 45 min, env BROOMVA_P9_STUCK_MIN): structured failure
dump (pid, ages, log tail, next action) + notification, deduped to one per
stall episode (--renotify overrides; a new episode starts when progress
moves). Dead pids are reap/rearm territory, not stuck. Exit code 1 when
anything is stuck — wire it into cron/governor loops as a cheap probe.
Cardinal invariant (hard rule)
P9 never silently drops state. Every failure produces (a) a
state.jsonl event, (b) a Linear ticket, or (c) both. If P9 cannot
write to state.jsonl AND cannot reach Linear, it crashes loudly
(exit 99) — degraded silent operation is forbidden.
