work
work
Claude Code runs it as
/work and Codex as $work. Other agents take its name or a plain request such as "work this wish".What it does
work executes a plan that review approved. It reads
.genie/wishes/<slug>/WISH.md, which must carry the status APPROVED, or IN_PROGRESS when you resume, and sets it to IN_PROGRESS before anything starts. The plan stays the source of every instruction.- Order. It works out the waves from the plan's Execution Strategy and each group's
depends-on. Dependencies come from the plan: a card that shows as ready on the board can still be waiting on another group. - Workers. Each group goes to its own worker through your agent's subagents, with its goal, deliverables, criteria, validation, owned files and stop conditions. Workers that write at the same time get separate files or their own worktrees. A worker in a shared checkout never commits or switches branches; only the coordinator does.
- Slices. Inside a group, the thinnest slice that runs end to end goes first, then it widens.
- Done. Only after SHIP and passing validation does the coordinator post the verdict on the group's card and mark it done.
The wish stays
IN_PROGRESS through the pull request and CI. Only a merge plus the plan's QA evidence makes it SHIPPED.The card conversation
Every group has a card on the board, and the card's timeline is the record of who did what. work posts to it at these moments and no others:
| Moment | Who | What |
| Dispatch | Coordinator | genie task comment naming the worker and the scope |
| Claim | Worker | genie task checkout before it changes anything |
| Stale claim reclaimed | New claimant | genie task comment starting reclaim:, naming the previous claimant, how long it sat idle and why, before the new genie task checkout |
| Handoff | Worker | One genie task report: the outcome, what changed and where, the validation result, and one Ruling: line per decision it took on your behalf |
| Review verdict | Coordinator | genie task comment with SHIP, FIX-FIRST or BLOCKED; the evidence goes to WISH.md |
| Group done | Coordinator | genie task done |
| Exhausted fix loop or diagnosed route | Coordinator | genie task comment starting blocked:, naming the cause and the route |
A worker stops to ask only for an irreversible or destructive action, a security decision, a side effect outside its worktree, or a plan too broken to follow. Every other decision is a ruling it takes and records in its report.
genie board --wish <slug> shows where the groups stand.When to use it
- A
WISH.mdthat an independent review approved. - A wish already
IN_PROGRESSthat stopped and needs to resume.
One decided task needs no plan: give it to wish. An idea without a plan starts at brainstorm, or at wish's plan entry when the decisions are already made.
Run it
| Agent | How it runs |
| Claude Code | /work <slug> |
| Codex | $work <slug> |
| Other agents | Its name, or a plain request such as "work this wish" |
work has no saved workflow: it runs in your agent's session and hands the groups to that agent's subagents. Without subagents it says so, and does not claim that an independent review took place. Without the
genie CLI or its database it tracks the groups in WISH.md.A recorded run
Simulated terminal: a replay of a real /work run in Claude Code, built from its saved capture and shortened in time. Edited in two places: host details hidden (paths shown as ~/, account plan and quota), and the agent launch line removed.
The run works a single-group wish in a small test repository: an engineer adds the change, a separate reviewer approves it, and the coordinator commits only the reviewed files and marks the card done. The repository has no remote, so the run ends without a pull request and asks how to proceed.
Read the transcript: the redacted text of the run's final screen and scrollback.