AFK Exploration

The user has a rough idea — a new project, a feature in an existing one, or a bug fix — and is stepping away from the computer. Use that gap to research the idea, build a knowledge base they can return to, and stop short of writing the spec. The artifact must be useful enough that on returning the user can write the spec from it without redoing the upfront thinking.

This is the unattended counterpart to brainstorming. There is no human to dialogue with mid-run; recorded assumptions replace clarifying questions.

When to use

• The user has a rough idea and signals they're stepping away (or explicitly asks for unattended exploration / research).
• Triggers across three shapes: a new project, a feature in an existing project, or a bug fix.
• Don't use for interactive brainstorming or anywhere the user is at the keyboard waiting on each step.

The agent receiving the request becomes the orchestrator. The orchestrator does no first-hand research itself — it analyses the request, plans research angles, dispatches subagents in parallel, follows up each angle with three critique subagents and a per-angle synthesiser, and never reads notes back into its own context. This keeps the orchestrator's window clear so it can track the clock and coordinate the run end-to-end.

Anti-pattern: clarifying questions

The user is not at the keyboard. A clarifying question deadlocks the run. Instead:

• Make the most plausible assumption, write it explicitly into 00-brief.md under Assumptions, and proceed.