istosandClaude Opus 5
635205486b
A project could run bench for months without a manager/local/.env: everything fell back to core/.env.example, so the two settings that change what bench is — claim-on-move and syncing through origin/main — were invisible to anyone who had not read that file. install.py now writes it on a first run. It asks three questions no default can be right about (solo or team, which agent adapter, the project's test command) and writes core/.env.example with the answers substituted into their lines, comments and all keys intact — so the written file is where the project reads what else it can change. - Runs after first_boot_clean: .env is one of the two things the first-boot guard reads, so writing it earlier would skip the clean. - Never asks without a terminal on stdin. install.py sits on the path of start.sh, update.sh and every hook, so no TTY prints one line and carries on rather than blocking a board start on an invisible prompt. --dry-run reports the questions and writes nothing. - An existing .env is never touched; --setup is the only way back to the questions, pre-filling from the current file and rewriting it in place, so start.sh's fallback BOARD_PORT line survives. - Bare Enter takes every default (the result is the example verbatim, i.e. today's behaviour exactly); Ctrl-D skips the rest. start.sh needed no change — it already calls install.py before the port dance, which is the right order. Tests drive the interactive runs over a real pty and the non-interactive ones with /dev/null on stdin. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Bench
A live kanban for coding-agent work: task files in stage directories are
the only source of truth; a stdlib-only board narrates everything that
happens to them — agents working in git worktrees, PRs opening on review,
CI and Copilot state on the cards, drives of the app from a task's own
branch, and an archive that is never a delete. Turn on team mode
(BOARD_SYNC=1) and the truth is origin/main: moves commit and push
themselves, every board pulls on a beat, and the person who claimed a
card first keeps it.
Install into a repo
mkdir .task-manager && curl -L \
https://github.com/12vectors/bench/releases/latest/download/bench.tar.gz \
| tar -xz -C .task-manager
./.task-manager/start.sh # wires the project (idempotent) and serves
No token, no clone: releases are curated artifacts that never contained bench's own cards or settings, so the board starts empty by construction.
The first run asks three questions it cannot answer for you — solo or
team, which agent adapter, what command runs your tests — and writes
manager/local/.env from the documented example, so every other setting
is discoverable in your own copy. Bare Enter takes the default
throughout; with no terminal (CI, a script) it asks nothing and
install.py --setup asks later.
Commit .task-manager/ into the host repo — core is vendored on purpose,
so clones work offline and updates show up in the host's own diffs.
The workflow brief ships as .task-manager/AGENTS.md — the cross-vendor
name coding agents read natively — with CLAUDE.md beside it as a one-line
compatibility pointer. Both live inside .task-manager/, so a host repo's
own root AGENTS.md is never touched.
Update
./.task-manager/update.sh # latest release
BENCH_REF=v2 ./.task-manager/update.sh # an exact release tag
The artifact is stamped with the repo it was built from, so updating
needs no configuration; BENCH_SOURCE=<owner/repo> in
manager/local/.env overrides the stamp. Updates replace
manager/core/ and the top-level scripts wholesale and touch nothing
else — tasks, plans, reference, and everything under manager/local/
(your driver, commands, prompt overrides, settings, state) survive every
update. Then python3 .task-manager/install.py and restart the board.
If the source repo has no published release yet, update.sh says so and
changes nothing.
Working on bench itself
git clone git@github.com:12vectors/bench.git && cd bench && ./start.sh
A clone carries bench's own cards and local/ content — that is dev mode,
not an install. (Installing from a clone anyway works: install.py
clears the shipped cards on its first boot in a host repo.) Releases are
built by ./release.sh from the manifest at
manager/core/release-manifest: tag = v<VERSION>, one stable asset
name (bench.tar.gz), contents at the tarball root — the two things the
install one-liner above depends on.
The three-layer law
Core knows about tasks, worktrees, PRs and events. It knows nothing about
any particular app (drivers do: local/driver/start), agent vendor
(adapters do: core/adapters/), or project (local/ does). Full docs in
AGENTS.md; the adapter contract in manager/core/adapters/README.md.
License
MIT.