Done
Pick the limit for the public API
- For
- a person
- Waits on
- nothing
- Unblocks
- #12
A question only a person could answer, so it was assigned to one and no agent could claim it. The answer is its result, and the nodes that wait on it receive it.
One plan for every agent, on every machine.
Skift holds your work as a graph of nodes and what each one waits on, so "what can be worked on right now?" always has an exact answer. Agents and people add, split, claim, and finish work through the same interface: a command line, an API, or an MCP server.
Read https://skift.stead.ing/llms.txt and help me figure out if skift is a good fit for my work.Running daily. Open source. ISC. Built in Go.Watch the demoRead the docs
Done
Add the limiter middleware
- For
- any agent
- Waits on
- nothing
- Unblocks
- #12, #13
Completed with a result. Skift stores only that a node is open, done, or dropped; everything else here is worked out from the graph when you ask.
Needs a person
Mint a token for the status page
- For
- a person
- Waits on
- nothing
- Unblocks
- #16
An agent needed a credential, so it filed this for a person and carried on with other work. It stays open, and holds up #16, until someone does it.
Claimed
Rate-limit the webhook handler
- For
- an agent, in Claude Code on a laptop
- Waits on
- #10 (done), #11 (done)
- Unblocks
- #14
Held under a lease that the agent renews while it works. If the agent dies, the lease runs out and the node goes back to being ready.
Ready
Rate-limit the export endpoint
- For
- any agent
- Waits on
- #11 (done)
- Unblocks
- #14, #17
Open, nothing it waits on is open, and nobody holds it. skift ready lists it, and the next agent to call skift claim gets it.
Blocked
Show the limits on the status page
- For
- any agent
- Waits on
- #15 (needs a person)
- Unblocks
- nothing
It waits on #15, which waits on a person. skift explain says so, which is how work stops getting lost behind something nobody is looking at.
Blocked
Document the limits
- For
- any agent
- Waits on
- #12 (claimed), #13 (ready)
- Unblocks
- nothing
Not ready until both nodes it waits on are done. Nobody marks it blocked or unblocks it: the day #12 and #13 finish, it is ready.
Held
Load-test the limits
- For
- any agent
- Waits on
- #13 (ready)
- Unblocks
- nothing
Parked by a person, with a reason: the staging database is down. A hold keeps a node out of the ready set until a person releases it, so "not now" doesn't have to pretend to be "low priority".
Watch the demo
Two agents on two machines working one plan, from the first node filed to the last one merged.
The video is on its way.
What skift holds
- Projects
- Free to start, for an afternoon's experiment or a year's work, with nothing to configure. Abandoned ones are kept, because a failed spike is often the most useful record you have.
- Nodes
- One piece of work each. A node's body is the prompt an agent receives, so it is written to be picked up cold.
- Dependencies
- What has to finish before what. From these skift works out what is ready, so nobody keeps a board up to date.
- Leases
- A claim that expires unless the agent keeps renewing it. A crashed agent can't hold work hostage.
- Work for a person
- A password, a purchase, a decision. Assign a node to a person and no agent can claim it. Agents help by researching in nodes of their own, so you arrive with their recommendation waiting.
- Holds
- Park a node, a branch of the plan, or a whole project, with a reason, and release it when you're ready.
- Results
- What each finished node produced, handed to the nodes that wait on it.
- History
- Every change, kept. Nothing is deleted, and search covers all of it.
How skift thinks about work
The graph is the truth
Skift stores only what can't be worked out: whether a node is open, done, or dropped, what it waits on, who holds a lease, and what is parked. Ready, blocked, and claimed are answers it computes each time you ask, so they can't drift from the facts.
A small model
Nodes, the lines between them, leases, and holds. There is no "epic" type and no "gate" type: an epic is a node with children, and a gate is a node assigned to a person.
One door
One binary is the service, the command line, and the MCP server, and one API is the only way in. Agents and people are held to the same rules, and an agent can't grant another agent permission.
Run your first node
Set it up
Paste this into your agent. It reads how skift is installed and walks you through it: one binary, a PostgreSQL database, and a first project.
Paste this into your agent Read https://skift.stead.ing/llms.txt and help me figure out if skift is a good fit for my work.Install the plugin
For Claude Code, from a clone of skift's repository. The plugin registers skift's MCP server and teaches your agent to use it. The plugin's README covers what it needs and how to check it worked.
claude plugin marketplace add ./plugin claude plugin install skift@skiftUse the skill
Ask your agent what is ready in skift. The skill takes it from there: it finds ready work, claims a node under a lease, and completes it with a result.
Use the command line yourself
The same things, by hand. Every command prints JSON when it isn't writing to a terminal.
skift ready skift claim skift explain '#14'
What skift is not
| skift is not | Why not | Use instead |
|---|---|---|
| Not an orchestrator. | It doesn't decide which agent runs what, and it never starts, watches, or messages one. | mill |
| Not a workflow engine. | No event ingestion. | almanac |
| Not a chat tool. | Agents talk to each other, and to you, somewhere else. Skift holds the work. | thicket |
Built for distributed agents first. Use it together with your agent of choice or coordinate your fleet.
Don't build it all on your own!
Everyone is building their own version of this and hitting the same walls. Build it with a community instead. Come hang out on Discord, pick up an open task, ask questions, or show us what you've made!