Universal `/simplify` and `/batch`

CoWork OS now ships two bundled, global skills as first-class slash commands:

• /simplify for targeted quality improvements
• /batch for parallelizable, repeatable migrations/transformations

These are domain-agnostic and work across code, research, writing, operations, and general tasks.

Global Skill Scope

Both skills are bundled and enabled by default:

• resources/skills/simplify.json
• resources/skills/batch.json

They are also published in registry artifacts:

• registry/skills/simplify.json
• registry/skills/batch.json

Legacy skills remain active. In particular, usecase-dev-task-queue is not deprecated and cross-links to /batch for broad migration-style requests.

Command Syntax

/simplify

/simplify [objective] [--domain <auto|code|research|operations|writing|general>] [--scope <current|workspace|path>]

Behavior:

• Objective is optional; when omitted, current task context is used.
• Explicit invocation only (no automatic post-task simplify).

/batch

/batch <objective> [--parallel <1-8>] [--domain <auto|code|research|operations|writing|general>] [--external <confirm|execute|none>]

Behavior:

• Objective is required.
• Parallelism is bounded to 1..8.
• Default external policy is confirm.
• Code-domain default stop point remains branch/worktree + validated summary (no auto-PR unless explicitly requested).

Desktop and Gateway Behavior

• Supported in desktop and gateway channels.
• Gateway routes /simplify and /batch through the shared remote command registry, then into task execution as normalized slash command text.
• Invalid command shapes return usage/help text in-channel.
• Help text across channel variants includes both commands.
• Recognized gateway slash commands are never queued or forwarded as ordinary task follow-up text.

Inline Chaining

You can chain command execution in one message:

Refactor this module then run /simplify
Migrate these docs then run /batch --domain writing --parallel 4

Execution order:

1. Run base objective first.
2. Run the mapped slash-skill workflow in the same task context.

Parser constraints:

• Ignores URL/path false positives (e.g. https://.../batch, /batch/migrations).
• Accepts punctuation terminators (e.g. /simplify.).
• Allows one inline chain per message; multiple then run /... chains are rejected with explicit guidance.

Deterministic Skill Invocation

For recognized /simplify and /batch commands, executor behavior is deterministic:

• Calls use_skill directly with skill_id and parsed parameters.
• Applies the returned skill as additive context for the existing task.
• Merges any scoped runtime directives from the skill into executor state.
• Preserves the canonical task prompt for planning, execution, safety checks, and UI display.

This avoids best-effort routing ambiguity for these two commands without letting the slash skill redefine the task.

/batch External Effects Policy

Policy modes:

• confirm: require explicit user approval before first external side-effect action in the run.
• execute: allow external side-effect actions under existing tool policies.
• none: block known external side-effect actions for the run.

Implementation details:

• confirm approval is requested with allowAutoApprove: false.
• none applies task-level tool restrictions for external side-effect tools.
• Read-only external actions are allowed under none (write-like external actions are blocked).

Composer UX

Desktop composer slash autocomplete remains discoverable, but Enter/Tab no longer auto-selects dropdown entries when the user typed an exact /simplify... or /batch... command. This ensures command pass-through to executor.

WhatsApp Natural Mapping

Common WhatsApp phrases map to slash commands:

• simplify this, run simplify ... -> /simplify ...
• batch migrate ..., run batch ... -> /batch ...

See Gateway Message Lifecycle for active-task handling, unknown slash command behavior, and direct /<skill-slug> args invocation from gateway channels.

Validation and Tests

Recommended checks for this feature area:

npm run skills:validate-routing
npm run skills:validate-content
npm run skills:audit
npx vitest run src/shared/__tests__/skill-slash-commands.test.ts src/electron/agent/__tests__/executor-schedule-slash.test.ts src/electron/gateway/__tests__/whatsapp-command-utils.test.ts