garrytan

garrytan/gstack

Use Garry Tan's exact Claude Code setup: 23 opinionated tools that serve as CEO, Designer, Eng Manager, Release Manager, Doc Engineer, and QA

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# gstack

> "I don't think I've typed like a line of code probably since December, basically, which is an extremely large change." — [Andrej Karpathy](https://fortune.com/2026/03/21/andrej-karpathy-openai-cofounder-ai-agents-coding-state-of-psychosis-openclaw/), No Priors podcast, March 2026

When I heard Karpathy say this, I wanted to find out how. How does one person ship like a team of twenty? Peter Steinberger built [OpenClaw](https://github.com/openclaw/openclaw) — 247K GitHub stars — essentially solo with AI agents. The revolution is here. A single builder with the right tooling can move faster than a traditional team.

I'm [Garry Tan](https://x.com/garrytan), President & CEO of [Y Combinator](https://www.ycombinator.com/). I've worked with thousands of startups — Coinbase, Instacart, Rippling — when they were one or two people in a garage. Before YC, I was one of the first eng/PM/designers at Palantir, cofounded Posterous (sold to Twitter), and built Bookface, YC's internal social network.

**gstack is my answer.** I've been building products for twenty years, and right now I'm shipping more products than I ever have. In the last 60 days: 3 production services, 40+ shipped features, part-time, while running YC full-time. On logical code change — not raw LOC, which AI inflates — my 2026 run rate is **~810× my 2013 pace** (11,417 vs 14 logical lines/day). Year-to-date (through April 18), 2026 has already produced **240× the entire 2013 year**. Measured across 40 public + private `garrytan/*` repos including Bookface, after excluding one demo repo. AI wrote most of it. The point isn't who typed it, it's what shipped.

> The LOC critics aren't wrong that raw line counts inflate with AI. They are wrong that normalized-for-inflation, I'm less productive. I'm more productive, by a lot. Full methodology, caveats, and reproduction script: **[On the LOC Controversy](docs/ON_THE_LOC_CONTROVERSY.md)**.

**2026 — 1,237 contributions and counting:**

![GitHub contributions 2026 — 1,237 contributions, massive acceleration in Jan-Mar](docs/images/github-2026.png)

**2013 — when I built Bookface at YC (772 contributions):**

![GitHub contributions 2013 — 772 contributions building Bookface at YC](docs/images/github-2013.png)

Same person. Different era. The difference is the tooling.

**gstack is how I do it.** It turns Claude Code into a virtual engineering team — a CEO who rethinks the product, an eng manager who locks architecture, a designer who catches AI slop, a reviewer who finds production bugs, a QA lead who opens a real browser, a security officer who runs OWASP + STRIDE audits, and a release engineer who ships the PR. Twenty-three specialists and eight power tools, all slash commands, all Markdown, all free, MIT license.

This is my open source software factory. I use it every day. I'm sharing it because these tools should be available to everyone.

Fork it. Improve it. Make it yours. And if you want to hate on free open source software — you're welcome to, but I'd rather you just try it first.

**Who this is for:**
- **Founders and CEOs** — especially technical ones who still want to ship
- **First-time Claude Code users** — structured roles instead of a blank prompt
- **Tech leads and staff engineers** — rigorous review, QA, and release automation on every PR

## Quick start

1. Install gstack (about 30 seconds of setup — see below)
2. Run `/office-hours` — describe what you're building
3. Run `/plan-ceo-review` on any feature idea
4. Run `/review` on any branch with changes
5. Run `/qa` on your staging URL or an isolated local API, CLI, job or webhook
6. Stop there. You'll know if this is for you.

## Install — about 30 seconds

`./setup` took 31 seconds after the clone on a 4-vCPU Linux cloud machine (v1.91.13.0, clean HOME, including the binary build and the Chromium download). Slower networks and laptops take longer.

**Requirements:** [Claude Code](https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs/claude-code), [Git](https://git-scm.com/), [Bun](https://bun.sh/) v1.4.2+ (the tested version; setup refuses Bun older than 1.3.3, which would let compiled tools read a project's `.env`, and warns in between), [Node.js](https://nodejs.org/) (Windows only). **Recommended on macOS:** the [Aside](https://aside.com) browser (macOS 15+) — browser skills, `/make-pdf`, and `/diagram` drive it first, with your real logged-in sessions. Without it, `./setup` builds gstack's own bundled browser and the same skills use that. `/cso` additionally needs a Bun release with all four `--no-compile-autoload-*` build flags plus a native toolchain: a static-capable C compiler on Linux, Xcode command-line tools on macOS, or Visual Studio 2022 Build Tools with Desktop development with C++ on Windows. If those are absent, setup installs everything else, removes stale CSO helpers, and `/cso` reports `not assessed` with the prerequisite.

When qualified CSO runtime images are published, setup gives each automatic preload a 30-second window plus a bounded setup allowance for the declared catalog. For slower registries, set an integer such as `GSTACK_CSO_IMAGE_PULL_TIMEOUT_SECONDS=120` (accepted range: 5–300 seconds). One image timing out does not consume the remaining images' windows; setup reports partial progress and a later run resumes from exact digests already present in local Docker. The complete preload is capped at one hour.

### Step 1: Install on your machine

Open Claude Code and paste this. Claude does the rest.

> Install gstack: run **`git clone --single-branch --depth 1 https://github.com/garrytan/gstack.git ~/.claude/skills/gstack && cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup`** then add a "gstack" section to CLAUDE.md that says to use the /browse skill from gstack for all web browsing, never use mcp\_\_claude-in-chrome\_\_\* tools, and lists the available skills: /office-hours, /plan-ceo-review, /plan-eng-review, /plan-design-review, /design-consultation, /design-shotgun, /design-html, /review, /deslop-shared-libs, /test-audit, /ship, /eval-plan, /land-and-deploy, /canary, /benchmark, /browse, /connect-chrome, /qa, /qa-only, /design-review, /scrape, /setup-browser-cookies, /setup-deploy, /setup-gbrain, /retro, /investigate, /document-release, /document-generate, /codex, /cso, /autoplan, /plan-devex-review, /devex-review, /careful, /freeze, /guard, /unfreeze, /gstack-upgrade, /learn. Then ask the user if they also want to add gstack to the current project so teammates get it.

### Step 2: Team mode — auto-update for shared repos (recommended)

From inside your repo, paste this. Switches you to team mode, bootstraps the repo so teammates get gstack automatically, and commits the change:

```bash
(cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup --team) && ~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-team-init required && git add .claude/ CLAUDE.md && git commit -m "require gstack for AI-assisted work"
```

No vendored files in your repo, no version drift, no manual upgrades. Every Claude Code session starts with a fast auto-update check (throttled to once/hour, network-failure-safe, completely silent).

Swap `required` for `optional` if you'd rather nudge teammates than block them.

### OpenClaw

OpenClaw spawns Claude Code sessions via ACP, so every gstack skill just works
when Claude Code has gstack installed. Paste this to your OpenClaw agent:

> Install gstack: run `git clone --single-branch --depth 1 https://github.com/garrytan/gstack.git ~/.claude/skills/gstack && cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup` to install gstack for Claude Code. Then add a "Coding Tasks" section to AGENTS.md that says: when spawning Claude Code sessions for coding work, tell the session to use gstack skills. Include these examples — security audit: "Load gstack. Run /cso", code review: "Load gstack. Run /review", QA test a URL: "Load gstack. Run /qa https://...", build a feature end-to-end: "Load gstack. Run /autoplan, implement the plan, then run /ship", plan before building: "Load gstack. Run /office-hours then /autoplan. Save the plan, don't implement."

**After setup, just talk to your OpenClaw agent naturally:**

| You say | What happens |
|---------|-------------|
| "Fix the typo in README" | Simple — Claude Code session, no gstack needed |
| "Run a security audit on this repo" | Spawns Claude Code with `Run /cso` |
| "Build me a notifications feature" | Spawns Claude Code with /autoplan → implement → /ship |
| "Help me plan the v2 API redesign" | Spawns Claude Code with /office-hours → /autoplan, saves plan |

See [docs/OPENCLAW.md](docs/OPENCLAW.md) for advanced dispatch routing and
the gstack-lite/gstack-full prompt templates.

### Native OpenClaw Skills (via ClawHub)

Four methodology skills that work directly in your OpenClaw agent, no Claude Code
session needed. Install from ClawHub:

```
clawhub install gstack-openclaw-office-hours gstack-openclaw-ceo-review gstack-openclaw-investigate gstack-openclaw-retro
```

| Skill | What it does |
|-------|-------------|
| `gstack-openclaw-office-hours` | Product interrogation with 6 forcing questions |
| `gstack-openclaw-ceo-review` | Strategic challenge with 4 scope modes |
| `gstack-openclaw-investigate` | Root cause debugging methodology |
| `gstack-openclaw-retro` | Weekly engineering retrospective |

These are conversational skills. Your OpenClaw agent runs them directly via chat.

### Other AI Agents

gstack runs on more agents than Claude. Bare `./setup` installs for Claude
Code only. Pick another agent with `--host <name>`, or install for every agent
setup detects on this machine with `--host auto`:

```bash
git clone --single-branch --depth 1 https://github.com/garrytan/gstack.git ~/gstack
cd ~/gstack && ./setup --host auto      # or: ./setup --host codex
./setup --status                         # one row per install: host, tier, scope, version, path
```

An explicit `--host X` installs for X only and never changes another agent's
install. `/gstack-upgrade` refreshes every install it registered, one row per
host, and says which ones failed.

A checkout carries skills only for the agents installed from it. Setup records
them in `.gstack-installed-hosts` and never drops one, so adding an agent later
is just `./setup --host <name>`. Copies rendered for other agents are pruned:
generated files move to `~/.gstack/backups/host-renders/`, and files gstack
can't prove it generated stay where they are. A global Claude install went
from 632 `SKILL.md` files (34.7 MB) to its own 63 (2.5 MB), which keeps Cursor-agent
from freezing on the skills tree (#1694). In a development checkout,
`bun run build` still renders every agent; inside an install it renders the
recorded ones, and `GSTACK_RENDER_HOSTS=all bun run build` renders them all.

Tiers: **full** is certified by a real workflow run (see
[Certify your host](docs/ADDING_A_HOST.md#certify-your-host)); **experimental**
installs and passes the conformance tests but has no certification run yet;
**instruction-only** installs nothing: setup prints what to copy.

| Agent | Tier | Install | First invocation | Safety skills | Outside review needs | Repair |
|-------|------|---------|------------------|---------------|----------------------|--------|
| Claude Code | full | `--host claude` (default) | `/office-hours` | enforced (hooks block) | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host claude` |
| OpenAI Codex CLI | experimental | `--host codex` → `${CODEX_HOME:-~/.codex}/skills/gstack-*/` | ask for `gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Claude Code CLI, signed in | `./setup --host codex` |
| OpenCode | experimental | `--host opencode` → `~/.config/opencode/skills/gstack-*/` + `/gstack-*` commands | `/gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host opencode` |
| Cursor | experimental | `--host cursor` → `~/.cursor/skills/gstack-*/` | ask for `gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host cursor` |
| Factory Droid | experimental | `--host factory` → `~/.factory/skills/gstack-*/` | ask for `gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host factory` |
| Kiro | experimental | `--host kiro` → `~/.kiro/skills/gstack-*/` | ask for `gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host kiro` |
| GitHub Copilot CLI | experimental | `--host copilot` → `~/.copilot/skills/gstack-*/` | `/gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host copilot` |
| Antigravity CLI | experimental | `--host agy` (or `--host antigravity`) → `~/.gemini/antigravity-cli/skills/gstack-*/` | `/gstack-office-hours` | advisory, not blocked | Codex CLI, signed in | `./setup --host agy` |
| Slate | instruction-only | `--host slate` (points at the Claude install; Slate reads `.claude/skills`) | `/office-hours` via the Claude install | advisory, not blocked | — | `./setup --host claude` |
| OpenClaw | instruction-only | `--host openclaw` (prints the digest path; ACP spawns Claude Code — [docs/OPENCLAW.md](docs/OPENCLAW.md)) | "Load gstack. Run /review" | advisory, not blocked | — | re-copy the digest after upgrades |
| Hermes | instruction-only | `--host hermes` (prints the digest path and `gen:skill-docs --host hermes`) | copy the digest, or render skills yourself | advisory, not blocked | — | re-copy the digest after upgrades |
| GBrain (mod) | instruction-only | `--host gbrain` (brain-aware variants ship from the GBrain repo) | — | advisory, not blocked | — | — |

Copilot invokes gstack skills by their prefixed names (`/gstack-review`) because
`/review` is a Copilot built-in. Copilot ignores skill hooks, so `/careful` and
`/freeze` only advise there, and `COPILOT_HOME` other than `~/.copilot` is not
supported yet (setup refuses and changes nothing).

Antigravity CLI also invokes skills by prefixed name (`/gstack-review`). Setup
writes only `~/.gemini/antigravity-cli/skills/gstack*`: Gemini CLI's
`~/.gemini/skills` and settings are never touched, and `--host auto` selects
Antigravity only when `agy` is on `PATH` or `~/.gemini/antigravity-cli` exists,
never for a Gemini-CLI-only `~/.gemini`. The Antigravity 2.0 app and IDE read
`~/.gemini/config/skills`, which this host does not install.

Outside reviews require the selected CLI to be installed and authenticated: Claude Code when using gstack in Codex, or Codex on other harnesses. External harnesses discover these commands as `/gstack-claude-code` and `/gstack-codex`; each harness omits its own wrapper. Explicit provider requests keep that provider. The existing `codex_reviews` setting controls automatic outside reviews where supported, regardless of the provider selected.

`/claude` has been renamed to `/claude-code`. Re-run `./setup --host <name>` to migrate managed installations, including other harnesses sharing the checkout. Setup preserves the previous installation if replacement generation or installation fails and prints repair instructions.

**Instruction-only tier (any rules-reading agent — Zed, Amp, Jules, side projects):**
copy the 2KB digest at [`agents-digest/gstack-AGENTS.md`](agents-digest/gstack-AGENTS.md)
into a location your agent reads (for example, append it to your project's `AGENTS.md`).
It carries gstack's ethos, reuse ladder, and voice rules — no install required. The
digest's first line shows its gstack version; re-copy it after upgrading.

For Codex, setup reads the top-level `model` from
`${CODEX_HOME:-~/.codex}/config.toml` and generates the matching behavioral
profile, falling back to `gpt-6-astra` when no usable model is configured.
`gpt-5.6-sol` automatically receives bounded-scope instructions that
finish the requested lake without expanding into adjacent cleanup or speculative
hardening. The Sol profile is exact-match only: dated snapshots and other 5.6
variants get the generic GPT profile, and setup warns on near-misses like
`gpt-5.6-sol-2026-08-01`. Override detection with `./setup --host codex --model <id>` — the
override applies to that run only; set `model` in your Codex `config.toml` to
make it stick across upgrades. After changing your Codex model, rerun
`./setup --host codex` to regenerate the skills.

**Plan-review and implementation tiers.** Plan workflows use an independent
`frontier` reviewer: Fable 5.1 from Codex, or GPT-6 Astra from Claude Code.
Implementation handoffs recommend the `smart` tier: Opus 5.5 or GPT-6.1 Sol.
Choose a different tier, pin either provider's model, or use `host` mode to
preserve native model settings. The read-only `gstack-models` command explains
the effective choices; changing these settings does not require regenerating
skills or switch your running session. A weekly maintenance check flags changed
official recommendations and retirement notices without automatically changing
models. See [model policy: setup, overrides and freshness](docs/model-policy.md).

**Other Codex calls keep their existing selection.** Without the explicit
`plan-review` role (including ordinary review and ship adversarial passes), gstack picks the model in this
order: a model you name for that request, then `GSTACK_CODEX_MODEL`, then
`model` in your Codex `config.toml` (for native `codex review`, `review_model`
first; a custom `CODEX_HOME` is honored), and only then gstack's default,
`gpt-6-astra`. Before spending anything, it prints the choice and where it came
from, for example `CODEX_MODEL: gpt-5.6-terra (exec; source: ~/.codex/config.toml model)`.
If your choice is invalid or your account cannot use it, gstack stops with a
repair message and reports the outside review as unavailable. It never silently
switches to its default. Nested Codex reviews also run with installed skills
hidden (`-c skills.include_instructions=false`), so a review cannot turn into a
whole nested skill run. Runtime model selection is separate from the setup-time
behavioral profile above. Without the plan-review role, `/claude-code` (`gstack-claude-code`
on Codex) preserves Claude's configured model. Set `GSTACK_CLAUDE_MODEL=<model>`
or name a model in your request to override it for the invocation, including
resumed consultations. See [eval defaults and overrides](CONTRIBUTING.md#testing--evals)
for capture, judge, and benchmark model selection.

The design binary (`$D`) uses OpenAI's `gpt-5.5` by default, with image
generation through `gpt-image-2`. Set `GSTACK_DESIGN_MODEL=<model>` to use
another gpt-5-class model for both image generation and screenshot analysis;
if OpenAI rejects it, the error names `GSTACK_DESIGN_MODEL`. Set
`GSTACK_DESIGN_IMAGE_MODEL=<gpt-image model>` to change the image tool model; a
value that is not a gpt-image model name is refused before any request. Check a
key against the defaults with `bun run design/scripts/live-model-check.ts`,
which always tests the default models and ignores both overrides; the weekly
periodic census runs the same check. Set `OPENAI_BASE_URL` to send every `$D`
call to an OpenAI-compatible gateway instead of `api.openai.com`; egress
receipts record the gateway host. On Codex, `/design-shotgun` generates mockups
with Codex's built-in `$imagegen` skill instead, so it needs no
`OPENAI_API_KEY`; `$D` still builds and serves the comparison board.

**Want to add support for another agent?** See [docs/ADDING_A_HOST.md](docs/ADDING_A_HOST.md).
Rendering a new agent is one TypeScript config file; installing it also needs a
setup arm and the conformance kit, and it starts as experimental.

## See it work

```
You:    I want to build a daily briefing app for my calendar.
You:    /office-hours
Claude: [asks about the pain — specific examples, not hypotheticals]

You:    Multiple Google calendars, events with stale info, wrong locations.
        Prep takes forever and the results aren't good enough...

Claude: I'm going to push back on the framing. You said "daily briefing
        app." But what you actually described is a personal chief of
        staff AI.
        [extracts 5 capabilities you didn't realize you were describing]
        [challenges 4 premises — you agree, disagree, or adjust]
        [generates 3 implementation approaches with effort estimates]
        RECOMMENDATION: Ship the narrowest wedge tomorrow, learn from
        real usage. The full vision is a 3-month project — start with
        the daily briefing that actually works.
        [writes design doc → feeds into downstream skills automatically]

You:    /plan-ceo-review
        [reads the design doc, challenges scope, runs 10-section review]

You:    /plan-eng-review
        [ASCII diagrams for data flow, state machines, error paths]
        [test matrix, failure modes, security concerns]

You:    Approve plan. Exit plan mode.
        [writes 2,400 lines across 11 files. ~8 minutes.]

You:    /review
        [AUTO-FIXED] 2 issues. [ASK] Race condition → you approve fix.

You:    /qa https://staging.myapp.com
        [opens real browser, clicks through flows, finds and fixes a bug]

You:    /ship
        Tests: 42 → 51 (+9 new). PR: github.com/you/app/pull/42
```

You said "daily briefing app." The agent said "you're building a chief of staff AI" — because it listened to your pain, not your feature request. Eight commands, end to end. That is not a copilot. That is a team.

## The sprint

gstack is a process, not a collection of tools. The skills run in the order a sprint runs:

**Think → Plan → Build → Review → Test → Ship → Reflect**

Each skill feeds into the next. `/office-hours` writes a design doc that `/plan-ceo-review` reads. `/plan-eng-review` writes a test plan that `/qa` picks up. `/review` catches bugs that `/ship` verifies are fixed. Nothing falls through the cracks because every step knows what came before it.

| Skill | Your specialist | What they do |
|-------|----------------|--------------|
| `/office-hours` | **YC Office Hours** | Start here. Six forcing questions that reframe your product before you write code. Pushes back on your framing, challenges premises, generates implementation alternatives. Design doc feeds into every downstream skill. |
| `/plan-ceo-review` | **CEO / Founder** | Rethink the problem. Find the 10-star product hiding inside the request. Four modes: Expansion, Selective Expansion, Hold Scope, Reduction. |
| `/plan-eng-review` | **Eng Manager** | Lock in architecture, data flow, diagrams, edge cases, and tests. Forces hidden assumptions into the open. |
| `/plan-design-review` | **Senior Designer** | Rates each design dimension 0-10, explains what a 10 looks like, then edits the plan to get there. AI Slop detection. Interactive — one AskUserQuestion per design choice. |
| `/plan-devex-review` | **Developer Experience Lead** | Interactive DX review: explores developer personas, benchmarks against competitors' TTHW, designs your magical moment, traces friction points step by step. Three modes: DX EXPANSION, DX POLISH, DX TRIAGE. 20-45 forcing questions. |
| `/design-consultation` | **Design Partner** | Build a complete design system from scratch. Researches the landscape, proposes creative risks, generates realistic product mockups. Writes `DESIGN.md` in the open DESIGN.md format, so impeccable, Google Stitch, and any tool that reads it share one file. |
| `/review` | **Staff Engineer** | Find the bugs that pass CI but blow up in production. Auto-fixes the obvious ones. Flags completeness gaps and gate integrity: every weakened test, timeout, snapshot or suppression reaches a human by name. Advisory simplification lens flags over-built code — never blocks, never auto-applies. |
| `/deslop-shared-libs` | **Shared Code Reviewer** | Find worthwhile shared-code extractions in recent work. Compares up to five opportunities and recommends the best three, with source evidence, reliability gains, and total code savings. Recommendations only. |
| `/test-audit` | **Test Auditor** | Sweep existing tests for ones that cost more than they protect: source greps, duplicates, assertion-free probes, test-only exports. Every candidate carries an evidence card; report-only unless you approve a batch. |
| `/investigate` | **Debugger** | Systematic root-cause debugging. Iron Law: no fixes without investigation. Traces data flow, tests hypotheses, stops after 3 failed fixes. |
| `/design-review` | **Designer Who Codes** | Same audit as /plan-design-review, then fixes what it finds. Atomic commits, before/after screenshots. If you have impeccable installed, its engine runs first and every mechanical finding arrives tagged with its rule id. |
| `/devex-review` | **DX Tester** | Live developer experience audit. Actually tests your onboarding: navigates docs, tries the getting started flow, times TTHW, screenshots errors. Compares against `/plan-devex-review` scores — the boomerang that shows if your plan matched reality. |
| `/design-shotgun` | **Design Explorer** | "Show me options." Generates 4-6 AI mockup variants, opens a comparison board in your browser, collects your feedback, and iterates. Taste memory learns what you like. Repeat until you love something, then hand it to `/design-html`. |
| `/design-html` | **Design Engineer** | Turn a mockup into production HTML that actually works. Pretext computed layout: text reflows, heights adjust, layouts are dynamic. 30KB, zero deps. Detects React/Svelte/Vue. Smart API routing per design type (landing page vs dashboard vs form). One slop-gate pass through the impeccable engine when you have it. The output is shippable, not a demo. |
| `/qa` | **QA Lead** | Explore browser, API, CLI, job and webhook behavior. Reproduce bugs, write failing regressions, fix the cause and re-verify before committing. |
| `/qa-only` | **QA Reporter** | Explore and report with replayable evidence. Suggest regression cases without changing product code or tests. |
| `/pair-agent` | **Multi-Agent Coordinator** | Share gstack's own browser with any AI agent. One command, one paste, connected. Works with OpenClaw, Hermes, Codex, Cursor, or anything that can curl. Each agent gets its own tab. Auto-launches headed mode so you watch everything. Auto-starts ngrok tunnel for remote agents. Scoped tokens, tab isolation, rate limiting, activity attribution. (Runs on the bundled browser — the fallback engine; agents driving Aside just open their own tabs.) |
| `/cso` | **Chief Security Officer** | Security audit with an application model, supported findings, independent challenge, and explicit coverage. Static assessment remains available without catalog profiles. With matching qualified profiles, comprehensive mode adds contained runtime/scanner execution and reviewable repair candidates for Node/Bun, Python, and Rails; no qualified runtime or scanner profile is published yet, so audits run static assessment only. Runtime-tested bundles authenticate separate external assertions. Project-test completion remains `self_reported` because target code controls the test process; `tested` is reserved for a future target-independent completion witness. |
| `/ship` | **Release Engineer** | Sync main, run tests, explore changed behavior, audit coverage, gate integrity and docs, then verify, push and open a PR. |
| `/land-and-deploy` | **Release Engineer** | Merge the PR, wait for CI and deploy, verify production health. One command from "approved" to "verified in production." |
| `/canary` | **SRE** | Post-deploy monitoring loop. Watches for console errors, performance regressions, and page failures. |
| `/benchmark` | **Performance Engineer** | Baseline page load times, Core Web Vitals, and resource sizes. Compare before/after on every PR. |
| `/eval-plan` | **Eval Planner** | Preregister a paid eval before the first priced call: bars, arms, decoys and stop rules, a $0 stub-model dry run over the real inputs, and a three-item priced pilot whose extrapolation and spend table gate the approval. |
| `/document-release` | **Technical Writer** | Audit changed behavior against project docs on every ship, before final verification and publication. Also runs standalone. Shows updated, reviewed/current or blocked docs and any remaining gaps. |
| `/document-generate` | **Documentation Author** | Generate missing docs from scratch using the Diataxis framework. Researches the codebase first, then writes reference / how-to / tutorial / explanation docs that actually match the code. Invokable standalone or chained from `/document-release` when the coverage map finds gaps. Learn more: [tutorial](docs/tutorial-document-generate.md) • [how-to](docs/howto-document-a-shipped-feature.md) • [why Diataxis](docs/explanation-diataxis-in-gstack.md). |
| `/retro` | **Eng Manager** | Team-aware weekly retro. Per-person breakdowns, shipping streaks, test health trends, growth opportunities. `/retro global` runs across all your projects and AI tools (Claude Code, Codex, Gemini). |
| `/browse` | **QA Engineer** | Give the agent eyes. Drives your [Aside](https://aside.com) browser first — your real sessions, real clicks, real screenshots — through deterministic `aside repl` scripts. No Aside? It falls back to gstack's own Chromium: real clicks, ~100ms per command, and `/open-gstack-browser` shows it headed with sidebar, anti-bot stealth, and auto model routing. Every other browser skill stands on it. |
| `/scrape` | **Data Extractor** | Pull structured data off a web page — tables, lists, prices — in your Aside browser with the page's real logged-in state. On the fallback browser, `/skillify` turns the flow into a permanent browser-skill that runs in ~200ms next time. |
| `/setup-browser-cookies` | **Session Manager** | Copy selected cookies from Chrome, Chromium, Brave, Edge, Windows-only Opera and Opera GX, or macOS-only Comet, Arc, and Dia into gstack's bundled browser. Choose your profile and domains; copying and sign-in verification are separate. Only needed on the fallback path — Aside already has your sessions. |
| `/autoplan` | **Review Pipeline** | One command, fully reviewed plan. Runs CEO → design → DX → eng review automatically (eng always last, so the shipping gate reviews the final amended plan) with encoded decision principles. Surfaces only taste decisions for your approval. |
| `/spec` | **Spec Author** | Turn vague intent into a precise, executable spec in five phases (why, scope, technical with mandatory code-reading, draft, file). Outside-review quality gate before filing (Claude Code on Codex; Codex on other harnesses; blocks below 7/10), fail-closed secret redaction, dedupe against existing issues, archive to `$GSTACK_STATE_ROOT/projects/$SLUG/specs/` for team-corpus recall. `--execute` spawns `claude -p` in a fresh worktree; `/ship` auto-closes the source issue on merge. Plan-mode aware. |
| `/learn` | **Memory** | Manage what gstack learned across sessions. Review, search, prune, and export project-specific patterns, pitfalls, and preferences. Learnings compound across sessions so gstack gets smarter on your codebase over time. |
| `/make-pdf` | **Publisher** | Markdown in, publication-quality document out. Mermaid and excalidraw fences render as vector diagrams, fully offline. Images scale to the page and never truncate; wide diagrams get their own landscape page. `--to html` emits one self-contained file, `--to docx` a Word doc. |
| `/diagram` | **Diagram Maker** | English in, editable diagram out. Emits a triplet: mermaid source, `.excalidraw` you can open and edit on excalidraw.com (hand-drawn style), and rendered SVG/PNG. Zero network. Embed the source in markdown and `/make-pdf` renders it. |

### QA without a webpage

Use the same commands for browser and non-browser software. Start in a repository
with its documented native command and an isolated local fixture; name the target
and the behavior you want checked. For example:

```text
/qa-only Test this repo's CLI using its documented local fixture. Check valid and invalid input, exit codes, stdout/stderr, and cancellation. Report only; do not change code or tests. For each finding, include the exact command, expected and actual results, and which checks remain untested. Keep requests inside the fixture; ask before contacting an external service.

/qa Test this repo's local webhook and worker fixture. Explore duplicate deliveries and recovery after a partial failure. Keep all effects inside the fixture; preserve reproduced bugs in native regression tests before repairing them.
```

QA first tells you which surface, tools and write permissions it will use. A CLI or
API does not need a browser. Browser targets keep real browser testing; developer
experience audits load only when onboarding, installation or ergonomics are in scope.
If the native tools or safe fixture are unavailable, the report names the blocker
and untested contracts instead of inventing a pass or installing another framework.

Exploration means learning from each result and choosing the next useful challenge,
not running random commands. Before the next discovery probe, QA saves a short
`exploration-NNN.json` evidence note with the previous result, the assumption being
tested and the next command. The final report links these notes; they do not require
an extra chat message between probes. A discovered bug must be reproducible, and its new test
must fail for the bug before the repair and pass afterward. Unit tests protect logic;
integration and end-to-end tests protect real boundaries that mocks would hide.
`/qa-only` proposes those tests without writing them.

Normal `/review` and `/ship` run a bounded version on changed behavior and nearby
risks automatically, including small diffs without a plan or web server. Existing
fix/test approval rules still apply. Missing dependencies, denied actions and time
limits remain visible coverage gaps; a short smoke pass never means exhaustive QA.
Production access and destructive or external effects require specific permission.

Bounded exploration uses an executable deadline guard, not an estimated clock: it
refuses late probes and stops owned foreground work at the limit. Unfinished checks
stay visible in the report. Required plan checks remain outside the review/ship smoke
budget. See [QA deadlines](docs/reference-qa-deadlines.md) for command, platform and
cleanup limits.

Every ship also runs the existing documentation audit, including repeat ships and
existing PR updates. Clear factual corrections join the final checked change; risky
rewrites need approval. A failed audit stops for recovery or explicit acceptance of
the named risk rather than silently dropping its result. Ship owns versioning, Git
and PR publication; the docs helper does not commit or push independently.

### Which review should I use?

| Building for... | Plan stage (before code) | Live audit (after shipping) |
|-----------------|--------------------------|----------------------------|
| **End users** (UI, web app, mobile) | `/plan-design-review` | `/design-review` |
| **Developers** (API, CLI, SDK, docs) | `/plan-devex-review` | `/devex-review` |
| **Architecture** (data flow, perf, tests) | `/plan-eng-review` | `/review` |
| **All of the above** | `/autoplan` (runs CEO → design → DX → eng, auto-detects which apply; eng always last) | — |

### Power tools

| Skill | What it does |
|-------|-------------|
| `/codex` | **Second Opinion** — independent code review from OpenAI Codex CLI. Review, challenge, and consult modes. Available on every harness except Codex. |
| `/claude-code` | **Second Opinion** — independent code review from Claude Code. Review, challenge, and consult modes, with session continuity for consultation. Available on every harness except Claude Code. |
| `/careful` | **Safety Guardrails** — warns before destructive commands (rm -rf, DROP TABLE, force-push). Say "be careful" to activate. Override any MEDIUM warning; root/home recursive deletes and default-branch force-pushes are hard-denied. |
| `/freeze` | **Edit Lock** — restrict file edits to one directory. Prevents accidental changes outside scope while debugging. |
| `/guard` | **Full Safety** — `/careful` + `/freeze` in one command. Maximum safety for prod work. |
| `/unfreeze` | **Unlock** — remove the `/freeze` boundary. |
| `/open-gstack-browser` | **GStack Browser** — launch gstack's own browser headed, with sidebar, anti-bot stealth, auto model routing (Sonnet for actions, Opus for analysis), one-click cookie import, and Claude Code integration. Clean up pages, take smart screenshots, edit CSS, and pass info back to your terminal. The visible face of the fallback engine; with Aside open you watch the agent's tabs there instead. |
| `/setup-deploy` | **Deploy Configurator** — one-time setup for `/land-and-deploy`. Detects your platform, production URL, and deploy commands. |
| `/setup-gbrain` | **GBrain Onboarding** — from zero to running gbrain in under 5 minutes. PGLite local, Supabase existing URL, or auto-provision a new Supabase project via Management API. MCP registration for Claude Code + per-repo trust triad (read-write/read-only/deny). [Full guide](USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK.md). |
| `/sync-gbrain` | **Keep Brain Current** — re-index this repo's code into gbrain via `gbrain sources add` + `gbrain sync --strategy code`, refresh the `## GBrain Search Guidance` block in CLAUDE.md, and auto-remove guidance when the capability check fails. `--incremental` (default), `--full`, `--dry-run`. Idempotent; safe to re-run. |
| `/gstack-upgrade` | **Self-Updater** — upgrade gstack to latest. Detects global vs vendored install, syncs both, shows what changed. |
| `/ios-qa` | **iOS Live-Device QA (v1.43.0.0+)** — drive a real iPhone or iPad over USB CoreDevice via an embedded `StateServer` in the app. Read Swift source, codegen typed `@Observable` accessors, run the agent loop. Optional `--tailnet` flag exposes the device to OpenClaw or any HTTP-capable agent on your Tailscale tailnet so remote agents can run iOS QA without ever touching the hardware. Capability-tier allowlist (observe/interact/mutate/restore), per-device session lock, audit log. |
| `/ios-fix`, `/ios-design-review`, `/ios-clean`, `/ios-sync` | iOS bug-fix loop, designer's-eye HIG audit, debug-bridge cleanup, and accessor resync. See `docs/skills.md`. End-to-end walkthrough: [docs/howto-ios-testing-with-gstack.md](docs/howto-ios-testing-with-gstack.md). |

### Standalone binaries

Beyond the slash-command skills, gstack ships standalone CLIs for workflows that don't belong inside a session:

| Command | What it does |
|---------|-------------|
| `gstack-model-benchmark` | **Cross-model benchmark** — run the same prompt through Claude, GPT (via Codex CLI), and Gemini; compare latency, tokens, cost, and (optionally) LLM-judge quality score. Auth detected per provider, unavailable providers skip cleanly. Output as table, JSON, or markdown. `--dry-run` validates flags + auth without spending API calls. |
| `gstack-taste-update` | **Design taste learning** — writes approvals and rejections from `/design-shotgun` into a persistent per-project taste profile. Decays 5%/week. Feeds back into future variant generation so the system learns what you actually pick. |
| `gstack-egress` | **Egress receipt auditor** — every gstack-initiated off-machine send writes a tamper-evident, hash-chained receipt to `~/.gstack/security/egress.jsonl` before the send. `list` shows what gstack attempted to send and to which host, `grants` shows the standing consent settings plus the exact command that revokes each, `verify` recomputes the hash chain and exits 3 on tamper (catches edits, reordering, and mid-chain deletion; truncating or deleting the ledger itself is out of scope — it's a forensic log, not tamper-proof storage). |
| `gstack-context-bill` | **Token bill-of-materials** — read-only, offline audit of what an installed skills tree costs in tokens: always-on frontmatter every session pays vs per-invocation SKILL.md + forced references. `--diff` compares two trees, `--budget` enforces a ceiling, `--exact` opts into Anthropic `count_tokens` (sends file text off-machine; writes an egress receipt first, degrades to the offline estimate if the receipt can't be written). |
| `gstack-code-intelligence` | **Code-intelligence provider picker** — wraps GBrain, Sourcebot, and Graphify behind one interface: `options`/`status` to see what's available, `select` to pick one, `index`/`search` to use it, `suggest` to check whether the one-time indexing offer should fire here. The offer triggers on large repos (1,000+ tracked files; a decline is persisted). Non-local providers refuse to index *or search* until you record per-repo consent (`consent <repo> yes\|no` — the query text is repo-derived content), the per-repo trust policy's deny and read-only tiers veto write-class operations regardless of consent, and every off-machine send writes an egress receipt. Fully optional — with nothing selected, gstack falls back to grep. |
| `gstack-verify-gate` | **Verification stop hook (opt-in)** — blocks a Claude Code turn from ending until the project's declared verify command passes (after 3 blocked re-entries it yields with a loud still-RED warning instead of looping forever). Declare it on one line in CLAUDE.md: ``. Hooks bypass the permission system, so a declared command never runs until you trust it once per repo (`gstack-verify-gate --trust`); editing the command invalidates trust until re-granted, and every grant is audit-logged. `./setup` never registers it for you — opt in with `gstack-settings-hook add-event --event Stop --command ~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-verify-gate --source verify-gate`, remove with `gstack-settings-hook remove-source --source verify-gate`. |
| `gstack-memorable` | **Memorable recall bridge (opt-in, third party, Claude Code only)** — connects Claude Code to the external [Memorable](https://memorable.sh) CLI *through gstack* instead of the vendor's own installer, so the hook gets gstack's guarantees: an explicit consent key (`memorable_recall`, off by default, listed by `gstack-egress grants`), a fail-closed egress receipt for every prompt handed over (`gstack-egress list --sink memorable-recall`), a HIGH-tier secret pre-scan, a trust envelope and 8 KiB cap on whatever comes back, an allowlisted environment and process-group containment for the vendor process, and clean removal. `enable` registers the hook at the stable install with a 5 s timeout and never runs the vendor's own consent command; `disable` revokes the gate first and removes the entry by identity even after Claude Code strips the tag; `status` is read-only. gstack never installs Memorable, and what its binary sends is the vendor's claim, not gstack's. Not available on Windows yet. [Full guide](docs/memorable-workflow-memory.md). |
| `gstack-wtree` | **Working-tree fingerprint** — prints a content hash of what's actually on disk (temp index seeded from the stat cache, ~40x cheaper than a full re-hash; untracked source counts, gitignored scratch doesn't). Identical content fingerprints identically through commits, rebases, amends, and squashes — it's what binds reviews and test evidence to content instead of commit SHAs. |
| `gstack-review-log` | **Review-pass receipts** — `--start <skill>` captures the working-tree fingerprint before a diff review; `'<JSON>' --finish <token>` consumes that single-use, repository/branch/skill-scoped receipt. Binding requires matching start/end content and reviewer-reported `completed:true` and `converged:true`; it is not independent proof that a model read the source. `--check-shared-libs <token>` reads a current finding as JSON on stdin and checks prior Skip decisions against the actual branch, capture and eligible raw source blobs. It returns `reusable:false` when proof is missing or unsafe, including older records without logger-versioned coverage. Final review logging computes shared-code fingerprints and coverage rather than trusting supplied proof. |
| `gstack-review-read` | **Review freshness** — emits review records with computed `review_freshness.status` and `reason`: CURRENT, STALE, or UNVERIFIED for diff reviews. `/ship` and `/land-and-deploy` use the same grade; a matching commit alone never certifies a diff review. [Dashboard rules](docs/skills.md#review-readiness-dashboard). |
| `gstack-evidence` | **Verification-evidence ledger** — `run --label <lane> -- <cmd>` transparently wraps any test command (the child's exit code always passes through) and records what ran against which working-tree fingerprint; `check` grades each label FRESH/STALE/MISSING with `--expect-cmd`, `--max-age`, and `--allow-paths` binding. /ship and /land-and-deploy cite fresh evidence instead of re-running suites. Per-run logs are 0600, capped at 2MB, pruned after 30 days; the ledger and logs stay machine-local by design. |
| `gstack-issue-guard` | **Tracker-text trust envelope** — fetches GitHub issue/PR text (`issue <n>`, `pr-body`, `pr-comments`, or `--stdin`) and wraps it in a labeled envelope so agents treat it as data: injection-shaped lines get labeled even through fullwidth and invisible-character evasion, and forged envelope banners are defused. Every tracker-text ingress in gstack routes through it, enforced by a CI scanner. |
| `gstack-ios-qa-daemon` | **iOS QA daemon** — Mac-side broker between an agent and a connected iPhone or iPad over USB CoreDevice. Loopback by default; `--tailnet` opens a Tailscale-facing listener with identity-gated capability tiers. Single-instance via flock on `~/.gstack/ios-qa-daemon.pid`. See [docs/howto-ios-testing-with-gstack.md](docs/howto-ios-testing-with-gstack.md). |
| `gstack-ios-qa-mint` | **iOS allowlist manager** — owner-grant CLI for the tailnet allowlist. `grant`/`revoke`/`list` against `~/.gstack/ios-qa-allowlist.json` (mode 0600). Remote agents never auto-allowlist; this is the explicit-intent path. |
| `gstack-ios-qa-regen` | **iOS bridge regenerator** — deterministically installs the canonical DebugBridge package, generates typed state accessors, and records the installed gstack version. Safe to rerun after source changes or upgrades. |

The private paid CSO evaluation producer is a packaging contract, not an ordinary `bun run build` artifact. On macOS or Linux, a release operator compiles `cso-eval-producer` with the documented hardened Bun flags in the same clean build session as `bun run build:cso`, then installs it beside `gstack-cso-launcher`, `gstack-cso-core`, `gstack-cso-watchdog`, and the hidden `.gstack-cso-generation` manifest as one root-owned, nonwritable five-artifact unit. The producer rejects root execution, writable/symlinked/incomplete installations, and unreviewed provider CLI versions; each receipt binds all five artifact hashes, and collection rejects receipts from different unit identities. See the [clean producer procedure](test/fixtures/cso-eval/README.md#trusted-five-artifact-producer-unit). Paid producer evaluation remains unavailable on Windows because the detached watchdog has no Windows build.

Each producer gets a curated one-cell source copy with directories sealed to `0555` and files to `0444`, plus pre/post content, Git, and mode checks. Claude receives no source add-directory, because an add-directory is a sandbox write root where Claude Code's bubblewrap leaves an empty `.mcp.json` mount point. Its Bash runs inside Claude Code's sandbox with one exception: the exact absolute launcher path that `--allowed-tools` names, which runs outside it as it does for users. The launcher is the boundary there. It replaces its environment with a fixed allowlist, uses only the local Docker Unix socket, and runs every target in hardened containers. The producer passes that policy through `--settings` (sandbox enabled, fail if unavailable, no unsandboxed fallback, no auto-allow, and `excludedCommands` naming only the launcher). It refuses to start the agent (`CLAUDE_PRODUCER_SANDBOX_POLICY_MISMATCH`) unless the generated arguments and environment carry exactly that policy. `CLAUDE_CODE_SUBPROCESS_ENV_SCRUB` stays unset, because it would force the launcher back into the sandbox. Every other Bash command is denied by `--allowed-tools`, and Write is confined to the provider work directory and `cso-home`. Gemini receives no source working directory or include-directory. Codex technically receives read-only filesystem access to the exact curated source root because the trusted helper inherits the Codex permission profile; its private provider work directory and exact `cso-home` artifact directory are the only write roots, every other root path remains denied, and the producer prompt requires source access through the helper. This is evaluation containment for an immutable public fixture, not a claim that Codex cannot directly read that fixture.

Copy each completed cell's receipt together with `state/cso-home/security/cso/` to the trusted adjudication host. Receipt entries are sorted paths relative to that directory and bind every retained file's size and SHA-256 plus an aggregate inventory hash. Provider homes, settings, sessions, and credentials live under separate disposable directories and are removed after the cell; they are never part of the retained artifact tree. The adjudicator must re-hash the transported tree against the receipt before trusting reports or repair bundles.

Paid producer qualification uses this explicit host matrix:

| Producer host | Daily/static cells | Comprehensive target execution |
|---|---|---|
| Codex CLI 0.153.4 | Supported under the custom permission profile | Fails closed because Docker/socket access is not granted to the model command sandbox; report the setup gap as partial |
| Claude Code 2.1.263 | Supported under restricted safe mode | Fails closed when the restricted launcher child cannot reach Docker; report the setup gap as partial |
| Gemini CLI 0.59.0 | Supported with isolated home/settings | Private release qualification host: the exact `run_shell_command(<launcher>)` policy can run the trusted helper without exposing a general shell |

Every setup-blocked comprehensive cell remains a miss in release-gate denominators. The evaluator does not silently count a host or workflow as supported when its containment policy prevents required setup.

`./setup` also registers one default-on Stop hook in `~/.claude/settings.json`:
`gstack-timeline-stop` (closes dangling session-timeline entries when a session
is interrupted; fail-open — 2s internal budget, always exits 0, can never block
a session). Opt out persistently with `./setup --no-timeline-stop-hook` — the
choice lands in the `timeline_stop_hook` config key, survives upgrades, and an
explicit "no" removes a live registration. `GSTACK_TIMELINE_STOP_HOOK=no` and
`gstack-config set timeline_stop_hook no` work too (flag > env > config).
`./setup --no-team` skips it for that run, `gstack-settings-hook remove-source
--source gstack-timeline-stop` removes it by hand, and `gstack-uninstall`
removes it too.

Hook registration is canonical-only: every hook command points at the stable
`~/.claude/skills/gstack` install, never the tree setup ran from, so deleting
a worktree or Conductor workspace can't leave dead hooks erroring in your
sessions. Every `./setup` run also heals first: `gstack-settings-hook
prune-stale --repoint` removes dead gstack hook entries, re-points stale ones
at the stable install, and collapses duplicates, printing one line (and
writing a backup beside the file) only when it changed something.

### Domain skills + raw CDP escape hatch

Two browser primitives in gstack's own engine (the fallback path when Aside isn't there) compound the agent over time:

- **`$B domain-skill save`** — agent saves a per-site note (e.g., "LinkedIn's Apply button lives in an iframe") that fires automatically next time it visits that hostname. Quarantined → active after 3 successful uses → optional cross-project promotion via `$B domain-skill promote-to-global`. Storage lives alongside `/learn`'s per-project learnings file. Full reference: **[docs/domain-skills.md](docs/domain-skills.md)**.
- **`$B cdp <Domain.method>`** — raw Chrome DevTools Protocol escape hatch for the rare case curated commands miss. Deny-default: methods must be explicitly added to `browse/src/cdp-allowlist.ts` with a one-line justification. Two-tier mutex serializes browser-scoped CDP calls against per-tab work. Output for data-exfil methods is wrapped in the UNTRUSTED envelope.

> Want raw CDP with no rails, no allowlist, no daemon — just thin transport from agent to Chrome? [browser-use/browser-harness-js](https://github.com/browser-use/browser-harness-js) is a different philosophy (agent-authored helpers vs gstack's curated commands) and a good fit if you don't want gstack's security stack. The two can coexist: gstack's `$B cdp` and harness can both attach to the same Chrome via Playwright's `newCDPSession`.

**[Deep dives with examples and philosophy for every skill →](docs/skills.md)**

### Karpathy's four failure modes? Already covered.

Andrej Karpathy's [AI coding rules](https://github.com/forrestchang/andrej-karpathy-skills) (17K stars) nail four failure modes: wrong assumptions, overcomplexity, orthogonal edits, imperative over declarative. gstack's workflow skills enforce all four. `/office-hours` forces assumptions into the open before code is written. The Confusion Protocol stops Claude from guessing on architectural decisions. `/review` catches unnecessary complexity and drive-by edits. `/ship` transforms tasks into verifiable goals with test-first execution. If you already use Karpathy-style CLAUDE.md rules, gstack is the workflow enforcement layer that makes them stick across entire sprints, not just single prompts.

## Parallel sprints

gstack works well with one sprint. It gets interesting with ten running at once.

**Design is at the heart.** `/design-consultation` builds your design system from scratch, researches what's out there, proposes creative risks, and writes `DESIGN.md`. But the real magic is the shotgun-to-HTML pipeline.

**`/design-shotgun` is how you explore.** You describe what you want. It generates 4-6 AI mockup variants using GPT Image. Then it opens a comparison board in your browser with all variants side by side. You pick favorites, leave feedback ("more whitespace", "bolder headline", "lose the gradient"), and it generates a new round. Repeat until you love something. Taste memory kicks in after a few rounds so it starts biasing toward what you actually like. No more describing your vision in words and hoping the AI gets it. You see options, pick the good ones, and iterate visually.

**Works with impeccable.** If you use [impeccable](https://impeccable.style) too, gstack does not fight it. gstack runs impeccable's deterministic engine as a pre-pass in `/design-review`, `/review`, `/ship`, and `/design-html` when you have it installed (gstack never runs impeccable's installer or launcher; the first time a design skill finds no engine it asks once whether to download the engine binary, checksum-pinned and logged, into `~/.impeccable`, and remembers your answer), speaks the same 61 rule ids in its own voice, reads `PRODUCT.md`, writes `DESIGN.md` in the open DESIGN.md format both tools read, and hands deferred findings to `/impeccable <command>`. Say no and nothing changes: no nag, no missing step. `gstack-config set design_detector off` turns the pre-pass off. Attribution for the material gstack derived from impeccable and the DESIGN.md spec is in `NOTICE.md`.

**`/design-html` makes it real.** Take that approved mockup (from `/design-shotgun`, a CEO plan, a design review, or just a description) and turn it into production-quality HTML/CSS. Not the kind of AI HTML that looks fine at one viewport width and breaks everywhere else. This uses Pretext for computed text layout: text actually reflows on resize, heights adjust to content, layouts are dynamic. 30KB overhead, zero dependencies. It detects your framework (React, Svelte, Vue) and outputs the right format. Smart API routing picks different Pretext patterns depending on whether it's a landing page, dashboard, form, or card layout. The output is something you'd actually ship, not a demo.

**`/qa` was a massive unlock.** It let me go from 6 to 12 parallel workers. Claude Code saying *"I SEE THE ISSUE"* and then actually fixing it, generating a regression test, and verifying the fix — that changed how I work. The agent has eyes now.

**Smart review routing.** Just like at a well-run startup: CEO doesn't have to look at infra bug fixes, design review isn't needed for backend changes. gstack tracks what reviews are run, figures out what's appropriate, and just does the smart thing. The Review Readiness Dashboard tells you where you stand before you ship.

**Test everything.** `/ship` bootstraps test frameworks from scratch if your project doesn't have one. Every `/ship` run produces a coverage audit. `/qa` creates native regressions when infrastructure is available and explicitly reports missing test coverage; CSS-only fixes may use browser evidence instead. 100% test coverage is the goal — tests make vibe coding safe instead of yolo coding.

**`/document-release` is the engineer you never had.** It audits relevant authored docs against the release diff and corrects factual drift before final verification. Risky changes return for approval. `/ship` invokes it on every run and owns TODOS, release metadata, generation and publication; the child reports updated, current or blocked documentation.

**Aside is the browser gstack drives first.** For browser surfaces, on a Mac with the [Aside](https://aside.com) AI browser open, `/qa`, `/qa-only`, `/design-review`, `/canary`, `/benchmark`, `/scrape`, and `/browse` all run there — your real browser, with your real logged-in sessions, in tabs the agent opens for itself and closes when it's done. No cookie import, no "open the browser" step, no CAPTCHA handoff dance: hit a sign-in wall, sign in inside Aside, say "done", and the agent continues. Anything a page returns is treated as untrusted content — the agent takes syntax from it, never instructions. `/make-pdf`, `/diagram`, and design previews print and screenshot through Aside too (served from your machine on loopback, one render per script), and the planning skills do their web research through Aside's own agent before reaching for a search tool.

**When Aside isn't there, gstack's own browser takes over — automatically.** Linux, Windows, or a Mac with Aside closed: the same skills use the bundled headless Chromium that `./setup` builds, produce the same evidence, and light up the features below that only make sense when the browser is gstack's rather than yours.

**Real browser mode.** `/open-gstack-browser` launches GStack Browser, an AI-controlled Chromium with anti-bot stealth, custom branding, and the sidebar extension baked in. Sites like Google and NYTimes work without captchas. The menu bar says "GStack Browser" instead of "Chrome for Testing." Your regular Chrome stays untouched. All existing browse commands work unchanged. `$B disconnect` returns to headless. The browser stays alive as long as the window is open... no idle timeout killing it while you're working.

**Sidebar agent — your AI browser assistant.** Type natural language in the Chrome side panel and a child Claude instance executes it. "Navigate to the settings page and screenshot it." "Fill out this form with test data." "Go through every item in this list and extract the prices." The sidebar auto-routes to the right model: Sonnet for fast actions (click, navigate, screenshot) and Opus for reading and analysis. Each task gets up to 5 minutes. The sidebar agent runs in an isolated session, so it won't interfere with your main Claude Code window. One-click cookie import right from the sidebar footer.

**Personal automation.** The sidebar agent isn't just for dev workflows. Example: "Browse my kid's school parent portal and add all the other parents' names, phone numbers, and photos to my Google Contacts." Two ways to get authenticated: (1) log in once in the headed browser, your session persists, or (2) click the "cookies" button in the sidebar footer to import cookies from your real Chrome. Once authenticated, Claude navigates the directory, extracts the data, and creates the contacts.

**Prompt injection defense.** Hostile web pages try to hijack your sidebar agent. gstack ships a layered defense: content filters (datamarking, hidden-element stripping, ARIA scrubbing, URL blocklist) on every page read, plus a 22MB ML classifier running locally in a sidecar subprocess that scans page-derived content before the agent sees it, with a verdict combiner that requires classifier agreement before blocking (prevents single-model false positives on Stack Overflow-style instruction pages). Everything runs on your machine, no network calls. Emergency kill switch: `GSTACK_SECURITY_OFF=1`. See [ARCHITECTURE.md](ARCHITECTURE.md#prompt-injection-defense-sidebar-agent) for the full stack.

**Browser handoff when the AI gets stuck.** Hit a CAPTCHA, auth wall, or MFA prompt? `$B handoff` opens a visible Chrome at the exact same page with all your cookies and tabs intact. Solve the problem, tell Claude you're done, `$B resume` picks up right where it left off. The agent even suggests it automatically after 3 consecutive failures.

**`/pair-agent` is cross-agent coordination.** You're in Claude Code. You also have OpenClaw running. Or Hermes. Or Codex. You want them both looking at the same website. Type `/pair-agent`, pick your agent, and a GStack Browser window opens so you can watch. The skill prints a block of instructions. Paste that block into the other agent's chat. It exchanges a one-time setup key for a session token, creates its own tab, and starts browsing. You see both agents working in the same browser, each in their own tab, neither able to interfere with the other. If ngrok is installed, the tunnel starts automatically so the other agent can be on a completely different machine. Same-machine agents get a zero-friction shortcut that writes credentials directly. This is the first time AI agents from different vendors can coordinate through a shared browser with real security: scoped tokens, tab isolation, rate limiting, domain restrictions, and activity attribution.

**Multi-AI second opinion.** In Codex, gstack sends outside reviews to Claude Code through `/claude-code`. In Claude Code, `/codex` sends them to OpenAI Codex. Other harnesses expose both skills and use Codex where automatic outside reviews are supported. Each skill supports code review, adversarial challenge, and consultation with session continuity. Routing follows the harness, so changing your configured model does not change the outside reviewer. Reports identify the provider that actually completed each review; unavailable outside coverage remains visible.

**Safety guardrails on demand.** Say "be careful" and `/careful` warns before any destructive command — rm -rf, DROP TABLE, force-push, git reset --hard. `/freeze` locks edits to one directory while debugging so Claude can't accidentally "fix" unrelated code. `/guard` activates both. `/investigate` auto-freezes to the module being investigated.

**Proactive skill suggestions.** gstack notices what stage you're in — brainstorming, reviewing, debugging, testing — and suggests the right skill. Don't like it? Say "stop suggesting" and it remembers across sessions.

## 10-15 parallel sprints

gstack is powerful with one sprint. It is transformative with ten running at once.

[Conductor](https://conductor.build) runs multiple Claude Code sessions in parallel — each in its own isolated workspace. One session running `/office-hours` on a new idea, another doing `/review` on a PR, a third implementing a feature, a fourth running `/qa` on staging, and six more on other branches. All at the same time. I regularly run 10-15 parallel sprints — that's the practical max right now.

The sprint structure is what makes parallelism work. Without a process, ten agents is ten sources of chaos. With a process — think, plan, build, review, test, ship — each agent knows exactly what to do and when to stop. You manage them the way a CEO manages a team: check in on the decisions that matter, let the rest run.

### Voice input (AquaVoice, Whisper, etc.)

gstack skills have voice-friendly trigger phrases. Say what you want naturally —
"run a security check", "test the website", "do an engineering review" — and the
right skill activates. You don't need to remember slash command names or acronyms.

## Uninstall

### Option 1: Run the uninstall script

If gstack is installed on your machine:

```bash
~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-uninstall
```

This handles skills, symlinks, global state (`~/.gstack/`), project-local state, browse daemons, and temp files. Use `--keep-state` to preserve config and analytics. Use `--force` to skip confirmation.

### Option 2: Manual removal (no local repo)

If you don't have the repo cloned (e.g. you installed via a Claude Code paste and later deleted the clone):

```bash
# 1. Stop browse daemons
pkill -f "gstack.*browse" 2>/dev/null || true

# 2. Remove per-skill directories whose SKILL.md points into gstack/
#    (rm -rf, not rmdir — installed dirs also contain runtime-asset links)
find ~/.claude/skills -mindepth 1 -maxdepth 1 -type d ! -name gstack 2>/dev/null |
while IFS= read -r dir; do
  link="$dir/SKILL.md"
  [ -L "$link" ] || continue
  target=$(readlink "$link" 2>/dev/null) || continue
  case "$target" in
    gstack/*|*/gstack/*)
      rm -rf "$dir"
      ;;
  esac
done
# Directories gstack created carry a .gstack-owned marker (the only signal on
# Windows, where installs are file copies with no symlink to read)
for marker in ~/.claude/skills/*/.gstack-owned; do
  [ -f "$marker" ] && rm -rf "$(dirname "$marker")"
done
# Alias skills install as copies (no symlink to detect) — remove by name
rm -rf ~/.claude/skills/_gstack-command ~/.claude/skills/connect-chrome 2>/dev/null

# 3. Remove gstack
rm -rf ~/.claude/skills/gstack

# 4. Remove global state
rm -rf ~/.gstack

# 5. Remove integrations (skip any you never installed)
rm -rf "${CODEX_HOME:-$HOME/.codex}/skills/gstack"* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.factory/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.kiro/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.openclaw/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.cursor/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.config/opencode/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
rm -rf ~/.gemini/antigravity-cli/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null

# 6. Remove temp files
rm -f /tmp/gstack-* 2>/dev/null

# 7. Per-project cleanup (run from each project root)
rm -rf .gstack .gstack-worktrees .claude/skills/gstack 2>/dev/null
rm -rf .agents/skills/gstack* .factory/skills/gstack* 2>/dev/null
```

Manual removal leaves gstack's hook entries behind in `~/.claude/settings.json`
(the uninstall script removes all of them for you, including entries whose
`_gstack_source` tag was stripped). Edit that file and delete every hook whose
command path points into `.claude/skills/gstack/`: the SessionStart auto-update
hook, the AskUserQuestion PreToolUse/PostToolUse hooks, and the Stop hooks
(session timeline, plus verify-gate if you opted in). Left in place, they error
on every matching event once the install directory is gone.

### Clean up CLAUDE.md

The uninstall script does not edit CLAUDE.md. In each project where gstack was added, remove the `## gstack` and `## Skill routing` sections.

### Playwright

`~/Library/Caches/ms-playwright/` (macOS) is left in place because other tools may share it. Remove it if nothing else needs it.

### Aside

gstack never installed Aside, so it never uninstalls it. Keep it or remove it like any other app.

---

Free, MIT licensed, open source. No premium tier, no waitlist.

I open sourced how I build software. You can fork it and make it your own.

> **We're hiring.** Want to ship real products at AI-coding speed and help harden gstack?
> Come work at YC — [ycombinator.com/software](https://ycombinator.com/software)
> Extremely competitive salary and equity. San Francisco, Dogpatch District.

## GBrain — persistent knowledge for your coding agent

[GBrain](https://github.com/garrytan/gbrain) is a persistent knowledge base for AI agents — think of it as the memory your agent actually keeps between sessions. GStack gives you a one-command path from zero to "it's running, my agent can call it."

```bash
/setup-gbrain
```

Four paths, pick one:

- **Supabase, existing URL** — your cloud agent already provisioned a brain; paste the Session Pooler URL, now this laptop uses the same data.
- **Supabase, auto-provision** — paste a Supabase Personal Access Token; the skill creates a new project, polls to healthy, fetches the pooler URL, hands it to `gbrain init`. ~90 seconds end-to-end.
- **PGLite local** — zero accounts, zero network, ~30 seconds. Isolated brain on this Mac only. Great for try-first; migrate to Supabase later with `/setup-gbrain --switch`.
- **Remote gbrain MCP** — your brain runs on another machine (Tailscale, ngrok, internal LAN) or a teammate's server; paste an MCP URL and bearer token. Optionally pair with a local PGLite for symbol-aware code search in split-engine mode. Best for cross-machine memory without standing up a local DB.

After init, the skill offers to register gbrain as an MCP server for Claude Code (`claude mcp add gbrain -- gbrain serve`) so `gbrain search`, `gbrain put`, etc. show up as first-class typed tools — not bash shell-outs.

**Keeping the brain current.** Run `/sync-gbrain` from any repo to re-index its code into gbrain (incremental by default, `--full` for a full reindex, `--dry-run` to preview). The skill registers the cwd as a federated source via `gbrain sources add`, runs `gbrain sync --strategy code`, and writes a `## GBrain Search Guidance` block to your project's CLAUDE.md so the agent prefers `gbrain search`/`code-def`/`code-refs` over Grep. The block is removed automatically if the capability check fails — no stale guidance pointing at tools that aren't installed.

**Per-remote trust policy.** Each repo on your machine gets one of three tiers:

- `read-write` — agent can search the brain AND write new pages back from this repo
- `read-only` — agent can search but never writes (best for multi-client consultants: search the shared brain, don't contaminate it with Client A's work while in Client B's repo)
- `deny` — no gbrain interaction at all

The skill asks once per repo. The decision is sticky across worktrees and branches of the same remote.

**GStack memory sync (different feature, same private-repo infra).** Optionally pushes your gstack state (learnings, CEO plans, design docs, retros, developer profile) to a private git repo so your memory follows you across machines, with a one-time privacy prompt (everything allowlisted / artifacts only / off) and a defense-in-depth secret scanner that blocks AWS keys, tokens, PEM blocks, and JWTs before they leave your machine.

```bash
gstack-artifacts-init
```

**Running gstack in Conductor?** Conductor explicitly strips `ANTHROPIC_API_KEY` and `OPENAI_API_KEY` from every workspace's process env, so paid evals and gbrain embeddings won't work out of the box. Set `GSTACK_ANTHROPIC_API_KEY` and `GSTACK_OPENAI_API_KEY` in Conductor's workspace env config instead — gstack's TS entry points promote them to canonical names at runtime. Full details and the contributor checklist for adding the import to new entry points: [Conductor + GSTACK_* env vars](USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK.md#conductor--gstack_-env-vars).

**Full monty — every scenario, every flag, every bin helper, every troubleshooting step:** [USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK.md](USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK.md)

Other references: [docs/gbrain-sync.md](docs/gbrain-sync.md) (sync-specific guide) • [docs/gbrain-sync-errors.md](docs/gbrain-sync-errors.md) (error index)

## Docs

| Doc | What it covers |
|-----|---------------|
| [Skill Deep Dives](docs/skills.md) | Philosophy, examples, and workflow for every skill (includes Greptile integration) |
| [Diagrams & Document Formats](docs/howto-diagrams-and-formats.md) | Mermaid/excalidraw fences in PDFs, image sizing and safety defaults, `--to html\|docx`, `/diagram` triplets |
| [Builder Ethos](ETHOS.md) | Builder philosophy: Boil the Ocean, Search Before Building, three layers of knowledge |
| [Using GBrain with GStack](USING_GBRAIN_WITH_GSTACK.md) | Every path, flag, bin helper, and troubleshooting step for `/setup-gbrain` |
| [GBrain Sync](docs/gbrain-sync.md) | Cross-machine memory setup, privacy modes, troubleshooting |
| [Architecture](ARCHITECTURE.md) | Design decisions and system internals |
| [Browser](BROWSER.md) | How gstack drives Aside first (the contract, the cookbook, rendering, research), when the fallback engine kicks in, and the fallback's full `$B` command reference |
| [Contributing](CONTRIBUTING.md) | Dev setup, testing, contributor mode, and dev mode |
| [Memorable recall bridge](docs/memorable-workflow-memory.md) | Opt-in third-party workflow memory through gstack: two consents, what gstack hands over and can attest, removal, troubleshooting |
| [Troubleshooting](docs/troubleshooting.md) | Every `not run` / `unavailable` message, what it means, and the fix |
| [Changelog](CHANGELOG.md) | What's new in every version |

## Privacy & Telemetry

gstack sends nothing about how you use it unless you opt in. Three kinds of
network traffic exist, and each has its own switch.

**Telemetry (opt-in, default off).** On first run gstack asks once. You can say
no, and `gstack-config set telemetry off` turns it off at any time.

- **What's sent, per skill run:** skill name, event type, outcome
  (success/error/abort), duration, gstack version, OS and CPU architecture,
  whether the browser was used, whether the run was live or a test, a session
  id, the count of live session markers (below), the error class, the failed step, and an error message passed through gstack's
  secret redaction (cut to 200 characters). `community` adds a stable device
  ID; `anonymous` sends no ID. Prompt-injection detections add the attacking
  page's domain, a payload hash, a confidence score, the detection layer and
  the verdict.
- **What's never sent:** code, file paths, repo names, branch names, prompts,
  or any other content you write.
- **What stays on your machine:** opted in, each run is also logged to
  `~/.gstack/analytics/skill-usage.jsonl` (under your state root; see
  [docs/state-root.md](docs/state-root.md)) with the repo name and branch, so
  `gstack-analytics` can show your own dashboard. `gstack-telemetry-sync`
  deletes those two fields (and, for `anonymous`, the device ID) before
  anything is uploaded. With telemetry off, gstack logs no usage analytics at
  all; nothing new is written there.
- **Where it goes:** [Supabase](https://supabase.com) (an open-source Firebase
  alternative). The schema is in [`supabase/migrations/`](supabase/migrations/),
  so you can verify what's collected. The publishable key in the repo is a
  public key; row-level security denies direct access, and edge functions
  enforce schema checks, event allowlists and field length limits.

**Update check (on by default, regardless of telemetry).** Every interactive
skill start runs `gstack-update-check`. When its cache is stale (60 minutes after an
up-to-date result, 12 hours while an upgrade is pending, 10 minutes after a
failure) it asks GitHub for the latest version: a `git ls-remote` of
`github.com/garrytan/gstack` and a GET of the `VERSION` file from
`raw.githubusercontent.com`. GitHub sees your IP address; nothing about you or
your code is sent. With telemetry on, the same check also posts your gstack
version and OS to gstack's Supabase. Turn the check off with
`gstack-config set update_check false`.

**Outside reviews (on by default; the first one prints a notice).** Plan
reviews, `/autoplan`, `/review` and `/ship` adversarial passes, `/ship`'s design
check, `/design-review`, `/design-consultation`, `/office-hours`,
`/document-release` and `/spec` can
ask a second model for an independent review: Codex under Claude Code, Claude
Code under Codex. That sends the review prompt and the relevant code, diff or
plan to that provider, using your own Codex or Claude Code login. The first
send on a machine says which provider and which account. Turn it off with
`gstack-config set codex_reviews disabled`; the binaries that send then refuse
(`not_run`, `consent_missing`) and start nothing, and an unreadable config
counts as disabled. `/codex` and `/claude-code` still run when you ask for
them by name.

**Local state that is not telemetry.** gstack keeps a few local files whatever
your telemetry setting. They are functional state, not usage logs, and the
files are never sent:

- **Session markers:** `~/.gstack/sessions/<pid>`, one empty file per live agent
  session, touched at skill start and deleted after 120 minutes. The count lets
  skills notice several sessions on one machine; with telemetry on, that number
  is the session count above.
- **Project timeline:** `~/.gstack/projects/<repo>/timeline.jsonl` records skill
  starts and finishes with the branch name, for `/context-restore` and `/retro`.
  It leaves the machine only if you turn on `artifacts_sync_mode full`
  ([docs/gbrain-sync.md](docs/gbrain-sync.md)).

**Every off-machine send is receipted.** Any gstack-initiated network send,
telemetry included, writes a hash-chained, tamper-evident receipt to
`~/.gstack/security/egress.jsonl` before the send; sensitive sinks refuse to
send at all if the receipt can't be written. Audit with `gstack-egress list`,
verify the chain with `gstack-egress verify` (exit 3 on tamper), and see the
standing consent settings with `gstack-egress grants`. The ledger records
attempted sends so accidents are auditable; it's an audit trail, not a network
firewall.

**Optional third-party bridges are off by default and receipted too.** The one
that exists today, the [Memorable recall bridge](docs/memorable-workflow-memory.md),
hands your prompt to a locally installed vendor binary only after you run
`gstack-memorable enable`; every hand-off writes a receipt first, the consent
shows up in `gstack-egress grants`, and what the vendor then sends is
documented as the vendor's claim.

## Troubleshooting

**Not sure what's wrong?** Run the doctor: `~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-doctor`
(on other hosts, `./setup --status` in your gstack checkout ends with the
doctor's absolute path). Without starting a skill or spending anything, it
prints one row per check (install, state root, Bun, hooks, Codex and its cached
model probe, artifacts sync, the browse bundle, the other compiled binaries,
the /cso native helper, Claude Code, your largest session journal and recent
/autoplan guard codes), each `ok`, `warn`,
`not configured` or `fail` with the command that fixes it. It exits non-zero
only on `fail`. `--live` also runs the paid Codex model check (one short call).
Paste its output into bug reports.

**A message says `not run`, `unavailable` or names a fix?** Look it up in
[docs/troubleshooting.md](docs/troubleshooting.md): every gate message gstack
prints, what it means, what was kept, and the command that fixes it.

**Skill not showing up?** Run `./setup --status` from your gstack checkout. It
prints every install (host, scope, version, skills directory, source checkout)
and, for a `stale`, `missing` or `unregistered` row, the exact command that fixes
it. The usual fix is to re-run setup from that row's source for that host, e.g.
`cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup` (Claude) or `cd ~/gstack && ./setup --host codex`.
A project install lives in the project's `.claude/skills/gstack` or
`.agents/skills/gstack`; run its `setup` from inside the project.

**Cursor freezes on load, or an agent's gstack skills went missing after an upgrade?** Each checkout now renders skills only for the agents installed from it (#1694). `./setup --status` lists them; `./setup --host <name>` adds one back. Pruned copies are in `~/.gstack/backups/host-renders/<time>-<id>/`, with every path in its `prune.log` ([troubleshooting](docs/troubleshooting.md#host-renders-pruned)).

**`/browse` (or `/qa`, `/design-review`) says `NEEDS_ASIDE` or `ASIDE_NOT_RUNNING`?** That's the probe telling you it's about to use the fallback browser. Want Aside? Open the app and sign in — `aside --version` should print a version and `aside repl 'console.log("ok")'` should print `ok` — then re-run. gstack never installs it for you. Want the fallback on purpose while Aside is open? `GSTACK_SKIP_ASIDE=1` makes every skill, the renderer, and `./setup` treat Aside as absent. When Aside is absent the probe prints `NEEDS_ASIDE: <OS>` and skills trust that line for the macOS-only download pitch; `GSTACK_PLATFORM` overrides the OS it names, for tests and unusual hosts (set it in your shell — gstack never reads it from a project `.env`).

**`/browse` fails on the fallback browser?** `cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && bun install && bun run build`

**`/make-pdf` or `/diagram` can't render?** Same two paths: with Aside open they print through Aside (`bun run ~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-render.ts some.html --screenshot /tmp/out.png` tests it directly, and its first line, `ENGINE=aside` or `ENGINE=browse`, names the browser that actually rendered); without it they use the bundled browser, so `bun run build` is the fix.

**Stale install?** Run `/gstack-upgrade` — or set `auto_upgrade: true` in `~/.gstack/config.yaml`.
On Codex and the other non-Claude hosts, upgrade from a terminal: find the
checkout in the `source` column of `./setup --status`, then
`cd <source> && git pull && ./setup --host <host>`, and start a new session.

**Typing into a specific field with the fallback browser?** `browse type --selector '<css>' <text>`
types into that element; bare `browse type <text>` types into whatever has focus.

**State in the wrong place, or a setting that won't stick?** `~/.claude/skills/gstack/bin/gstack-paths --explain` shows which directory gstack uses for its state and why. See [docs/state-root.md](docs/state-root.md).

**Want shorter commands?** `cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup --no-prefix` — switches from `/gstack-qa` to `/qa`. Your choice is remembered for future upgrades.

**Don't use some skills?** `gstack-config set disabled_skills make-pdf,pair-agent` stops registering them on every host, so their descriptions stop loading into each session. Claude Code updates right away; other hosts on their next `./setup --host <name>` or `/gstack-upgrade`. Their files stay installed, so a skill that calls a disabled one still works (you get a warning). Typos are rejected with the closest skill name, `gstack-upgrade` can't be disabled, and `gstack-config set disabled_skills ""` re-enables everything.

**Want namespaced commands?** `cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup --prefix` — switches from `/qa` to `/gstack-qa`. Useful if you run other skill packs alongside gstack.

**Codex says "Skipped loading skill(s) due to invalid SKILL.md"?** Your Codex skill descriptions are stale. `${CODEX_HOME:-~/.codex}/skills/gstack` is a runtime directory, not the checkout: `./setup --status` shows the Codex row's source checkout. Fix: `cd <that source> && git pull && ./setup --host codex` — for a repo-local install, run it from inside the project.

**Windows users:** gstack works on Windows 11 via Git Bash or WSL. Aside is macOS-only, so on Windows (and Linux) the browser skills, `/make-pdf`, and `/diagram` always use gstack's bundled browser. Node.js is required in addition to Bun — Bun has a known bug with Playwright's pipe transport on Windows ([bun#4253](https://github.com/oven-sh/bun/issues/4253)). The browse server automatically falls back to Node.js. Make sure both `bun` and `node` are on your PATH. Native `/cso` additionally requires PowerShell (PowerShell 7 `pwsh` is preferred; Windows PowerShell 5.1 is the fallback) and Visual Studio 2022 Build Tools with the Desktop development with C++ workload; setup leaves that skill explicitly unavailable when they are absent. /cso is optional: if its native helper fails to build or publish, setup still finishes, says which step failed with the log path and retry command, and keeps an earlier helper when it has one (`GSTACK_STRICT_BUILD=1` makes that failure fatal, as CI does).

**Known issue: Windows Smart App Control** ([#2595](https://github.com/garrytan/gstack/issues/2595)). gstack's compiled binaries (`browse`, `find-browse`, `design`, `pdf`, `gstack-global-discover`) are built on your machine and unsigned, so Windows 11 with Smart App Control on refuses to start them; Git Bash shows `Permission denied`. setup detects this, names the blocked binaries and the skills that need them, and `gstack-doctor` reports them as `blocked`. Today's workarounds are running gstack inside WSL, or turning Smart App Control off. Details: [troubleshooting](docs/troubleshooting.md#windows-smart-app-control). The sidebar terminal uses Consolas on Windows, so its text no longer renders spaced out.

From PowerShell, `.\setup.ps1` (same arguments as `./setup`) checks that Git for Windows, Bun and Node.js are on PATH, prints the `winget` command for any that are missing, and otherwise runs `./setup` in Git Bash.

On Windows without Developer Mode (MSYS2 / Git Bash), `setup` falls back to file copies instead of symlinks because `ln -snf` produces frozen copies that don't refresh on `git pull`. **Re-run `cd ~/.claude/skills/gstack && ./setup` after every `git pull`** so your skill files match the repo. `setup` prints a one-line note reminding you. Unix and WSL keep symlinks and don't need the re-run.

**Chromium install failed or hung during `./setup`?** The bundled browser is
best-effort: setup records the reason, finishes registering every skill, and
prints which skills are affected (`/qa`, `/qa-only`, `/design-review`,
`/browse`, make-pdf, `/diagram`, `/pair-agent`). With Aside open, the browser
skills keep running in Aside and only the fallback engine is missing;
`/pair-agent` always needs the bundled browser. Fix the cause and re-run
`./setup`. Knobs:
`GSTACK_PLAYWRIGHT_INSTALL_TIMEOUT=<seconds>` raises the download bound
(default 600) on slow links; `GSTACK_SKIP_PLAYWRIGHT=1` skips the Chromium
install entirely (CI, no-browser boxes); `GSTACK_CHROMIUM_NO_SANDBOX=1` is the
fix when Chromium installs but cannot launch because the host blocks
unprivileged user namespaces (Ubuntu 24.04+ AppArmor default, #2157).

**Setup ended with "Not registered (a skill you own already uses the name; left untouched)"?**
gstack only deletes or links over a skill entry it can prove it created: a
symlink into gstack, a directory carrying the `.gstack-owned` marker `./setup`
writes into every directory it creates, or a SKILL.md that is byte-identical to
gstack's or carries the generated `` banner. A
`qa/` or `ship/` you wrote yourself is left untouched by `./setup`,
`gstack-relink`, and both prefix-mode flips, and the linker names it in the
final summary. Rename or move yours, or switch modes (`./setup --prefix` /
`--no-prefix`) so the names stop colliding. If you started your own skill from
a generated gstack SKILL.md and then edited it, that file is moved to
`~/.gstack/backups/skills/<timestamp>/<skill>/SKILL.md` before gstack's is
linked in, never deleted.

**Claude says it can't see the skills?** Make sure your project's `CLAUDE.md` has a gstack section. Add this:

```
## gstack
Use /browse from gstack for all web browsing. Never use mcp__claude-in-chrome__* tools.
Available skills: /office-hours, /plan-ceo-review, /plan-eng-review, /plan-design-review,
/design-consultation, /design-shotgun, /design-html, /review, /deslop-shared-libs, /test-audit, /ship, /eval-plan, /land-and-deploy,
/canary, /benchmark, /browse, /open-gstack-browser, /qa, /qa-only, /design-review, /scrape,
/setup-browser-cookies, /setup-deploy, /setup-gbrain, /sync-gbrain, /retro, /investigate,
/document-release, /document-generate, /codex, /cso, /autoplan, /pair-agent, /careful, /freeze,
/guard, /unfreeze, /gstack-upgrade, /learn.
```

## License

MIT. Free forever. Go build something.

Repository info

Default branch: main
Latest version: —
Created: 2026-03-12
Last activity: 2026-10-13
License: MIT
Open issues: 70
Watchers: 777

Contributors

garrytan

429 contributions

test22345

17 contributions

16francej

7 contributions

time-attack

6 contributions

byliu-labs

1 contributions