archive-project

Imported from mikestopcontinues/agent-skills (claude/skills/archive-project/SKILL.md). Install upstream with npx skills add mikestopcontinues/agent-skills --skill archive-project. Copyright stays with the author.

Archive a project. Condenses one docs/xNNN-<name>/ to a single archived README that summarizes what was done, what decisions were made, and what follow-up was surfaced. Promoted decisions move to top-level docs/decisions/; promoted follow-up moves to docs/notes/. Inbound cross-references across docs/ are rewritten. The condensed README is validated via single-pass /validate-doc before any source content is deleted. Archive lands as one atomic git commit; recovery is git revert of that commit.

When to Use

• Captain explicitly requests archive of a project (/archive-project xNNN-name)
• Captain has decided the project's work is done and the workspace is ready to be condensed

When NOT to Use

• Project is still in flight (active spike, in-progress plan, open decisions) — finish the work first
• Captain wants to delete a project outright with no historical record — git rm and a normal commit; archive-project produces a condensed README, not a removal
• Re-running on an already-archived project — archive is irreversible via this skill; restart by git revert first

Inputs

• project (required) — the project id (xNNN-name) or an absolute path to its directory under docs/. The project must exist and must not already be status: archived.

Tools

Read, Edit, Write, Glob, Grep, Bash, Dispatch

Hard rules

• Never delete source content before step 6 validation passes and the captain confirms (the corrected step ordering — the prior body skeleton inverted these and is the documented bug this skill fixes).
• Promotion requires per-decision captain approval. Walk decisions one at a time; do not batch-promote, do not infer "looks important".
• Atomic commit only. Every artifact this skill touches lands in one git commit at the end. If any step fails, leave the working tree dirty and surface the failure — do not partial-commit.
• No anchors in rewritten links (per the project-organization decision on file-level cross-references). All rewritten links are file-level only.

Process

1. Pre-flight: link check

Run the link-checking pre-commit script:

${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/doc-check-links.sh

If the script exits non-zero, abort the whole archive operation and surface the broken-link list to the captain. No destructive (or even non-destructive) work runs until the link graph is clean. Re-invoke the skill after the captain has fixed the broken refs.

2. Promote important long-term decisions

Walk <project>/decisions/d*.md, oldest to newest. For each decision:

1. Read the file. Summarize: question, decision, scope (project-internal vs cross-cutting).
2. Brief the captain with the summary. Ask: promote to top-level docs/decisions/, or summarize-only into the condensed README?
3. If promote: invoke /create-decision --global <name> style flow (or directly scaffold via ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/yolo new decision --global <name>). The promoted file gets the next-available top-level dNN- and preserves the original-name slug (e.g., x000-yolo-project/decisions/d03-canonical-format.md → docs/decisions/d12-canonical-format.md if d11 was the latest). Copy the body verbatim; preserve the frontmatter status and any supersedes. Do not edit the body during promotion.
4. Record in the in-memory promotion mapping table: <old-path> → <new-path> for promoted, <old-path> → README#summary for summarize-only.

The mapping table feeds steps 4 (rewrite) and 5 (README composition).

Example mapping table shape:

3. Move follow-up work

Walk <project>/notes/*.md and <project>/tasks.md unchecked rows. For each item:

1. Brief the captain with the item's text and origin.
2. Ask: move to docs/notes/<topic>.md, or drop as no-longer-relevant?
3. If move: scaffold via ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/yolo new note --global <name> and write the item's body. If multiple project notes belong together, ask the captain whether to consolidate into one docs/notes/<topic>.md or keep separate.
4. Append to the same promotion mapping table from step 2: <old-path> → <new-path> for moved, <old-path> → (dropped) for no-longer-relevant.

4. Rewrite cross-references

Scope: every Markdown file under docs/. Specifically:

• docs/conventions/ — convention files
• docs/decisions/ — top-level decisions
• docs/notes/ — top-level notes
• Every other docs/xNNN-*/ project (their READMEs, tasks, decisions, notes, spike/plan chapters)

For each file, scan for two reference shapes:

1. Markdown link syntax: ](<path>) where <path> matches an entry in the promotion mapping table's "old path" column.
2. Frontmatter source: fields: top-of-file YAML frontmatter keys named source: whose value matches an "old path" entry.

Rewrite each match per the mapping table. Do not match bare path mentions in prose (e.g., a paragraph mentioning "see xNNN-foo/decisions/d01-bar.md for context" without link syntax) — those are commentary, not links, and rewriting them would corrupt prose.

Build an "orphan" report: any reference whose path begins with the project's prefix (docs/xNNN-name/) but matches no mapping entry. Surface the orphan list to the captain before proceeding to step 5. The captain decides per orphan: rewrite to the condensed README, rewrite to a different target, or leave as-is.

5. Stage the condensed README

Write docs/<project>/README.md (overwriting the existing project README) with this structure:

---
status: archived
---

# <project name>

<one-paragraph summary of what the project did>

## Decisions

<promotion mapping table from steps 2 & 3>

### Decisions promoted to docs/decisions/

- [<name>](../decisions/dNN-<name>.md) — <one-line summary>
- ...

### Decisions summarized here (not promoted)

- **<question>** — <captain's answer, one or two sentences>
- ...

## Follow-up

### Moved to docs/notes/

- [<topic>](../notes/<topic>.md) — <one-line summary>
- ...

### Dropped as no-longer-relevant

- <item> — <why dropped>
- ...

## History

Full chapter content lives in git history. The project directory
formerly contained: <enumerate spike/plan dirs and their chapter count>.

Critical: at the end of step 5 the working tree contains the new condensed README plus all the original source files (tasks.md, decisions/, notes/, spike/plan directories). The captain will validate the condensed README against those originals in step 6. Do not delete anything yet.

6. Validate the staged README

Invoke /validate-doc against the staged condensed README:

• artifact path: docs/<project>/README.md
• focus list: [comprehensiveness, clarity] (the archive-project baseline; lifecycle skills may extend per project — e.g., add accuracy if cross-cutting decisions were promoted)
• iteration: 1
• review directory: docs/<project>/

Wait for /validate-doc to return its summary. For each rNN- file the dispatcher landed:

1. Triage findings via /triage-feedback.
2. Per cluster routed to act: invoke /revise-doc on the condensed README to apply the fix.
3. Per cluster routed to surface: present to the captain as a blocking question. Wait for captain direction.
4. Per cluster routed to lock-decisions: invoke /lock-decisions for the captain to lock; new decisions land in docs/decisions/ (not the project — the project is archiving).

This is a single-pass validate-loop (per the lifecycle-and-routers spec): one round of validate-doc, apply act-items, surface remaining to the captain. There is no iteration-2; if the captain rejects the condensed README, the captain resolves by direct edit or by re-invoking the skill after fixing the upstream issue.

After step 6 completes, ask the captain: proceed with deletion? Wait for explicit confirmation. No deletion happens until the captain says yes.

7. Delete source content

Only after step 6 passes and the captain confirms:

rm <project>/tasks.md
rm -rf <project>/decisions/
rm -rf <project>/notes/
rm -rf <project>/sNN-*/  # every spike directory
rm -rf <project>/pNN-*/  # every plan directory

The condensed README from step 5 is the only file remaining in <project>/. All other content is recoverable via git history.

8. Set archived frontmatter

The condensed README's frontmatter was already written as status: archived in step 5. Verify it is still set; if a step-6 revision accidentally removed it, restore it. The condensed README's status: archived is the canonical signal that the project is archived.

9. Atomic git commit

Stage every file the operation touched:

• The condensed README (docs/<project>/README.md)
• Every promoted decision (docs/decisions/dNN-<name>.md)
• Every moved note (docs/notes/<name>.md)
• Every cross-reference rewrite across docs/
• Every source deletion (<project>/tasks.md, decisions/, notes/, spike/plan dirs)

Verify git status shows no untracked or unstaged changes related to the archive (other staged work the captain had in flight is the captain's concern; surface it, do not auto-stage).

Commit with a message of the shape:

docs(archive): condense xNNN-<name> to archived README

Promoted N decisions, moved M follow-ups, rewrote K inbound refs.

Co-Authored-By: <agent>

Brief the captain with: condensed README path, promoted decision count and paths, moved note count and paths, rewritten reference count, the commit SHA. Recovery, if needed: git revert <SHA>.

Failure modes to avoid

• Deleting source content before validation passes — the corrected step order in this body is the explicit fix. Step 7 must follow step 6's captain confirmation.
• Auto-promoting decisions — every promotion requires per-decision captain approval. Batched "promote all important-looking ones" is forbidden.
• Missing inbound references from docs/conventions/ or docs/decisions/ — step 4's scope explicitly includes those directories. A common bug is to scan only sibling projects and miss the convention/decision cross-references.
• Rewriting bare prose mentions — step 4 matches link syntax and frontmatter source: only. A paragraph mentioning a path is commentary, not a link.
• Non-atomic commit — leaving uncommitted changes after step 9 defeats the recovery story. Verify git status is clean for the archive scope before reporting success.
• Re-running on already-archived project — check the project README's frontmatter at step 0; if status: archived, refuse and tell the captain to git revert first.