v6.0.0 — The Lean Orchestrator

v6.0 is a structural evolution. AGENT-11 stops reinventing what Claude Code's platform now provides natively (hooks, native tool deferring, Routines, the Agent Skills open standard) and shrinks the framework's own surface dramatically — library/CLAUDE.md from 575 lines to 78 (-86%), context tracking from 5 active files to 3, MCP startup cost reduced via ENABLE_TOOL_SEARCH=auto. Public-facing API is largely backwards-compatible (/coord build still works the same); the wins are mostly invisible structural improvements that ship cleaner sessions.

Migration: existing v5.x users run bash <(curl -sSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/TheWayWithin/agent-11/main/project/deployment/scripts/migrate-v5-to-v6.sh) (or download and run manually). The script detects v5.x markers, backs up everything before any change, and guides through the upgrade. See Migration Guide for details.

Added

• Universal Router (/coord [mission]) — deterministic mission-based routing. 13 missions across Mode A (greenfield: build, mvp, dev-setup, dev-alignment, integrate, migrate), Mode B1 (surgical: fix), Mode B2 (maintenance: refactor, optimize, document, release, deploy, security). Mode override syntax: /coord mode:maintenance security. Unknown missions fail with a clear error and the valid list — no NLP "did you mean..." inference.
• Karpathy operating constitution — seven principles applied by every specialist: read before writing, state assumptions, prefer minimal diffs, verify by running, avoid speculative refactors, lightest valid path, present alternatives explicitly when uncertain. Replaces the previous "always delegate" discipline. Deployed to .claude/constitution/karpathy-constitution.md.
• Dynamic context loading — coordinator reads only the files the mission's mode requires. Mode A loads project-plan.md + agent-context.md + mission file; Mode B1 (fix) loads only the bug report; Mode B2 loads project-plan.md if it exists. evidence-repository.md and progress.md are on-demand only.
• Phase Handoff blocks — structured 5-field schema (Findings / Decisions / Warnings & Gotchas / Open Items / Evidence) appended to agent-context.md at phase boundaries. Replaces the separate handoff-notes.md file.
• Quality-gate hooks — .claude/settings.json ships with advisory PostToolUse hooks for tsc/ruff/rubocop on Edit/Write/MultiEdit (auto-skip when toolchain absent — package.json/pyproject.toml/Gemfile gates) and a PreToolUse confirmation prompt for destructive Bash (rm -rf, git push --force, git reset --hard, etc.). Advisory by default (|| true); promote to blocking by changing to || exit 2.
• Native MCP tool deferring — .claude/settings.json ships ENABLE_TOOL_SEARCH=auto, leveraging Claude Code's threshold-based tool loading. Specialists discover MCP tools on demand via tool_search_tool_regex_20251119(pattern="mcp__SERVERNAME").
• Routines for Mode C (operational work) — three paste-ready prompt templates in routines/: pr-review.md (GitHub webhook), nightly-qa.md (cron), backlog-triage.md (cron). /coord detects cadence keywords ("daily", "every Monday", "schedule", etc.) and points users at the matching template instead of executing one-time work. Routines run on Anthropic-managed cloud via claude.ai/code/routines.
• 3-tier skills model — Tier 1 (behavioural, in CLAUDE.md), Tier 2 (project-domain, in user skills/), Tier 3 (marketplace, in .claude/skills/). All 7 SaaS skills aligned with Anthropic's Agent Skills open standard: each has a proper description field. Custom AGENT-11 fields preserved for backward-compat.
• migrate-v5-to-v6.sh — one-command migration script for v5.x users. Detects markers, backs up before changes, folds handoff-notes.md into agent-context.md, retires .mcp-profiles/. Supports --dry-run and --yes flags. Idempotent.
• /coord mode override — /coord mode:greenfield|surgical|maintenance [mission] forces a specific mode regardless of mission name.
• /coord Routine detection — cadence keywords trigger a pointer to the matching Routine template instead of one-time delegation.

Changed

• library/CLAUDE.md shrunk from 575 lines to 78 lines (-86%). Most content was duplicate of canonical sources elsewhere (coordinator.md, field-manual/, command files); lean version points at them.
• project/commands/coord.md shrunk from 549 lines to 134 lines. Old briefing duplicated content already in coordinator.md; thin dispatcher only.
• Coordinator's session-start protocol now mode-aware. Staleness check only runs on resumed missions (where tracking files exist), not blindly on every fresh start.
• progress.md demoted to write-only by default. Coordinator appends entries (issues, fixes, deliverables) but doesn't read at session start. Reads happen on staleness checks (resumed missions) or post-/clear reconstruction.
• MCP server registry (.mcp.json) deployment unchanged — it's correctly Claude Code's stdio config. v5.x's .mcp-profiles/ profile-switching system is retired entirely.
• All 7 MCP-using specialists (developer, tester, operator, architect, analyst, marketer, designer) updated with concise Tool-Centric Workflow guidance. Long static MCP tool listings replaced with Tool Search references.
• install.sh deploys: library/settings.json.template → .claude/settings.json (new); project/constitution/karpathy-constitution.md → .claude/constitution/ (new — was referenced by coordinator but missing pre-v6.0); field-manual/mcp-integration.md (added to deployment list).
• install.sh always installs all 11 specialists (previously defaulted to "core" 4-agent squad). The squad selector argument is accepted but ignored with a deprecation notice.

Deprecated

• install.sh [core|full|minimal] arguments accepted but ignored (deprecation notice). Removal scheduled for v7.0.

Removed

• handoff-notes.md retired as a separate active-context file. Folded into agent-context.md as Phase Handoff blocks. v5.x users migrate via migrate-v5-to-v6.sh (one line: cat handoff-notes.md >> agent-context.md && rm handoff-notes.md).
• .mcp-profiles/ directory and the profile-switching system retired. Replaced by native tool deferring (ENABLE_TOOL_SEARCH=auto).
• /mcp-switch, /mcp-list, /mcp-status slash commands retired (Sprint 4a).
• templates/handoff-notes-template.md retired (folded into agent-context-template.md).
• project/mcp/dynamic-mcp.json removed — Sprint 11 artefact based on Claude API schema (per-tool defer_loading), which doesn't apply to Claude Code's .mcp.json. Caught at Sprint 4f T1 audit. Native deferring replaces it.
• project/field-manual/mcp-optimization-guide.md archived — its entire premise was the retired profile-switching optimisation. field-manual/mcp-integration.md is now the canonical MCP doc.
• project/deployment/scripts/validate-mcp-profiles.sh archived — validated profiles that no longer exist.
• mcp-setup.sh at repo root (root-level MCP setup helper) retired in Sprint 4a alongside the profile system.

Architecture

v6.0 is delivered as 8 sub-sprints under the "Sprint 4" umbrella. Each followed a rolling-wave protocol where the next sprint's spec was the closing task of the current sprint:

• 4a — Baseline + Great Deletion: validation harness; v5.2 baseline measured; MCP profile system, backups, ASCII art deleted.
• 4b — Prompt Hygiene & Budget Controls: Karpathy constitution shipped; PAUSE-AND-PLAN replaces NO-WAITING; mission budget frontmatter; subagent hardening. Headline measurement: Task 4 (refactor) dropped 75% (6:07 → 1:33).
• 4c — The Universal Router: /coord rewritten 549 → 91 lines; deterministic mission routing; dynamic context loading.
• 4d — Native Primitives + CLAUDE.md Shrink: hooks in settings.json; library/CLAUDE.md 575 → 79 lines; Meta-Dev skill for the agent-11 repo; constitution deployment fix.
• 4e — Context Consolidation 5→3: handoff-notes.md folded into agent-context.md as Phase Handoff blocks; progress.md demoted to write-only.
• 4f — Dynamic MCP Tool Search: recalibrated mid-sprint after T1 audit caught a schema mismatch; ENABLE_TOOL_SEARCH=auto enabled native deferring; dynamic-mcp.json archived; profile-switching residue retired.
• 4g — Skills + Routines: skills audited against open standard; 3-tier model documented; 3 paste-ready Routine templates; /coord operational-intent detection.
• 4h — Validation + Migration: harness validates v6.0 vs baseline; migrate-v5-to-v6.sh for v5.x upgrades; consolidated docs (this CHANGELOG entry).