Everyday use
Everyday use — just talk to Claude
| You say to Claude | What the skill runs |
|---|---|
| “Set up kanbanr for this project, states Backlog→Doing→Done, new features start in Backlog” | kanbanr project init … --statuses Backlog,Doing,Done --default-state Backlog |
| “Add a Foundations milestone” | kanbanr milestone add --name Foundations --code MS-001 |
| “Track a feature for the login flow under MS-001 with a spec” | kanbanr feature add --title "Login flow" --milestone MS-001 --spec "…" |
| “Start a todo-list for this session on FEAT-001” | kanbanr todo add FEAT-001 --description "session 1" (→ TL-001) |
| “Add tasks to TL-001” | kanbanr task add FEAT-001 TL-001 --text "…" |
| “Start task T2 in TL-001” / “T2 is done” | kanbanr task state FEAT-001 TL-001 T2 InProgress / Completed |
| “Move the login feature to Scheduled” | kanbanr move FEAT-001 Scheduled |
| “What’s on the board?” | kanbanr board |
| “Save these API notes under design/api” | kanbanr doc add design/api … |
Every feature requires a milestone — create the milestone first.
How Claude uses kanbanr (the contract)
Say “start using kanbanr for this project” once. In a folder that isn’t tracked yet, Claude first runs a short setup interview in plan mode: the board, the charter and the workflow. Once you approve it, the setup runs. See the quickstart. After that, for the rest of the project you don’t have to say anything about kanbanr — Claude treats it as the single system of record:
- Everything about the project’s activity lives in kanbanr — scope, specs, progress, task status, decisions, docs. The only thing kept outside it is your conversation transcript.
- Docs live in kanbanr by default. Any document, whether you asked for it or Claude wrote it on
its own (design notes, decisions, research, runbooks, plans, guides), is saved as a kanbanr doc
(
kanbanr doc add …), not as a file in your codebase. Claude writes a doc into the project folder only when you ask, e.g. when you want an mdBook/MkDocs site or README as a deliverable. - No ephemeral lists. Claude does not track project work in a throwaway session list; it creates persistent todo-lists on the feature items instead — so nothing is lost.
- Resumable across sessions. At the start of a session Claude recovers state from kanbanr
(
kanbanr board) and continues exactly where things left off. - Updated before and after every task — it reflects what it’s about to do (todo-list item → In progress) and what it finished (→ Completed, spec/docs updated, status moved).
- When moving a feature out of
Deferred, Claude first reviews its spec for staleness. - Feature items are never deleted — to retire one it’s moved to a no-op state.
- For several changes at once, Claude sends one bundled
kanbanr batchcall (new/edited feature items, status moves, new todo-lists + items, task-state updates, doc changes).