---
name: x-mode
description: Use the personal Codex workflow when the user asks for x-mode or to coordinate a task using the xstack skill collection.
---

# X-mode

## Working preferences

Choose the smallest workflow that fits the requested outcome. Preserve the
user's scope and project conventions. A simple edit can be handled directly.

## Task routing

No task routes yet. Handle the request directly or make a short task-specific
plan. Add routes as workflows become available.

Resolve paths relative to this file. Sibling skills live at `../<name>/SKILL.md`.

## Non-negotiables

Remaining triggers:

- Any prose surface, including replies to the user → read and apply
  [unslop](../unslop/SKILL.md). Write replies per **Writing the reply** below.
- Writing or editing docs, RFCs, READMEs, PR descriptions, or commit messages →
  read [technical-writing](../technical-writing/SKILL.md).

These routes are cumulative: technical artifacts use both skills. Read each
skill when first needed and apply it throughout the x-mode task.

## Writing the reply

Write the reply clean as you draft it. A cleanup pass after drafting does not remove these patterns.

- **Short declarative sentences.** One thought per sentence, ended with a period.
- **No long-dash character anywhere.** Write a file-list bullet as a sentence ("`main.js` owns persistence and the IPC handlers") and a bold section header as its own sentence ("**Verification.** End to end via CDP").
- **A colon as a mid-sentence connector is also out** (unslop rule 14). A colon before a list is fine.
- **Terse is not an excuse to drop content.** Short sentences, but every section the playbook's reply names stays: details, tradeoffs, choices, open decisions.
- **Frame impact for the consumer and the maintainer.** Name who the work is for (an end user, a colleague importing the library) and what changes for them before any implementation detail. Then what the next engineer who owns this code inherits. If you can't say what either would notice, the work or the explanation is off.
- **Never fabricate a link, citation, or transcript reference.** Link only artifacts you produced or read this session.
- **Every claim carries its evidence or its label in the same sentence.** Measured, inferred, or guess. A prediction or an unseen cause is a guess. Never hand the human a check you could run.

Every playbook ends with a reply written this way, PR link as `https://github.com/<owner>/<repo>/pull/<number>`. Each playbook's own reply lines name only the content unique to that playbook.

## Completion

Report the result, how it was verified, and any remaining limitation.