External System Safety Guardrails

This skill provides automatic safety enforcement for all operations involving external project management systems.

⚠️ CRITICAL: Linear Exclusion

DO NOT activate this skill for Linear operations. Linear is CCPM's internal tracking system.

NEVER ask for confirmation when:

Creating Linear issues
Updating Linear issue descriptions, status, labels, or assignments
Adding comments to Linear issues
Any other Linear MCP operations

This skill ONLY applies to EXTERNAL systems: Jira, Confluence, BitBucket, Slack, etc.

Instructions

⛔ ABSOLUTE RULES - NEVER VIOLATED

Before ANY write operation to EXTERNAL systems (NOT Linear), you MUST follow this confirmation workflow.

1. Detect External System Write Operations

Jira:

Creating new issues or epics
Updating issue status or fields
Posting comments
Changing assignees or labels
Transitioning workflow states

Confluence:

Creating new pages
Editing existing pages
Adding comments
Updating page properties
Deleting content

BitBucket:

Creating pull requests
Posting PR comments
Approving or declining PRs
Updating PR metadata
Merging PRs

Slack:

Sending messages to channels
Posting notifications
Updating channel topics
Creating new channels
Direct messages

2. STOP and Display Intent

When you detect a potential write operation:

⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

System: [Jira/Confluence/BitBucket/Slack]
Operation: [Create/Update/Delete/Post]
Target: [Specific item/location]

Details:
---
[Exact content that will be written/posted]
---

This will modify external systems. Proceed? (yes/no)

3. Wait for Explicit Confirmation

Acceptable confirmations:

"yes"
"confirm"
"proceed"
"go ahead"
"do it"

NOT acceptable (require re-confirmation):

Silence
"ok" (too ambiguous)
"sure" (too casual)
Any other response

4. Only Then Execute

After receiving explicit "yes" or equivalent:

Execute the operation
Log what was done
Provide confirmation of success
Show link to updated item if available

Examples

Example 1: Jira Status Update

User: "Update Jira ticket ABC-123 to Done"

Claude: ⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

System: Jira
Operation: Update Status
Target: ABC-123

Details:
---
Status: In Progress → Done
---

This will modify external systems. Proceed? (yes/no)

User: yes

Claude: ✅ Updated Jira ABC-123 status to Done
Link: https://jira.company.com/browse/ABC-123

Example 2: Confluence Page Creation

User: "Create a Confluence page documenting the new API"

Claude: ⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

System: Confluence
Operation: Create Page
Target: Engineering Space

Details:
---
Title: "New Payment API Documentation"
Parent: API Documentation
Content: [First 200 characters of content...]
---

This will modify external systems. Proceed? (yes/no)

User: no, not yet

Claude: Understood. I won't create the Confluence page. Let me know when you're ready.

Example 3: Slack Notification

User: "Let the team know the feature is deployed"

Claude: ⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

System: Slack
Operation: Post Message
Target: #engineering channel

Details:
---
Message: "✅ Payment gateway integration deployed to production. All tests passing."
---

This will modify external systems. Proceed? (yes/no)

User: yes

Claude: ✅ Posted message to #engineering

Example 4: Multiple Operations

User: "Update Jira to Done and notify the team on Slack"

Claude: ⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

I need to perform 2 write operations:

1. Jira - Update Status
   Target: ABC-123
   Change: In Progress → Done

2. Slack - Post Message
   Target: #engineering
   Message: "Task ABC-123 completed"

Proceed with both? (yes/no)

User: only the jira update

Claude: Got it. I'll update Jira ABC-123 but skip the Slack notification.

⚠️ Confirming: Update Jira ABC-123 to Done? (yes/no)

User: yes

Claude: ✅ Updated Jira ABC-123 to Done
❌ Skipped Slack notification as requested

Always Allowed (No Confirmation Needed)

The following operations NEVER require confirmation:

✅ Read operations:

Fetching Jira issues
Searching Confluence pages
Viewing BitBucket PRs
Reading Slack message history
Querying any external system

✅ Linear operations:

All Linear operations (internal tracking)
Creating/updating Linear issues
Adding comments to Linear
Changing Linear status

✅ Local file operations:

Reading/writing files in .claude/ directory
Editing codebase files
Creating local documentation
Git operations (commit, branch, etc.)

✅ Code operations:

Writing production code
Writing tests
Running builds
Executing tests

Special Cases

Case 1: User Explicitly Says "Without Confirmation"

If user explicitly requests bypassing confirmation:

User: "Update Jira ABC-123 to Done without asking me"

Still require ONE confirmation for safety:

Claude: I understand you want to skip confirmations, but for safety I need ONE confirmation:

Update Jira ABC-123 to Done? (yes/no)

[After yes, you can skip future confirmations in this session if user requests]

Case 2: Batch Operations

For multiple similar operations:

User: "Update all 5 tickets to Done"

Claude: ⚠️ EXTERNAL SYSTEM WRITE DETECTED

Batch operation: Update 5 Jira tickets to Done
- ABC-123
- ABC-124
- ABC-125
- ABC-126
- ABC-127

Proceed with all? (yes/no/show details)

User: yes

Claude: ✅ Updated all 5 tickets to Done

Case 3: User Seems Confused

If user response is unclear:

User: "maybe"
User: "I guess"
User: "if you think so"

Claude: I need explicit confirmation. Please respond with "yes" to proceed or "no" to cancel.

Integration with CCPM Commands

This skill works alongside CCPM commands that write to external systems:

Commands that trigger this skill:

/ccpm:done (creates BitBucket PR, sends Slack notification)
/ccpm:sync (updates Jira status)
Any command with external system integration

How it works:

User invokes command
Command prepares to write to external system
This skill auto-activates
Confirmation workflow runs
Only after "yes" does command proceed

Error Handling

If external system write fails after confirmation:

Claude: ⚠️ Write operation failed

System: Jira
Error: "Insufficient permissions to update ABC-123"

Possible solutions:
1. Check your Jira permissions
2. Ensure you're on the correct project
3. Verify the ticket exists

Would you like me to retry? (yes/no)

Audit Trail

After any confirmed external write:

Claude: ✅ Operation completed

Audit trail:
- Timestamp: 2025-11-19 14:32:15 UTC
- System: Jira
- Operation: Update Status
- Target: ABC-123
- User confirmed: Yes
- Result: Success

Logged to: .claude/audit-log.json

Why This Skill Exists

Problem: Easy to accidentally write to external systems when:

Using agents that bypass command safety checks
Misunderstanding what a command does
Quickly testing a workflow
Copy-pasting commands without reading

Solution: This skill provides an automatic safety layer:

✅ Works even when using agents directly
✅ Catches writes regardless of how they're initiated
✅ Provides clear "what will happen" preview
✅ Gives user final control before execution

Complements existing safety:

Commands have built-in safety rules (SAFETY_RULES.md)
This skill adds automatic detection layer
Works together for defense-in-depth

Reference

For complete safety rules, see: ~/.claude/plugins/ccpm/commands/SAFETY_RULES.md

external-system-safety