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Productivity · Version 1.2.0 · Reviewed 2026-08-02

Worktree Safety Checker

Turn engineering context into a reliable artifact for dirty-worktree inventory and change ownership separation with evidence, explicit trade-offs, and a verification plan.

4 method steps 4 documented failure modes 4 diagnostic checks 7 quality gates

Classifies staged, unstaged, untracked, ignored, generated, and upstream changes before automation writes, commits, switches branches, or rebases.

₹199 one-time

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What this skill helps you do

  • Dirty-worktree inventory
  • Change ownership separation
  • Safe-operation recommendation

How Worktree Safety Checker works

You provide

Repository access, entry points, and the target change

It inspects

Real execution path for dirty-worktree inventory, not naming

It decides

A change ownership separation explanation with safe change seams

You verify

Claims confirmed against code paths or a test

What it checks first

Worktree Safety Checker classifies staged, unstaged, untracked, ignored, generated, and upstream changes before automation writes, commits, switches branches, or rebases. Use it when the work involves Dirty-worktree inventory, Change ownership separation, Safe-operation recommendation.

  1. The entry points and the data flow between them, which is the fastest way to build an accurate mental model.
  2. Where behavior is actually decided, rather than where it appears to be configured.
  3. Which parts change frequently, since those carry the most current knowledge and the most risk.
  4. The seams where a change can be made safely without a wide blast radius.

Failure modes it recognizes

  • A mental model built from naming conventions that no longer match behavior.
  • Hidden coupling through global state, events, or reflection that static reading misses.
  • Dead code that appears authoritative and misleads the reader.
  • Documentation that describes an intended design the code no longer implements.

Answers it will reject

  • Explaining what code does line by line rather than what it is responsible for and why.
  • Trusting comments and documentation over the executing code path.
  • Recommending a refactor before the current behavior is understood and covered by tests.

Decision rules it applies

  • Trace one real request end to end before generalizing about the architecture.
  • Verify a claim about behavior against the code path or a test, and label unverified claims.
  • Identify the smallest safe change point rather than the theoretically correct structure.

Evidence it asks for

  • Follow a concrete input through the system and name each file and function it reaches.
  • Use call hierarchies and references rather than text search alone to establish coupling.
  • Confirm behavior with an executable test before changing it.

The method inside

  1. Establish what is actually true about dirty-worktree inventory from the supplied evidence, and mark what is missing.
  2. Identify the mechanism behind change ownership separation rather than restating the symptom.
  3. Choose the smallest defensible change for safe-operation recommendation, weighing impact, confidence, effort, and reversibility.
  4. Check every claim against the source

Deliverables

  • Dirty-worktree inventory assessment
  • Change ownership separation decision and action plan
  • Safe-operation recommendation verification checklist

Evidence requirements

  • Source code, discussion, notes, or existing artifact
  • Audience, decision, and acceptance criteria
  • Repository conventions and constraints

Quality gates

  • Every material claim traces to supplied evidence or is labeled as a hypothesis.
  • The response follows the declared deliverable contract.
  • No execution, access, measurement, or verification is invented.
  • Secrets and personal data are redacted rather than repeated.
  • The user receives a concrete independent verification step.
  • The relevant failure modes in this domain were considered rather than only the reported symptom.
  • No listed anti-pattern was recommended as a solution.

Example task

Input

Check whether it is safe to create a branch and publish my changes without overwriting work that may belong to another task.

Expected output

Inspect status, staged and unstaged diffs, untracked paths, upstream divergence, and nested repositories. Separate intended work from unrelated edits without reverting anything, identify operations that could discard or mix changes, and recommend the least destructive next step with exact affected paths...

Boundaries and compatibility

Ideal for

  • Dirty-worktree inventory: produce a decision or artifact grounded in supplied evidence.
  • Change ownership separation: produce a decision or artifact grounded in supplied evidence.
  • Safe-operation recommendation: produce a decision or artifact grounded in supplied evidence.

Out of scope

  • Inventing repository behavior or decisions
  • Replacing review by the accountable owner

Agent compatibility

  • GitHub Copilot Agent Skills
  • Cursor Agent Skills
  • Claude Code Skills
  • OpenAI Codex Skills
  • JetBrains Junie Skills

Tool policy: Advisory by default. No tools are assumed. If the host provides tools, use read-only evidence gathering unless the user explicitly approves a scoped write or execution action.