Agentic QA Core — Foundation reference host

agentic-qa-core is the shared reference library that every workflow skill in this repo cites. It exists so doctrine (briefing template, dispatch patterns, orchestration rules, skill composition tiers) lives in one place instead of being duplicated across every SKILL.md.

Loading a workflow skill (e.g. shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-automation) implies loading the relevant agentic-qa-core/references/*.md on demand — workflow skills declare a ## Dependencies block at the top so the AI knows what to pull in.

This skill does NOT orchestrate workflows, does NOT generate files, and does NOT bootstrap a target repo. The entire framework (skills, foundation files, scripts) ships together as one repo; à la carte adoption is not supported — see "Install model" below.

Compact Rules

• DO NOT create, modify, or delete ANY file while acting as agentic-qa-core. It is a passive reference library with no write path of its own.
• DO NOT write .context/ artifacts here (that is /project-discovery), scaffold tests / fixtures / KATA components (that is /test-framework-adaptation and /test-automation), adapt the framework to a stack (/test-framework-adaptation), or sync OpenAPI schemas (bun run api:sync).
• DO NOT orchestrate a workflow or bootstrap a target repo from this skill. It hosts doctrine; the workflow skills execute it.
• WHEN a workflow skill cites agentic-qa-core/references/*.md: load ONLY the files that skill's ## Dependencies block names. Never preload the whole reference set.
• WHEN deriving test cases or coverage from acceptance criteria in ANY testing skill: references/test-design-doctrine.md is mandatory reading first.
• WHEN filing any bug / defect / improvement: references/defect-management-doctrine.md is mandatory reading first.
• WHEN dispatching a subagent: use the 7-component briefing in references/briefing-template.md and pick the pattern via references/dispatch-patterns.md. A subagent that must answer the user directly also loads references/behavioral-layer.md — it inherits no register from the orchestrator.
• WHEN closing a workflow stage: verify that stage's Definition of Done in references/stage-gates.md BEFORE advancing.
• DO edit the owning skill's references/*.md when a rule changes, then run bun run skills:registry, then refresh the deck under packages/decks/agentic-qa-core/. That order keeps prose, registry, and decks from drifting.
• DO treat this boilerplate as clone-in-full. Copying a single skill directory in isolation leaves it without the foundation files it depends on, and it will not function.

Read full SKILL.md when: you need the full table of hosted references and who cites each one, the deck-hosting details, or the exact ## Dependencies block shape to add to a skill.

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References hosted

File	Cited by	Purpose
references/test-design-doctrine.md	shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation	Canonical doctrine for deriving test cases / ATCs from acceptance criteria: the 5 principles (AC-verify ≠ testing; AC = floor not ceiling; criterion-vs-test-case; 1:N explode-default/justify-collapse; risk-outside-criterion), the redefined coverage model, and the formal techniques (EP, BVA, State-Transition, Decision Tables, Pairwise, Error Guessing, Risk-based) with binding triggers + the Test-Design Checklist gate.
references/briefing-template.md	shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation, regression-testing, project-discovery	The 7-component subagent briefing template, with concrete filled examples per dispatch pattern.
references/dispatch-patterns.md	All workflow skills with a "Subagent Dispatch Strategy" section	Decision table + heuristic for picking Single / Sequential / Parallel / Background.
references/stage-gates.md	All workflow skills (shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation, regression-testing)	Definition-of-Done checklist per workflow stage. The orchestrator verifies each stage's DoD (planning stages include the Test-Design Checklist) before appending the progress checkpoint and advancing — turns the prose doctrine into an enforced gate.
references/orchestration-doctrine.md	Subagents that need orchestration rules without pulling the whole AGENTS.md	Cacheable mirror of AGENTS.md §"Orchestration Mode (Subagent Strategy)".
references/behavioral-layer.md	Subagents that must answer the user directly, in any workflow skill	Cacheable mirror of AGENTS.md §2: caveman compression, Butler granularity, PM Voice register, Visual Mapping. A dispatched subagent inherits none of that from the orchestrator, so its report reads in a different voice unless it pulls this.
references/skill-composition-strategy.md	framework-development, every workflow skill	T1-T4 tier model + SDD boundary + composition contract.
references/skill-resolver.md	Skills that resolve composable skills at runtime via the registry	Skill Resolver Protocol used by sub-agent launches. Companion: scripts/build-skill-registry.ts → .agents/skills/REGISTRY.md.
references/preflight-gate.md	shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation, regression-testing, framework-development	Readiness Preflight Gate doctrine — probe tools/MCPs/CLIs/credentials and surface a user checklist BEFORE a skill starts its real work. Owns the secret/token handling + OpenAPI api-login → RESTART flow.
references/mcp-capabilities.md	AGENTS.md Rule #10 / §5 / §6, preflight-gate.md §8, every skill declaring metadata.requires_capabilities	The MCP capability vocabulary (web-search, library-docs, db, api-schema): tool-name suffixes that provide each one (a prefix is a server, a suffix is the capability, so a claude.ai connector or a user-level server qualifies), the committed .mcp.json server, how to enable a missing one per host, the frontmatter declaration + correspondence rule, and the point-of-use STOP (never a silent fallback). Mirrored by the CAPABILITY-VOCAB and CAPABILITY-UNDECLARED checks in scripts/lint-skills.ts.
references/adr-doctrine.md	project-discovery, framework-development, sprint-testing, test-automation	When a test-architecture decision earns an ADR (two-gate test: architectural AND hard-to-reverse) + the detect → draft → record procedure. Test architecture = runner/framework choice, Page-Object vs Screenplay, fixture/data strategy, isolation & parallelization, auth-in-tests, selector contract, exploratory-vs-scripted boundary, reporting/CI sharding, flake-retry policy.
references/api-testing-doctrine.md	sprint-testing, test-automation, test-documentation	Canonical API-testing maneuver (agentic level, not KATA code): the three-tool split — OpenAPI MCP = schema READ-ONLY (discover endpoints/schemas), bun run api:login = mint token only (→ .auth/tokens.env env var API_TOKEN_<ROLE>_<ENV> + .auth/tokens.json keyed <ROLE>_<ENV>; --profile <name> isolates both under .auth/profiles/<name>/), curl = authenticated execution. Covers the schema-drift caveat (dev/latest vs target env), token-freshness checks, and the "shell env vars don't persist across the agent's Bash calls → source per curl call" rule.
references/db-testing-doctrine.md	sprint-testing (trifuerza DB leg), test-automation	Canonical DB-testing maneuver, sibling of the API one: DBHub MCP as [DB_TOOL] (tools named {tool}_{source_id}, so execute_sql_primary / search_objects_primary), dbhub.toml interpolating ${DBHUB_*} from the launch environment, the DBHUB_* vars .env.example declares, the validation query cookbook (orphans, duplicates, numeric mismatch, timestamp windows, four strategies, checklist) and connection troubleshooting.
references/mcp-atlassian-optin.md	acli, agentic-qa-onboard, anyone enabling MCP-level Jira access or debugging agents:compat:check	The opt-in Atlassian MCP block for Claude / OpenCode / Codex (literal JIRA_URL from bun run --silent jira:url, {file:} secrets on OpenCode, env_vars on Codex) and the MCP parity contract (what the check compares and why Codex never gets a placeholder).
references/planning-ladder.md	sprint-testing, regression-testing, project-context, test-documentation, the sync scripts	The ratified QA Planning Ladder: altitudes (MTP / FTP / STP / ATP / RTP and their Runs), the {ACRONYM}: {scope}: {desc} title grammar, the four QA-process Epics, items-over-fields, with the RTP/RTR amendments.
references/defect-management-doctrine.md	sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation, regression-testing	Canonical doctrine for filing and owning quality issues: Bug / Defect / Improvement classified by the FEATURE's lifecycle stage (not by where it was found), QA Assignee self-set and never overwritten, mandatory Components, the three-axis model (parent = QA process epic, link = source Story, components = product module), the mandatory field matrix and the Severity → Priority derivation.
references/traceability-linking.md	shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, regression-testing	Turning declared traceability into real Jira issue links — Story ↔ test-artifact coverage, Story → Bug causation, Story → Bug blocking, the TC → ATS → Story cascade, and the post-create verification recipe. Local declarations document intent; these links are what a consumer walking issuelinks actually reads.
references/session-management.md	Every long/medium workflow skill (Phase 0 resume check, Phase N archive)	The long-skill resume contract: plan-first persistence under .session/<skill-slug>/<scope>/, the per-stage progress checkpoint, resume detection after an interruption, and the topic-key conventions for artifact tagging.
references/session-footer-contract.md	Every skill explicitly marked in its metadata as the owner of a stage (metadata.stage_owner: true)	The chat-facing close-out contract: the two blocks the AI surfaces unprompted at session end (captured evidence paths; skills / MCPs / CLIs used + testing-pyramid levels touched, "none" stated per untouched level). Chat only — never a Jira comment or ATR body.
references/evidence-conventions.md	sprint-testing, bug-screenshot-annotation, regression-testing, and any subagent briefed to capture evidence	The shared three-bucket model for every file produced while testing, plus the naming contract. Prevents the two recurring failures: stray artifacts at the repo root, and "evidence" claimed in a report that never existed on disk.
references/acli-integration.md	Every skill that resolves [ISSUE_TRACKER_TOOL] / [TMS_TOOL] to /acli	The QA-side plug for the tool-agnostic acli skill: which slug, which status, which custom field, which modality. Load it BEFORE the tool surface — acli/SKILL.md answers how the binary works, this answers what to send it here.
references/jira-publishing-gotchas.md	Any skill about to publish to a Jira rich-text field (Story / Bug / Test body or custom field)	The Markdown → ADF conversion edges that produce an HTTP 400 at publish time, and how to pre-empt them. Scope boundary: this is what BREAKS; acli/references/adf-authoring-style.md is what reads well.
references/skill-refinement-protocol.md	Every skill marked metadata.stage_owner: true in its frontmatter (session close), skill-scaffold.md	How a session PROPOSES a lesson for a skill instead of editing it: the four criteria (stable, not regenerable, changes behaviour, paid for), the refinements.md block schema, the apply matrix per skill owner, and the human gate per entry.
references/skill-scaffold.md	framework-development (the change IS a skill), project-context mode context-skill	The contract every new T1 skill is born with: frontmatter incl. metadata.kind, per-kind files + suffix + mandatory sections, the three-question test for context skills (.context/ holds facts, the skill holds judgment, cite never copy), the minimal context-skill template and the Definition of Done.
references/upstream-feedback.md	Every skill marked metadata.stage_owner: true in its frontmatter (failure / blocker path), skill-refinement-protocol.md §4	Filing a skill problem against the boilerplate: repo resolution order (UPEX_TEMPLATE_REPO → installer lock → local), the redacted draft, explicit OK before gh issue create, verification with gh issue view, the manual-filing fallback.
references/artifact-lifecycle.md	shift-left-testing, sprint-testing, test-documentation, test-automation, regression-testing	Which status every harness artifact is created in, which stage moves it where via which transition slug, and its terminal status. Covers assignee-at-create on every QA artifact, the unmapped-status fallback (list the live transitions, one question, fire the live id, recommend bun run jira:sync-workflows) and the light stage verifier every stage closes with. Load before firing any transition.
references/decision-elicitation-doctrine.md	agentic-qa-onboard, any skill that must ask the user to decide	How the harness asks a human to decide: the ladder from harness prompt to mkd decision deck to plan mode, the threshold (more than three decisions, or one dense one), the non-silent gate and its fallback, and how to read the returned contract (a "did not understand" note means do not execute that item).
references/volatile-facts.md	Every skill that writes or reviews committed prose (framework-development, test-framework-adaptation, project-context, pr-review-lead), AGENTS.md Rule #17, the two linters	Canon for Critical Rule #17: committed prose names the source of truth, never its current value. The five volatile categories (count, enumeration, file:line, current-state claim, edit-history narration) with one test each, the stable vocabulary that passes, the exemptions where a snapshot is the point, the forensic-note split (the why stays, the figure and date go to ADR-0006 or a dated ledger), and the volatile-ok: <reason> escape hatch the FILE-LINE / CURRENT-STATE lint checks honour.

When a skill cites one of these, it includes a Dependencies block at the top so the AI knows to load agentic-qa-core before continuing.

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Core reference decks (visual, human-facing)

agentic-qa-core hosts the canonical presentations below under packages/decks/agentic-qa-core/ (published on the GitHub Pages hub; see agentic-qa-onboard for the opening protocol):

File	Teaches	Language
naming-conventions.es.html	The Naming Codex — every test-artifact title format across the seven layers (CASE · GROUP · CONTAINER · CODE · JIRA · GIT · FILESYSTEM), plus a coverage audit of open naming gaps.	Spanish (technical terms in English)
skills-io-flow.es.html	The E2E flow (Historia → Refinamiento → Dev → Testing) seen through each skill's inputs & outputs — what every phase reads (stdin), which skills it loads (deps), what it produces (stdout), and which Jira fields/transitions it touches. Mac-terminal UI with one tab per phase.	Spanish (technical terms in English)
output-style.es.html	The chat-output contract the AI speaks under — the layer split (caveman compression / Butler granularity / PM Voice register / Visual Mapping form), what each layer owns, and the suspension triggers that switch the register to technical.	Spanish (technical terms in English)

They are the human-facing mirror of the rules that live in prose across the workflow skills' references/*.md. The Naming Codex answers "how is this artifact named"; the skills-io deck answers "what does this skill need and emit"; the output-style deck answers "why does the AI talk like that". Navigate with arrow keys (naming deck: O = overview, F = fullscreen; skills-io deck: tabs + 1-9). Offer the matching deck when a user asks about naming or about how the skills chain together end-to-end.

Keep them canonical: when a rule changes, edit the owning skill's references/*.md, regenerate REGISTRY.md (bun run skills:registry), then refresh the deck in packages/decks/agentic-qa-core/ so the decks never drift from the prose source.

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Dependency declaration for downstream skills

Every workflow skill that cites agentic-qa-core/references/*.md should declare it explicitly so the AI knows what to load on demand. Example block to add near the top of the skill's SKILL.md:

## Dependencies
Requires `agentic-qa-core`. Loads on demand:
- agentic-qa-core/references/briefing-template.md
- agentic-qa-core/references/dispatch-patterns.md

The block is documentation — the AI reads it and pulls the cited files. There is no automated wiring: skills are markdown, not code.

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Install model

This boilerplate is designed to be cloned in full. The workflow skills under .agents/skills/ depend on foundation files that live at the repo root (AGENTS.md, .agents/, scripts/, package.json, tests/) and on shared references under agentic-qa-core/references/. Installing only a subset of skills (e.g. copying one skill directory in isolation) leaves those skills without their dependencies and they will not function.

If a downstream user has only the skills and not the rest of the repo, the supported path is to clone the full boilerplate repository and integrate it as a single unit. No per-skill scaffolding action is provided by this skill — the skill set is intentionally inseparable from the foundation.

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Out of scope

agentic-qa-core does not:

• Create or modify any files. It is a passive reference library.
• Create or modify .context/ files (that belongs to /project-discovery).
• Generate or scaffold tests, fixtures, or KATA components (that belongs to /test-framework-adaptation and /test-automation).
• Adapt the framework to a specific stack (that belongs to /test-framework-adaptation).
• Sync AI-critical documents or project-specific facts in AGENTS.md (the docs follow-through of /framework-development in the boilerplate, /test-framework-adaptation Phase 9.3 in a project).
• Sync OpenAPI / API schemas (that's bun run api:sync).

For framework evolution (changes to KATA bases, fixtures, cli/, scripts/, api/schemas/ pipeline), see /framework-development.