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Stop offering Drop findings as a separate action in /wrap-up #536

Description

@williamthorsen

Problem

The /wrap-up skill currently requires every finding in the inventory to be routed by an explicit action — either a ticket-creation action or a "Drop findings" action. From the skill (packages/agents/content/skills/wrap-up/SKILL.md):

There is no bare "skip" keyword for the findings pool: a finding is closed without a ticket only by selecting the "Drop findings" action, never by menu omission.

This was likely intended to make closure deliberate, but in practice it adds noise and breaks the "all" affordance:

  • Noise: the user must always look at the action menu and decide whether to drop. For most sessions, the user has already decided which findings warrant tickets when reading the inventory; the "Drop findings" action only adds ceremony.
  • Regression on "all": the menu's "all" reply is no longer usable when "Drop findings" is offered, because choosing "all" would create tickets and drop the same findings — a contradiction. The user is forced to enumerate IDs.
  • The agent now polices completeness: the skill says "If any finding is unrouted, surface the orphans by ID and ask the user to confirm." This pushes the agent into a meta-conversation about menu hygiene instead of executing the user's intent.

Context

Discovered during a /wrap-up invocation following an orchestrated /orchestrate-dev run for node-monorepo-tools ticket #375. The user explicitly noted this as a regression — the option adds noise and prevents the "all" reply from working.

Dropped findings are not currently captured in any other artifact: the run-summary, review artifacts, devlog, and created tickets all omit them. Without preservation in the deferred-findings artifact, dropped findings would live only in conversation scrollback — not durable. The refined design preserves this information without forcing menu-time ceremony.

Solution

Switch the contract from "explicit routing required" to "menu omission implies drop", and preserve dropped-finding visibility through reporting and artifact changes rather than through interactive prompts.

Skill changes (packages/agents/content/skills/wrap-up/SKILL.md)

  1. Remove the "Drop findings" action. Drop the row from the standard actions table, the "Dropping findings" explanatory paragraph, the "in particular, 'Drop findings'…" note in the rendering rules, and step 3 ("Drop findings") in the execution order list.

  2. Remove the orphan-routing rule. Delete the "Routing every finding" paragraph in response parsing. Findings not selected for a ticket-creation action are implicitly dropped.

  3. Remove the "drop X" free-form syntax. Update the "Mixed disposition" example in response parsing to no longer reference "drop S1". Drop the "There is no bare 'skip' keyword…" sentence. Menu omission is the only way to close a finding without a ticket.

  4. Simplify the inventory's instruction line. Replace the current "Reply with numbers, or adjust… To close a finding without a ticket, choose the 'Drop findings' action — there is no bare 'skip'; every finding listed must be routed by an explicit action." with simply: Reply with numbers, or 'all'.

  5. Loosen the deferred-findings "when to write" rule in Phase 4 step 1: write the artifact when ≥1 ticket was created OR ≥1 finding was dropped. Today the rule requires ≥1 ticket; the new rule ensures dropped-finding records persist even in sessions where everything was dropped.

  6. Add a ## Dropped section to the deferred-findings artifact body. Lists each dropped finding's ID and full description, so a future reader can evaluate whether to revisit any of them without conversation history.

  7. Consolidate Phase 4 step 2 report sections. Replace the separate ### Devlog and ### Deferred findings sections with a single ### Artifacts saved section listing both paths. Filename suffixes (_devlog.md, _deferred-findings.md) carry the type information.

  8. Show full descriptions in the report's ### Dropped section. Each dropped item lists its ID and description (mirroring the artifact's ## Dropped section).

Acceptance criteria

  • The "Drop findings" action is no longer offered in the action menu.
  • The action table, "Dropping findings" paragraph, rendering note, and execution-order step for "Drop findings" are removed from the skill.
  • The orphan-routing rule ("Routing every finding") is removed; findings not selected for ticketing are implicitly dropped without confirmation.
  • The "drop X" free-form syntax is removed from the response-parsing examples and the "no bare skip" sentence is dropped.
  • The inventory's instruction line reads Reply with numbers, or 'all'. (or equivalent simplification).
  • The deferred-findings artifact is written when ≥1 ticket was created or ≥1 finding was dropped (currently: only when ≥1 ticket was created).
  • The deferred-findings artifact body includes a ## Dropped section listing each dropped finding's ID and full description.
  • The Phase 4 results report uses a single ### Artifacts saved section in place of separate ### Devlog and ### Deferred findings sections.
  • The Phase 4 results report's ### Dropped section lists each dropped item's ID and full description (not IDs alone).
  • The cost-aware disposition reference (_data/ticket-creation-cost.md) and any other cross-references in the skill are reviewed for outdated mentions of "Drop findings" and updated accordingly.

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