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.

Install into a repo

git clone <this repo> .task-manager && rm -rf .task-manager/.git
./.task-manager/start.sh        # wires the project (idempotent) and serves

The first start.sh clears the distribution's own cards from tasks/, plans/ and reference/ (printing each removal), so a fresh install starts with an empty board.

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

# in manager/local/.env:  BENCH_SOURCE=<this repo's git url>
./.task-manager/update.sh              # latest
BENCH_REF=v1 ./.task-manager/update.sh # a specific release tag

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.

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.