mwguerra/plugins-haiku/deep-work

deep-work — a state machine over run-state

A deep-work run is rows, not memory: a runs row plus one run_steps row per step in .taskmanager/taskmanager.db, with one brief file per step at .taskmanager/runs/<run-id>/step-<seq>-<name>.md. The window holds nothing; resume, crash recovery, and post-compaction pickup are all the same query. Store spec: docs/architecture/runtime-state.md (schema v5, v_next_step, checkpoint rules).

Entry conditions (counted, not felt)

Run deep-work when ANY row fires; no row fired → /implement handles it directly.

An audit / production-readiness ask is not deep-work — run deep-analysis.

The step machine

The plan step inserts the execute-<k> and synthesize rows and writes every brief; execution order is run_steps.seq, served by v_next_step.

Invariant rules (always in force)

1. One step per invocation. Read the step's phase file and its brief; execute;

checkpoint; only then query v_next_step again. Never read ahead to other steps; never load two phase files at once.

1. Every step opens with the re-orientation preamble (fixed text in each phase

file): the brief is the complete truth; read ONLY what its attention contract names; files win over memory.

1. Checkpoint order: artifacts to disk → the step's run_steps row

(status, artifacts_json, notes) → runs.current_step. The DB may lag disk, never lead it.

1. A failed step halts the run — v_next_step returns no row for it, by

construction. Never silently retry in the same window; a step retried ×2 across windows escalates per docs/architecture/escalation-ladder.md row 8.

1. Parallelism is decided at plan time by the wave table in phase-1 — counted

from the subtasks' file lists, never from a feel for "large enough".

1. The board lives in the store. Step notes go in run_steps.notes; anything

larger is a disk artifact listed in artifacts_json. No thoughts/ directory (retired — see skills/thoughts/SKILL.md).

Preflight

No .taskmanager/ → run taskmanager:init first. runs table absent (schema < v5) → stop and name the migration per docs/architecture/runtime-state.md (migrate-v4.2-to-v5.sh); never emulate the store with files.