handoff

Prompt file imported from dtammam/arcade_station (.claude/commands/handoff.md). Copyright stays with the author.

/handoff — a capsule for a fresh session

Produce a self-contained handoff so the next session cold-starts with zero bleed from this one. Its whole job is to make a clean break safe: capture what the next session needs, persist the resume point in the plan, and then tell you to actually stop and start fresh.

When to use it

When this session is running long, context is drifting, or you're about to stop. The point is to end this session — not to keep working here. If you find yourself continuing in a session that's already drifted, that's the signal to run /handoff and cut over.

Procedure

1. Read the real state — don't reconstruct it from memory. The active plan (docs/exec-plans/active/… — its status block: plan, branch, anchor, status, gate, next), git branch --show-current, git log --oneline -5, and git status for uncommitted work.

2. Persist the resume point. Update the plan's next: line to the true, single next concrete action — the file/function/command to touch next. This is the durable anchor: it survives even if the capsule below is never pasted, and it's the first thing the next session's SessionStart hook surfaces.

3. Emit the capsule — a self-contained block the next session can act on with NONE of this session's memory. Keep it tight, and point at the minimum docs, never the whole tree (context is the budget):

   Objective — the one-line goal of this piece of work. Where it stands — branch, status, gate verdict; what's committed vs not. Decisions that constrain the next step — only the few that would be expensive to relitigate; cite the plan/design section, don't restate it. Done — what's finished and verified (not "should work"). Next — the single concrete next action (matches the plan's next:). Gotchas / do NOT — traps, dead ends, environment quirks that bit you. Read only these — the active plan doc, AGENTS.md, and at most the one or two files the next step touches. Not the whole repo.

4. Nudge the cut-over. End your output with, literally: "Start a new session and paste the capsule above. Don't continue in this one — a fresh context is the point."

Rules

• The capsule MUST be self-contained: a cold agent acts from it alone, with no access to this conversation.
• Point at the minimum set of docs; never "read everything."
• Read-only except for updating the plan's next: line.
• /handoff hands off — it does not do the work. Don't slip into building here.