docs/dev/handoff.md gives the common steps of a handoff. This page gives only what differs for the planner.
In a handoff of a planner, the old planner gives its work to a new planner in a new session. Both are follow-up planners, as The initial planner and the follow-up planner of planner.md defines.
The rules of this page cover only the follow-up planner. They do not cover the initial planner.
An open draft is a draft that the follow-up planner did not post or drop yet. It can be a draft in its review loops, a draft that waits for a decision of the user, or a draft of a comment that waits for the approval of the user. The review loop of a draft of planner.md gives these cases.
The planner counts the issues that it posts in its session. Each change of the body of an open issue also counts as one post. At a count of 12, the planner suggests a handoff to the user after that post. The follow-up planner tells the user each suggestion as The operator of working-with-the-user.md says.
The reason for the count: most of the context of a planner comes from the drafts of each issue and their rewrites.
After the start, the old planner does these steps:
- Post nothing new and start no new draft.
- Write the handoff file, with the name and the time of The handoff file. An example is
2026-10-24-1530-docs-planner.md. - Send the path of the handoff file to the operator of the session as an item, as The form of an item of operator-items.md says.
Until the end of the handoff (The end of a handoff), the old planner does step 1 of these steps, also after step 3.
The handoff file of the planner holds the items of The items of a handoff file. The old planner also puts these items in the handoff file:
- The prompt names the milestone, the session name
planner-<slug>and the first free item id. The first step of the prompt is the prompt read of The items of a handoff file. The prompt names no other doc for the start reads. The second step of the prompt is The start of the new planner. - The path of each open draft, not its text, its source, and the decision of the user that it waits for, if any.
- Each lesson, measured fact or proposed issue that another session sent or that the old planner found, and that has no draft yet. Each entry names its sender, its facts and its sources.
- The number of each issue that the old planner posted in its session.
The new planner is planner-<slug>. The stop and the start applies. The new
planner does the check of the handoff folder.