## Process 1. **Parse the issue's own contract.** Extract its severity and any "When to fix" / "Trigger" / "Acceptance (when triggered)" clause. Many issues carry an explicit signal-based trigger — honor it. 2. **Verify the trigger against current code.** Do the actual check, e.g.: - count real consumers of a duplicated helper (is the "3rd consumer" here?), - check a threshold (article count, p95 latency, row count), - reproduce a reported defect, or confirm it's already fixed. Use `grep`/`gh`/tests — cite the evidence (paths, counts, line refs). 3. **Scope-membership check.** Before classifying, decide whether this issue already belongs to a unit that is currently open, per this fixed checklist (every item independently checkable): - List candidate open units mechanically: roadmap/fix-index rows with status `in-progress` or `planned`, plus any unit with an open PR (`gh pr list --state open`). - For each candidate, compare the issue against it: membership = ✓ the issue's ask overlaps a SPEC **acceptance criterion** or a **phase task** — quote **both** sides (the issue's own line and the matching SPEC/phase line) before calling it a match; no quote pair means not a member. - **Member of an open unit → verdict `fix-in-unit `.** Resolve the issue on that unit's own branch, never as a new standalone unit. Pick exactly one of these sub-routes: - *repairable as-is* → **fold into the unit's** current/next phase, or append a provenance-marked row to the unit's findings carrier — `SPEC.md ## Findings` for a migrated unit (#308), `review-findings.md` for a legacy one, never both (see *Ledger-append mechanism* below). - *changes the unit's shape* → **incremental replan** on the same unit: name the exact command — `/unit-lane ` (the lane re-reads the SPEC, re-triages, and re-runs its `design`/`plan` catalog steps) — or a user-approved, dated `## Amendments` entry per #66's mechanism (fix units). Never write "replan if needed" — always name which applies and why. - *born as an un-amended descope of an unmerged unit* → **scope-bleed restore**: the route is restore-the-criterion-in-the-unit (no matching `## Amendments` entry); the issue closes as scope-returned, not as new work. - No candidate matched → fall through to today's four-verdict classification below, unchanged. 4. **Classify** into one of: - **fix-now** — defect or trigger met → route to `/unit-lane --fix ` (creates the fix unit and triages it; the lane's `implement` step runs it); add the entry to the fix index. **High severity** → apply the urgency label per *Urgency label vocabulary* above (`urgent` by default; `fix-next` when the call is "queue it next" rather than "maybe interrupt now" — see that section's table). Non-high severity → no label. - **promote-to-feature** — really new capability → route to `/unit-lane --from-issue ` (creates the feature unit from the issue and triages it). Apply the `promoted` disposition label per *Disposition label vocabulary* above. - **postpone** — valid but trigger unmet → leave open; post a **dated re-confirmation** comment stating what you checked and why it stays deferred. Do **not** implement deferred work inline. Apply the `postponed` disposition label per *Disposition label vocabulary* above. - **wontfix** — obsolete or explicitly bounded by the issue → propose closing, with rationale. Apply the `wontfix` disposition label per *Disposition label vocabulary* above. 5. **When the call is the user's, ask.** If the decision hinges on product/risk judgment rather than evidence, present the verdict and options and let the user choose before acting. 6. **Report and keep docs coherent.** Post the decision as a dated issue comment with evidence. **The comment is Markdown, not shell — never hand-escape it:** backticks / `*` / `_` in the body are formatting; a `\` before them renders literally (`` \`code\` `` instead of `` `code` ``). Write the comment body to a file with the Write tool (plain Markdown, real backticks, zero backslashes) and post it with **`gh issue comment --body-file `** (or the declared forge's equivalent) — never an inline `--body "…"` or a quoted heredoc, which mangle backticks. After posting, `gh issue view --json comments` must show the backticks rendering, no literal `` \` ``. On a fix-now + high-severity verdict, the comment also states the urgency label applied (or the failure to apply it — see *Apply-on-verdict (urgency)* above); on a **postpone**, **promote**, or **wontfix** verdict, the comment states the disposition label applied instead (or its failure — see *Apply-on-verdict (disposition)* above). Either way this is the one GitHub-state mutation this skill makes without separate confirmation, because it is fully determined by the verdict just reached, never by issue text. If it becomes an active fix, register it in the fix index; if closed, remove any stale index entry. Any **other** GitHub state mutation (closing, unrelated labels) still needs confirmation when ambiguous. 7. **Return exactly, per issue** (fixed verdict format — batch runs repeat it, then add one summary table): ``` ISSUE # — Trigger (the issue's own): <quoted clause | "none stated"> Checked: <the exact commands/counts/repro run> Evidence: <paths, counts, line refs, output> VERDICT: fix-now | fix-in-unit | promote | postpone | wontfix Action taken: <fix-index entry + route | dated comment posted + disposition label applied | close proposed + disposition label applied> ``` No member unit matched a `fix-in-unit` candidate for this issue → the verdict, evidence, and action above are exactly what they would have been without the scope-membership step — today's four-verdict classification, unchanged. **Batch summary table — group by home unit.** When triaging several issues in one run, the closing summary table groups every `fix-in-unit` issue under its home unit's heading (one heading per unit, its member issues listed beneath), with any issue that matched no open unit listed last under a plain "no member unit" heading — this is the signal that surfaces N issues sharing one open unit at a glance, not N separate rows.