Triage

Moves filed-but-unevaluated beads issues to a decided state. State vocabulary and the ready-for-agent gate: .beads/beads.md → Intake States. Commands: the beads skill. This skill decides when an issue moves; it does not redefine what states mean.

Show what needs attention

Present four buckets, oldest first, with counts and a one-line summary per item:

1. bd list -l needs-triage — filed, never evaluated
2. bd list -l idea — raw captures worth promoting or dropping
3. bd list -l needs-info — were the open questions in notes answered since?
4. bd human list — waiting on the user to execute

Use the supplied issue or authorized batch. Ask for selection only when the request did not establish a scope.

Triage one issue

1. Gather. bd show <id> including notes. Do not re-ask anything a prior Established: note already records.

2. Redundancy check. Search the codebase for an existing implementation by domain concept, not the issue's wording — and report where you looked. If it already exists, that is a wontfix close (step 6).

3. Prior-rejection check. bd search "<terms>" --status all for earlier wontfix: closes that resemble this. Surface any match before proceeding.

4. Verify the claim. For bugs: reproduce it, or record exactly why you could not. An unreproduced bug does not pass the gate.

5. Decide within authority. Recommend an outcome with evidence. Apply it when the user already authorized that decision or bulk triage; otherwise obtain the missing approval. An unreproduced bug stays unresolved/needs-info, not automatically wontfix.

6. Apply the outcome (all writes with --actor):

   Outcome	Commands
   Agent-executable	verify the gate holds, then bd label add <id> ready-for-agent (+ bd update --acceptance if missing)
   User's work	bd label add <id> human
   Underspecified	bd label add <id> needs-info + questions via --append-notes
   Real, not now	bd label add <id> backlog + bd defer <id> --until …
   Not doing it	bd close <id> --reason "wontfix: <why>"

   Remove the previous state label, and record what was settled: bd update <id> --append-notes "Established: …" — so the next session resumes instead of re-asking.

Rules

• One state label per issue; never stack them.
• Never promote to ready-for-agent past a failing gate — that label is what autonomous claiming trusts.
• Analysis-only requests remain read-only. Carry existing triage authority through clear items; escalate material ambiguities separately.