commandcode-delegate – Coding skill for AI agents

Command Code Delegate

Runtime availability

This catalog tree contains documentation only. scripts/relay.mjs is absent; the relay commands and result fields below describe an external upstream installation, not bundled functionality. Before dispatch, locate a user-approved upstream revision, inspect the exact relay source, license and CLI help, and verify compatibility. Do not execute the absent path, fabricate the helper or claim its tests/results. Brief drafting and independent diff review can proceed without it. Compatibility metadata requires Node 22+; the older Node 18 statement below is superseded.

Delegation may send workspace content to the configured provider and incur charges. Use approved data and minimal credentials, private artifacts and finite time/turn budgets. A worktree does not isolate host files. Existing user authorization applies; ask only for genuinely unapproved host access or expanded scope.

When to Use

• You want to delegate a bounded coding task to a separate commandcode implementer (Command Code) and then review its diff yourself.
• The user explicitly asked for delegation to this implementer.

You are the orchestrator. This skill lets you hand a bounded coding task to a separate

implementer — the Command Code CLI (cmd) — then review what it produced and land it yourself.

You write the brief and own the judgment; Command Code does the typing in your working tree; you

verify and commit.

Nothing here is specific to one orchestrating agent. The loop needs only the ability to run a shell

command and read a file, so it works the same whether you are Claude Code, OpenCode with a selected

model, or any comparable agent. (It is designed for and run on Claude Code; treat other orchestrators

as designed-for, not yet proven.)

When NOT to use this

• The task is small enough to just do inline — delegation overhead is not worth it.
• The cmd CLI is not installed or not authenticated (run cmd login).
• You want to write the code yourself, or you only need a review (Command Code has its own /review).
• You are on native Windows and cmdc --version does not work. Upstream recommends WSL for stable Windows use.

Read this before the first dispatch: the autonomy model

Command Code's headless mode has exactly two states, with nothing in between:

• Default (-p with no --yolo): read, grep, and glob work. Every write, edit, and shell call is

refused by the CLI's permission layer, and headless mode has no prompt to grant them mid-run. This

is the relay's --read-only.

• --yolo (alias --dangerously-skip-permissions): every tool is allowed, anywhere the process

can reach. There is no filesystem sandbox and no path restriction. This is what an implementation

run needs, so the relay passes it by default.

--permission-mode auto-accept and --tools-all do not lift the headless write gate. Direct CLI

probes refused write, edit, and shell with both. So an implementation run

through Command Code is a full-trust run: scope it with a tight brief and a clean working tree, not

with a sandbox. The brief is guidance, and a git worktree isolates a checkout without containing the

process. If writes outside the target tree are unacceptable, use an OS-enforced sandbox such as

codex-delegate or run this one inside a container.

Before a write-capable run, verify whether the user has authorized this unsandboxed mode. Explain the scope and request acceptance only if that authority is absent; do not repeat a previously satisfied confirmation.

Prerequisites (check once)

1. cmd --version succeeds and cmd status reports authenticated. If not, install Command Code and

run cmd login.

2. Confirm the CLI on PATH. On macOS/Linux, command -v cmd shows the active cmd. On native

Windows, use cmdc --version; cmd is the system shell. The relay uses cmdc there and launches

its npm .cmd shim through cmd.exe. COMMANDCODE_BIN remains an absolute-path override and must

never point to the system command interpreter. The relay records the version it ran in

result.json, so a wrong binary is visible after the fact.

3. You are in (or will point --cd at) the target git repository, and its tree is clean before you

dispatch — a full-trust run is much easier to review against a clean baseline.

The loop

Run these five steps per task. Steps 1, 4, and 5 are your judgment; 2 and 3 are mechanical.

1. Write the brief

Command Code sees only the text you send — no repo memory, no chat history, no shared context

(beyond the repo's own AGENTS.md, which it reads automatically). Everything the task needs goes in

the brief: the goal, the current state, what to change, what to leave untouched, the project's

actual gate commands (discover them from the repo's AGENTS.md/CLAUDE.md/Makefile — do not assume),

and a report contract. Tell it that it will not commit (you will). Keep one task per brief. Full

guidance and a template: [references/writing-the-brief.md](references/writing-the-brief.md).

2. Dispatch

Send the brief to Command Code with the bundled helper. It wraps cmd -p, captures the run, and

writes a structured result.json — so your only job is "run a command, read a file." (<skill-dir>

below is this skill's installed directory — the folder containing this SKILL.md, i.e. the directory

you loaded the skill from. Claude Code prints it as "Base directory for this skill" when the skill

loads; on other orchestrators use that same directory — use the explicit installation path supplied by the user or environment rather than searching the entire home directory.)

node "<skill-dir>/scripts/relay.mjs" --brief brief.txt --cd /path/to/repo
# read-only (review/diagnosis, no edits):   add --read-only
# continue the exact session:               add --session <sessionId>  (from result.json; send only the delta brief)
# fallback when no session id is available: add --continue-last
# hard time limit (watchdog):               add --timeout 2h  (default: off; implementation runs routinely need 1-2h)
# see all options:                          node .../relay.mjs --help

The helper defaults to a write-capable (--yolo) run, which intentionally edits the target repository.

Its temp directory keeps only relay artifacts out of that repository. The relay never commits —

see step 5. Mechanics, flags, and the

result.json shape: [references/dispatch-and-poll.md](references/dispatch-and-poll.md).

3. Wait for completion

The helper blocks until Command Code finishes, so back it with whatever your orchestrator offers and

resume when it returns:

• Claude Code: run the Bash call with run_in_background: true; you are notified on completion.
• Plain shell / other agents: run it in the foreground for short tasks, or background it and poll

the result file — … & in bash/zsh, or your shell's equivalent. The run is done when result.json

exists with a status. (A pre-run usage error — bad args or an empty brief — instead exits with code

2 and a stderr message and writes no result file, so check the exit code too. A missing cmd binary

exits 127 but *does* write a result.json with status commandcode_unavailable.)

Do not trust progress trackers over reality: a run is finished when result.json is written and the

process has exited. Read the working tree, not a status line. The implementer's full report is the

finalMessage field in result.json (also printed in full on stdout between the report markers).

4. Review — do not trust the self-report

result.json includes Command Code's own summary and gate claims. Re-verify, don't accept:

• Re-run the project's gates yourself (the test/lint/build commands from step 1). Never take

"gates passed" on faith.

• Read the diff against the brief: did it do what was asked, nothing more (scope creep) and

nothing less? touchedFiles in the result is your starting point — and because the run was

full-trust, check for edits *outside* the paths the brief named, not just inside them.

• Run the relevant guard skills on the diff if you have them installed (clean-code-guard,

test-guard, etc. from guard-skills) — this skill produces the work; those skills judge it.

• For schema/migration changes, round-trip them; for removals, grep for dangling references.

Full checklist: [references/review-and-land.md](references/review-and-land.md).

5. Land it

The relay never commits, but it cannot stop Command Code under --yolo from writing .git. The brief

forbids implementer commits, and the reviewer compares HEAD with the recorded pre-dispatch baseline

before landing anything. The orchestrator commits. Only after the gates pass and the diff holds:

• Commit the verified work yourself, with a clear message.
• If it needs changes, send a delta brief with --session <sessionId> from the prior result.json

(use --continue-last on

… (full content is in the download package)