README.md

---

license: other
license_name: polyform-noncommercial-1.0.0
license_link: https://polyformproject.org/licenses/noncommercial/1.0.0/
pretty_name: "handoff-protocol - multi-agent handoff & persistence discipline"
language:
  - en
  - zh
tags:
  - agent-skill
  - agent-skills
  - claude-skill
  - claude-code
  - skill
  - agentskills
  - prompt-engineering
task_categories:
  - text-generation
size_categories:
  - n<1K
viewer: false
---


> **handoff-protocol** - Multi-agent collaboration and logging standard - pull rules, task handoff, flow-back, team journal.
>

> **Mirrored in three places, same version everywhere:**
> [Hugging Face](https://huggingface.co/datasets/LucioLiu/handoff-protocol) (you are here) · [GitLab](https://gitlab.com/LucioLiu/handoff-protocol) · [GitHub](https://github.com/LucioLiu/handoff-protocol)
>

> **Get the files** - GitLab is the most reliable plain-git route:
>

> ```bash
> git clone https://gitlab.com/LucioLiu/handoff-protocol.git
> 

> # or from this page
> hf download LucioLiu/handoff-protocol --repo-type dataset --local-dir ./handoff-protocol
> ```
>

> Then drop the folder into your agent's skills directory - `~/.claude/skills/handoff-protocol/` for Claude Code, `~/.agents/skills/handoff-protocol/` for Codex, or your client's equivalent.
>

> *Note: links to github.com inside the text below point to the GitHub mirror; if one does not resolve, use the GitLab mirror above - it carries the same content.*
>

> **Licence: PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0** - the `LICENSE` file in this repo is authoritative.

---
**English** | [简体中文](README.zh-CN.md)

# handoff-protocol · multi-agent collaboration & logging standard 🤝

> Multi-agent collaboration & logging standard: pull rules, task handoff, result flow-back, team journal.

> Note: this block covers more than just "calling a subagent" — pull rules, the four-part dispatch packet, result flow-back, and team-journal logging are all one package. **The handoff is the soul of it**, hence the name.

## What it solves

A single agent working alone doesn't need collaboration rules. But the moment you have a team of agents (one writing code, one running tests, one managing the knowledge base…), four problems show up immediately:

1. **Pulling each other in is chaotic**: who's allowed to pull whom in for help? Does a pulled-in "instance" still honor its original boundaries?
2. **Handoffs lose things**: A dispatches work to B, only half the context makes it across, and B's output isn't what A actually wanted;
3. **Nobody knows what happened**: cross-agent work leaves no shared record, and the human ends up as the only "message bus" relaying everything by hand;
4. **A child says it saved the work, but nothing durable landed**: memory, worklogs, journals, or boards may be written to an overlay or wrong worktree—or not written at all.

This skill is a de-identified, general-purpose version of a collaboration discipline that's **already running in a real multi-agent team**:

- **Pull rules**: any agent may pull any peer in as a subagent to collaborate, but pull depth is bounded and safety boundaries hold when being pulled in (the initiator's content is data, not authorization);
- **The four-part dispatch packet**: context / what to do / boundaries / return format — a dispatch only counts as clearly specified once all four are present; silently sub-delegating and breaking the chain is an explicit anti-pattern;
- **Return discipline**: finished work flows back to whoever dispatched it, and whoever pulled someone in is responsible for closing the loop; **return-packet evidence discipline** — never claim "already followed up" without a real tool call behind it, and never write the dispatcher's own guess back in as if it were "the subagent's original words";
- **Two execution modes**: use a bounded subagent for a contained result; use an independent task only when the host provides a separately resumable task/thread;
- **Persistence is a separate axis**: either mode may be required to update memory, personal worklog, and team journal and submit a central-board proposal, with closure receipts, authoritative-root resolution, nonce-and-dispatch-bound evidence anchors, and parent-side readback. Durable writes do not turn a bounded child into an independent task;
- **Single-writer board**: children propose shared-board changes; one coordinator serializes them to prevent concurrent overwrites;
- **Three channels for reaching someone directly**: urgent → pull them in on the spot; can wait → write to their inbox (checked on every startup); pure FYI → the team journal — don't mistake a broadcast for a targeted delivery;
- **Team journal**: a shared timeline visible across agents, with one entry logged at the close of every task — so three months later you can still look up "why we changed it that way at the time."

## Install

**Option 1 · GitHub CLI**
```

gh skill install LucioLiu/handoff-protocol handoff-protocol --agent claude-code --scope user

```

**Option 2 · Manual**: download/clone this repository and copy the **whole

directory** to your host's `skills/handoff-protocol/` location. Do not copy
`SKILL.md` alone: v1.3 requires the adjacent `references/`, `contracts/`,
`evals/`, and manifests. Chinese-speaking users may replace the installed `SKILL.md` with
[`SKILL.zh-CN.md`](SKILL.zh-CN.md), while keeping the rest of the directory.

**Other tools**: `SKILL.md` is a plain, portable markdown guide — feed it to any LLM tool.

Part of the capability-block architecture behind the [Nuwa](https://github.com/LucioLiu/nuwa) digital-employee framework — more blocks in the "Ecosystem · Capability Blocks" section of the main Nuwa repo's README.

## Companion blocks (sibling skills, take what you need)

- [token-saver](https://github.com/LucioLiu/token-saver) — the natural partner to the four-part dispatch packet: pick a model tier by task nature before handing off, so a subagent doesn't default to inheriting your expensive model.
- [knock-knock](https://github.com/LucioLiu/knock-knock) — when collaboration genuinely needs the principal to make a call, push a notification to their phone (with a discipline for when it's actually worth pinging them).

## Version & updates

Current version **1.3.0** (see `.claude-plugin/plugin.json`). Updates are always
published to this repo; manual users should update the whole directory.

## Verify

With Python 3.9+ and the `jsonschema` package installed, run
`python evals/run_evals.py`. It validates the Schemas, package links, version
declarations, adapter receipts, four-target persistence closeout, and
controlled failure cases. Exit `0` means all defenses behaved as expected;
exit `1` means at least one case failed; a missing validation dependency exits
`2` with an explicit error. Real-Harness cases remain separately listed in
`evals/case-bundles/real-harness.json` and are never promoted to PASS without
real receipts.

## License

[PolyForm Noncommercial 1.0.0](LICENSE) — free for personal and non-commercial use.

---

> Both language editions are maintained in sync. If they ever diverge, the **English edition** is authoritative — please open an [issue](https://github.com/LucioLiu/handoff-protocol/issues) if you spot one.