Agentile — Claude Code plugin

Agile, with agency.

A low-ceremony methodology for 1–5 person teams who direct AI agents as their primary way of building software. It keeps the agile spirit — short loops, working software, respond to change — while dropping the ceremony small teams can't justify. We replaced the standup with a digest, so you can stand down.

Agentile is the implementation of the Lean Agentic Loop methodology — the full synthesis is in lean-agentic-loop.md. This README is the operating manual for the plugin.

The loop

capture → shape → spec → plan → build → verify → ship → learn

• capture — /ag-capture <idea> drops a one-line stub in inbox.md. Instant, mid-build safe.
• shape — /ag-shape interviews a stub into a Ready spec, against your project's Definition of Ready.
• spec — shaped specs land in specs/. /ag-spec writes one directly for trivial work.
• plan — /ag-plan (Plan Mode or the ag-planner agent) proposes the approach before any code.
• build — the ag-builder agent implements on a branch/worktree, running your gates.
• verify — the ag-reviewer agent critiques the diff with fresh context; gates + /security-review + a human read.
• ship — small, flagged, reversible PRs to trunk.
• learn — /ag-retro compiles a flow digest and encodes lessons into CLAUDE.md and ADRs.

Fixed core vs. tailorable content

The plugin ships the methodology — the skills, the agents, the hooks. You don't fork them. Each project tailors its content through the .agentile/ files that /ag-init scaffolds:

File	What it controls
.agentile/shaping.md	What "Ready" means — the questions a stub must answer before it's a spec. The prime tailoring surface.
.agentile/config.md	Paths and the Business Value × Technical Certainty triage routes.
.agentile/gates.json	The deterministic commands — format, lint, test, build, deploy — and protected branches.
.agentile/spec-template.md	The shape of a Ready spec.
.agentile/adr-template.md	The shape of an ADR.

The fixed skills read these at runtime, so content flexes while the loop's structure holds. To change what a shaped item must answer, edit one file — .agentile/shaping.md — and every future /ag-shape asks accordingly.

Install (in a project)

1. Add the marketplace and install the plugin:

   claude plugin marketplace add agenta-consulting/agentile
   claude plugin install agentile@agentile
   

2. Restart the session, then in your target project run /ag-init to scaffold inbox.md, .agentile/, docs/adr/, and the CLAUDE.md standing-context section.

3. Start the loop: /ag-capture, /ag-inbox, /ag-shape, …

Skills

/ag-init, /ag-capture, /ag-inbox, /ag-shape, /ag-spec, /ag-plan, /ag-retro.

Agents (the "hats")

ag-planner (architecture & approach), ag-builder (implementation), ag-reviewer (verification & security). Each runs in its own context so the reviewer catches what the builder missed.

Hooks

Config-driven and opt-in safe — they read .agentile/gates.json and no-op when a command is blank, so installing the plugin never disrupts an unconfigured repo:

• format-on-edit (PostToolUse) — runs your formatter after each edit. If the format command contains {file}, the edited path is substituted.
• test-gate (Stop / SubagentStop) — blocks "done" until your test command passes.

The hook scripts are Ruby (hooks/*.rb), so Ruby must be on PATH.

Developing the plugin while it's installed

Claude Code freezes an installed plugin as a snapshot, so source edits aren't seen until you reinstall. Two layered modes over this one repo:

• Live (your machine): run bin/ag-dev-link once (after a first bin/ag-sync) to symlink the install location to this repo. Edits to skills/agents/hooks then apply on the next session reload — no reinstall.
• Snapshot (distribution / fresh machine / CI): bin/ag-sync validates, registers the marketplace, and installs/updates. This is the path everyone else uses, so what you test equals what ships.

The one rule

First be agile, then agentic. Agentile amplifies a healthy loop — and amplifies a broken one. Get the trunk, the gates, and the written spec right first; the agents make a good loop fast, not a bad loop safe.