/review

A second opinion before committing. Checks alignment between intent and execution, detects drift, and decides: continue, adjust, or salvage.

Part of the Intent → Execution → Review loop at every scale — from a single commit to a multi-week project. Review closes the loop.

When to Use

Invoke /review when: before committing, at natural pause points, something feels off, scope seems to have grown, or before PRs.

Do not use when: You're in deep flow and making progress. Review at natural breaks, not arbitrary intervals.

Review Lenses

Default to the core workflow review in this file. When the artifact being reviewed needs a sharper domain lens, load the matching supporting reference:

• Code, PRs, technical plans, or implementation work: references/code.md
• Prose, documentation, essays, prompts, or release notes: references/writing.md
• Tutorials, explanations, onboarding, or teaching behavior: references/learning.md

Use these as lenses, not replacement workflows. The final review still answers the core /review questions: aim, alignment, sufficiency, mechanism, drift, completion, and next action.

The Review Process

Step 1: State the Original Aim

"The aim was: [original intent in one sentence]"

If you can't state the aim clearly, that's the first finding.

Step 2: Check Alignment

Ask five questions. Keep them artifact-neutral; load a review lens only when the artifact needs domain-specific judgment.

1. Necessary? — Does this still need to exist now, or did speculative work creep in?
2. Aligned? — Does the current work still serve the original aim?
3. Sufficient? — Is this enough for the aim without unnecessary scope, abstraction, or entanglement?
4. Mechanism clear? — Can you state why this approach should produce the intended outcome?
5. Complete? — Are promised characteristics, dependencies, verification, and handoff covered?

If RNA MCP is available, check work against guardrails (oh_search_context with artifact_types: ["guardrail"]) and declared outcomes (outcome_progress).

Step 3: Detect Drift

Drift is the gap between where you started and where you are. Explicitly name any drift found:

Scope Drift — task grew beyond original boundaries Solution Drift — approach changed from plan Goal Drift — aim itself shifted without explicit decision

For each drift:

Drift: [type]
Started as: [original]
Became: [current]
Impact: [what this means]

Step 4: Decide Next Action

Decision	When	Action
Continue	Aligned, on track	Proceed with confidence
Adjust	Minor drift, recoverable	Correct course and continue
Pause	Unclear aim or major questions	Stop, clarify, then resume
Salvage	Significant drift, restart needed	Extract learning with /salvage

If the review surfaces new hard constraints, record them (oh_record_guardrail_candidate).

Output Format

## Review Summary

**Aim:** [original intent]
**Status:** [Continue / Adjust / Pause / Salvage]

### Alignment Check
- Necessary: [Yes/No - brief note]
- Aligned: [Yes/No - brief note]
- Sufficient: [Yes/No - brief note]
- Mechanism clear: [Yes/No - brief note]
- Changes complete: [Yes/No - brief note]

### Drift Detected
[List any drift found, or "None detected"]

### Needs Human Verification
Claims that cannot be self-checked by the model and require independent human judgment:
- [claim or assumption that needs external confirmation]
- [one-way decision that was not independently challenged]
- [delivered characteristic that was asserted but not externally observed]

If this section is empty, say why. Model-generated review of model-generated work shares the same blindspots. The purpose of this section is to route the right questions to the actual human checkpoint (PR review, stakeholder sign-off, manual test) rather than pretending the model can answer them.

### Decision
[Reasoning for the status decision]

### Next Steps
[Concrete actions to take]

Completion Gate (Before "Done")

When the user or agent claims work is complete, verify:

1. Intent clear? — Can you state what changed and why in one sentence?
2. Work reviewed? — Has the actual artifact been checked against the stated intent?
3. Evidence present? — Are the relevant checks, examples, or observations recorded?
4. Feedback handled? — Have review comments or open objections been resolved or explicitly deferred?
5. Declared criteria delivered? — Were promised characteristics verified, not merely claimed?
6. Needs Human Verification surfaced? — Have claims the model cannot self-check been flagged for human attention?

If incomplete:

"Completion gate: [missing step]. Run the check before marking complete."

Session Persistence

Reads: Aim, Problem Statement, Solution Space, Execute status, Ship status — essential for detecting drift and judging whether declared criteria were delivered.

Writes: Review assessment including contract verification:

## Review
**Updated:** <timestamp>
**Verdict:** [ALIGNED | DRIFTED | BLOCKED]

[review findings, drift analysis, contract verification, recommendations]

Position in Framework

Comes after: /execute (natural checkpoint after building). Leads to: /ship if aligned, /salvage if drifted, back to /aim if fundamentals are unclear. This is the gate: Review decides whether to continue, adjust, or restart.