Positron Intake Rotation

Overview

This skill provides comprehensive guidance for handling issue intake rotation for the Positron IDE repository. Intake rotation is a weekly assignment (Monday-Friday) where team members review and respond to new issues, discussion posts, and support tickets to ensure timely responses and actionable issue tracking.

The goal is to respond to new items within approximately one business day and ensure all issues have the details required to be actionable.

🚨 CRITICAL: Manual Action Protocol

This skill assists with intake rotation but NEVER executes GitHub actions directly.

All GitHub interactions must be performed manually by the user:

• ✅ Draft responses for review before posting
• ✅ Suggest labels and categorization
• ✅ Prepare commands for user to execute
• ✅ Search and analyze issues/discussions
• ❌ NEVER post comments or responses directly
• ❌ NEVER edit issues, add labels, or change status
• ❌ NEVER close issues or create new ones
• ❌ NEVER execute gh commands that modify GitHub state

Workflow: Analyze → Recommend → Draft → User executes manually

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when:

• Currently on intake rotation duty
• Helping another team member with intake tasks
• Learning the intake rotation process
• Reviewing backlog items without status
• Responding to GitHub discussions
• Handling customer support tickets
• Searching for duplicate or related issues

Quick Start

Essential Scripts

Four shell scripts are provided to streamline intake tasks:

1. scripts/fetch_intake_issues.sh - List open issues without status (the intake queue)
2. scripts/fetch_discussions.sh - List recent open discussions needing attention
3. scripts/fetch_labels.sh - Show all available repository labels for categorization
4. scripts/search_related.sh <query> - Search for related issues and discussions

All scripts support --json flag for programmatic use. Run scripts from the skill directory.

Essential References

Two comprehensive reference documents provide detailed workflows:

1. references/intake_workflow.md - Complete workflows for handling issues, discussions, and support tickets
2. references/response_examples.md - Response patterns and examples from experienced team members

Load these references when drafting responses or handling complex scenarios.

Core Workflow

Daily Intake Process

Follow this process each day during rotation:

1. Check for new items

   • Run scripts/fetch_intake_issues.sh to see issues without status
   • Run scripts/fetch_discussions.sh to see recent discussions
   • Check Support Tickets in Jira

2. Review each item systematically

   • Read the full description and context
   • Assess completeness (are system details, reproduction steps, etc. provided?)
   • Determine item type (bug, feature request, question, duplicate)

3. Search for related content

   • Use scripts/search_related.sh "<keywords>" to find similar issues
   • Check documentation at https://positron.posit.co/welcome.html
   • Look for existing discussions on the topic

4. Recommend categorization and organization

   • Run scripts/fetch_labels.sh to see available labels
   • Suggest appropriate labels (area, type, priority) for user to apply
   • Recommend setting status to "Triage" once organized
   • Suggest adding to "Positron Backlog" project if applicable
   • Prepare gh commands for user to execute manually

5. Draft response for user review

   • Consult references/response_examples.md for patterns
   • Draft welcoming message thanking the contributor
   • Include clarifying questions if information is missing
   • Suggest workarounds or links to related content when available
   • Set realistic expectations about next steps
   • Present draft to user for review before posting

6. Recommend follow-through actions

   • Suggest tagging relevant team members if specialized knowledge is needed
   • Draft duplicate closure message with reference to canonical issue
   • Recommend converting discussions to issues when appropriate
   • Advise continuing follow-up even after rotation ends, or explicit handoff

Using GitHub CLI

Prefer using GitHub CLI (gh) over other methods for consistency. All commands below are for the USER to execute manually.

Read-only commands (can be executed to gather information):

# View issue with all comments
gh issue view <number> --repo posit-dev/positron --comments

# Search issues
gh issue list --repo posit-dev/positron --search "<query>" --state all

# View discussion
gh api graphql -f query='...' # (see scripts for examples)

Modification commands (prepare for user, NEVER execute directly):

# Add labels - DRAFT THIS COMMAND for user to run
gh issue edit <number> --repo posit-dev/positron --add-label "area: console,Bug"

# Close as duplicate - DRAFT THIS COMMAND for user to run
gh issue close <number> --repo posit-dev/positron --comment "Closing as duplicate of #<canonical-number>"

Important: Present modification commands to the user in a code block with clear instructions to review and execute manually.

Handling Different Scenarios

Bug Reports

For bug reports, assess completeness:

Complete bug report:

• System details (Positron version, OS, commit hash)
• Clear reproduction steps
• Expected vs. actual behavior
• Error messages or screenshots

If complete:

1. Search for duplicates using scripts/search_related.sh
2. Suggest labels (area, "Bug" type) for user to apply
3. Recommend setting status to "Triage"
4. Draft response thanking reporter and acknowledging the issue

If incomplete:

1. Draft message thanking the reporter
2. Include specific questions about missing information
3. Suggest referencing the bug report template if helpful
4. Advise keeping issue open until information is provided

Refer to references/intake_workflow.md for detailed bug handling workflows.

Feature Requests

For feature requests:

1. Draft message thanking the user for the suggestion
2. Search for existing related feature requests
3. If duplicate, draft message linking to existing issue (user closes manually)
4. If new, suggest labels and recommend adding to backlog
5. Draft message setting realistic expectations about prioritization

Discussions

For discussions:

1. Determine discussion type (question, idea, bug report, announcement)
2. Draft appropriate response:
   • Questions: Provide answer or link to docs
   • Ideas: Acknowledge and link to related issues
   • Bug reports: Ask user to create formal issue
   • Off-topic: Politely redirect

Recommend converting discussions to issues when they contain clear, actionable bug reports or feature requests (user performs conversion manually).

Support Tickets

Support tickets require special handling:

⚠️ CRITICAL: Never mention customer names in public issues or discussions

1. Review ticket context in Jira
2. Search for related public issues
3. Draft response in Jira (not publicly) for user to post
4. Recommend creating sanitized public issue if needed
5. Suggest linking between ticket and issue

Security Issues

If an issue describes a security vulnerability:

1. Do NOT discuss details publicly
2. Draft message asking reporter to email security@posit.co
3. Recommend closing public issue with note about private reporting (user closes manually)
4. Advise alerting team privately

Response Guidelines

Tone and Style

Be welcoming: Thank contributors for their time and effort

Be clear: Use simple language, explain technical terms, provide examples

Be helpful: Offer workarounds, link to resources, provide next steps

Be realistic: Don't overpromise timelines or solutions

Be professional: Remain calm and constructive, even with frustrated reporters

Learning from Examples

To see examples from experienced team members:

# Find issues commented on by key team members
gh search issues --repo posit-dev/positron --commenter juliasilge --limit 20
gh search issues --repo posit-dev/positron --commenter jmcphers --limit 20

# View specific issue with comments
gh issue view <number> --repo posit-dev/positron --comments

Pay special attention to responses by juliasilge and jmcphers for tone and approach guidance.

Load references/response_examples.md for detailed response patterns and anti-patterns.

Important Reminders

Team Collaboration

Don't try to solve everything alone. Reach out to team members when:

• The issue requires specialized domain knowledge
• You're unsure how to categorize or prioritize
• The issue describes complex technical problems
• You need help understanding the user's concern

Handoff Protocol

If handling an item extends beyond your rotation week:

• Typically: Continue following up yourself to get to triage
• If not possible: Explicitly communicate handoff to next person on rotation
• Don't drop items without clear handoff

Documentation

If recurring issues or common questions emerge:

• Consider creating FAQ entries
• Suggest documentation improvements
• Note patterns for team discussion

Quick Reference Links

• Issue Intake Board - Issues without status
• Discussions - Community discussions
• Support Tickets - Customer support (Jira)
• Rotation Schedule - Google Sheet
• Documentation - Official Positron docs
• Positron Assistant - GitHub issue assistant

Workflow Summary

Daily Intake (Assistant Mode - Draft & Recommend):
1. Fetch new items (scripts/fetch_intake_issues.sh, scripts/fetch_discussions.sh)
2. Review and assess each item
3. Search for related content (scripts/search_related.sh)
4. SUGGEST labels and categorization (scripts/fetch_labels.sh)
5. DRAFT response (references/response_examples.md) for user review
6. PREPARE gh commands for user to execute
7. RECOMMEND setting status to "Triage" (user executes)
8. ADVISE on follow-through or handoff

Remember: The goal is to ASSIST the user with timely response and actionable
organization. NEVER execute GitHub modification commands directly - always
present drafts and recommendations for the user to review and execute manually.