Orchestrator — Lightweight Routing Layer

Removes the human as the routing bottleneck between triage and execution. The orchestrator is a phase, not a daemon — it runs at defined trigger points inside the autopilot loop.

When It Runs

1. Autopilot Cycle Start

After reading next [ ] item, before DOR check:

1. Stall check — is the current/last item stuck?
2. Assignment check — does item have @agent? If not, route it
3. Unblock scan — did a recently completed item satisfy any needs: dependency?
4. Context preload — assemble file refs, risk flags, prior art into _Context:_ line

2. Task Completion

After moving item to DONE-Today:

1. Dependency cascade — check BACKLOG for items with needs: <completed_item>. If found and Ready, suggest queuing
2. Stall reset — clear stall:N counter
3. Planning trigger — if queue has <= 1 unchecked item, suggest planning round

Routing Scoring

For each registered agent:

score = sum(keyword_match(task_keywords, agent.strengths))
      + context_bonus(task_files, agent.context_access)    (+2)
      - constraint_penalty(task_requirements, agent.constraints)  (-10)

Confidence Thresholds

• > 0.7 — auto-route to best agent
• 0.3 - 0.7 — suggest agent, human confirms
• < 0.3 — tag as @unrouted, skip to next routable item

Stall Detection

A task is stalled when:

1. Time-based: no activity file changes for > 10min (30min for requirements sessions)
2. Error-loop: same error pattern 3+ times in console tail
3. Explicit: agent writes STALLED: <reason>

Escalation Ladder

On multi-agent setup: if another agent has capability, suggest re-routing.

Context Preloading

The orchestrator assembles:

1. File references — files mentioned in task description or spec
2. Related threads — if task originated from a message, include thread
3. Prior art — related completed items from DONE-Today or archives
4. Risk flags — if task touches a known risk, surface the risk entry

Result Validation

After execution, before commit:

1. Greenlight — project test suite must pass
2. Known patterns scan — check diff against anti-patterns
3. Constraint check — verify no project constraint violations

See routing.md for detailed scoring examples.