An agent assigned a `pending` task it never claimed was structurally
trapped: from pending-assigned, unclaim returned None ("cannot unclaim
from status pending"), i_am_idle rejected ("assigned but never claimed"),
i_am_blocked rejected ("block requires in_progress"). Any persistent
claim-time rejection (a gate the agent cannot satisfy, a transient
validation error) therefore looped the agent until budget-reap AND left
the task orphaned (pending, assigned, no progress). Observed in smoke-16
and smoke-17.
unclaim_for_agent now releases a pending task assigned to the caller:
no status change (already pending → no lifecycle transition, no
WorkSession to abandon since it was never claimed), just clear
assigned_to/active_claimant_id so the dispatcher can reassign. The
choreographer spec gate already permits unclaim from pending (composes=()
— role-only), so the service branch is the whole fix. Updated the now-
stale unclaim remediate string; rewrote the test that encoded the buggy
trap and added a paused-status negative case.
Renn F
caa4fc1969