Lifecycle and Phases

Lifecycle and Phases

Definition. The lifecycle is the ordered set of phases a product moves through from idea to a running, documented release. Each phase has an owner agent, an artefact it produces, and a gate a person passes before the next phase starts.

Phase	Question it answers	Skill	Artefact	Gate
Setup	Is the repo ready for the crew?	/crew-init	AGENTS.md, docs/00, docs/20, rules, hooks	check command runs
Discover	What are we building and why?	/crew-brainstorm, /crew-research	docs/01, docs/02	decision approved
Define	For whom, what, in what order?	/crew-prd	docs/03, docs/04	P0 fits the deadline
Design	How, and what did we decide?	/crew-architecture, /crew-adr, /crew-design, /crew-llm	docs/05, 09, 10, 11, 12, 06, ADRs	constitution check, ADRs accepted
Specify	What exactly does this feature do?	/crew-spec, /crew-plan, /crew-tasks	docs/specs/NNN-*/	spec Ready, tasks small
Build	Does the code do it?	/crew-implement, /crew-test, /crew-debug	code, tests, ticked tasks	check green, one commit per task
Verify	Is it right and safe?	/crew-review, /crew-security, /crew-verify	findings, conformance table	no Critical open
Ship	Can we release and undo it?	/crew-deploy-check	checklist, runbook	person approves production
Record	Is the record true?	/crew-checkpoint, /crew-docs	docs/20, README, changelog	status matches the tree

/crew-status tells you the current phase and the next task at any time.

Phases are not waterfall

Build, Verify and Record repeat per feature. Design is revisited whenever a change crosses a boundary (a new service, a schema change), which produces a new ADR. Discover is revisited on a pivot. The order protects one thing: no code before a spec, no spec before a decision.

Related

Spec-Driven Development · Gates