sync-codex

Quick Summary

Goal: Run the full Codex mirror pipeline (sync + verify) from inside the bundle. This runner is the single and only entrypoint for the pipeline.

PORTABILITY CONTRACT — .claude/ and .codex/ are portable, self-running and self-testing. Copy them into ANY repository — a Python repo, a .NET repo, a repo with no package.json at all — and every sync / verify / check / fix / test entrypoint still works, because each one is a path INSIDE the bundle invoked with plain node. Never drive this framework through a host package.json script, and never document one: npm run … names a command that does not exist in most projects the bundle is copied into. The only external requirement is node >= 18 — no node_modules, no npm, no lockfile (PORT-001 enforces the pipeline imports only node: built-ins). Catalog regeneration additionally needs Python 3 (py -3 on Windows, python3 on macOS/Linux).

Discover the roster instead of memorizing it: node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --list-stages

Summary:

• Run the 19-stage orchestrator in order; stage 1 reconciles CLAUDE.md, stages 2-4 generate the Codex mirrors, and stages 5-19 run tests and read-only release gates.
• Keep .claude canonical and source-owned; never hand-edit .agents, .codex, or AGENTS.md, and expect Claude slash invocations to become Codex dollar invocations only in generated mirrors.
• Keep AGENTS.md discoverable under Codex's read budget: it is the project-information projection of CLAUDE.md (Doc Lookup and project rules first; universal rules arrive by hook, never through this file); fix a discovery defect in CLAUDE.md, its template, or the projection script, then re-sync.
• If a stage fails, rerun that stage with --only=<stage> --verbose, then rerun the full pipeline and inspect the generated diff before handoff.

Renamed: formerly /codex-sync — that name no longer resolves as a slash command; use /sync-codex.

Also upserts the TUI notification and status-line keys into .codex/config.toml. Alerts come from the mirrored Stop/SessionEnd hooks, which Codex runs for the main thread only. The sync removes the retired legacy notify = ["node", ".codex/scripts/codex/codex-notify.mjs"] line and its generated helper: Codex ran that command after every turn of every thread, subagent threads included, which duplicated the hook alerts. A project's own notify command is kept. The bundle pins no auto-compaction budget, so Codex applies its own default: the sync never writes model_auto_compact_token_limit, and it retires a top-level one only when its value is exactly the formerly bundled 500000 (plus the unchanged bundled comment block above it). Any other value is the user's — kept, with one kept user-set model_auto_compact_token_limit=<v> line.

Workflow:

1. Preflight — The runner checks CLAUDE.md; it initializes a missing file, updates a marker-managed stale file, and leaves a markerless file untouched as project-owned (run /ai-context-refresh --mode update to add generated sections around it).
2. Run — node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs
3. Verify — Exit code 0 = pass; check stdout summary
4. Inspect — On failure, re-run the failing stage manually with --only=<stage> and --verbose

Key Rules:

• MUST evaluate all 19 stages in order — configured stages fail fast on the first non-zero exit; optional stages emit an explicit SKIP (not configured) when the adopter has not declared their contract
• NEVER edit .agents/skills/sync-codex/** (auto-mirror) — edit .claude/skills/sync-codex/** source instead
• .claude is the source for skills/workflows/hooks; generated acceptance targets are .agents/skills/**, .codex/agents/*.toml, .codex/hooks.json, and AGENTS.md
• Stage 1 may mutate CLAUDE.md; stages 2-4 mutate .agents/skills/, .codex/, AGENTS.md; stages 5-19 are read-only (tooling tests, optional tech-spec freshness and feature-registry validation, 3 hook-suite gates, the other Codex verifiers, and the cross-surface divergence oracle)
• Stage 2 upserts [tui].status_line to show model+reasoning, current directory, project root, context used, five-hour limit, and weekly limit by default
• Stage 2 never upserts model_auto_compact_token_limit; it retires the top-level key only when its value equals the formerly bundled 500000 and keeps any other value. No host pins a compaction budget — any compaction default change goes here AND in the other two surfaces, never in one alone
• Stage 2 leaves the native instruction budget unchanged. It retires a top-level project_doc_max_bytes = 98304 only on that exact former bundled value; custom values and other spellings stay. Retirement stops at the first table, multiline string or multiline collection to preserve complex user configuration. Project-only instructions should fit the native 32 KiB budget, shared with nested AGENTS.md files. Reduce oversized instructions instead of raising the framework default. A deliberate personal 98304-byte allowance belongs in user config, outside sync ownership.
• Stage 4 generates the bounded AGENTS.md projection of CLAUDE.md (project information only) and removes the retired .codex/CODEX_CONTEXT.md. The framework's shared protocols and the workflow route reach Codex through the mirrored hooks (.codex/hooks.json), never through a generated file; mode on requires working hooks; intentionally choosing quiet or off is supported (read .claude/docs/configuration/README.md#framework-runtime-mode). Review the new handlers in Codex /hooks after the first sync and after any handler change: until they are reviewed, Codex receives no universal rules and no workflow route, and no static fallback exists (.claude/docs/hooks/README.md#hook-only-delivery-host-requirements).
• Stage 2 must not inline lessons.md content — it lives in the project-reference docs root (default docs/project-reference/; a docsRoots.projectReference.path entry in docs/project-config.json overrides the path) — into .agents/skills/**; generated skill mirrors carry no project content
• AGENTS.md and the skill mirrors carry no shared-protocol text: the universal hook delivers it (verify-skill-protocol-compliance.mjs fails on any copy)
• Test stages set CK_FRAMEWORK_MODE=on only in their child processes so verification still exercises hooks when chat mode is quiet or off; saved preferences remain unchanged.
• No npm dependency — pure node + spawned subprocesses
• Idempotent — safe to re-run; second run produces only timestamp diffs
• opencode handoff: when the project has a local .opencode/ directory, the runner hands off to /sync-opencode after all 19 stages pass (its --verify-only form under --verify-only). The handoff is an integration step, NOT a 20th stage — the 19-stage roster stays fixed

Contents

• Quick Summary
• opencode handoff (when .opencode/ exists)
• Bootstrap Gate (when AGENTS.md is missing)
• Coordination with ai-context-refresh
• Skill profile on Codex
• Stages
• Usage
• Closing Reminders

opencode handoff (when .opencode/ exists)

opencode has no shell-command hooks, so its hook surface is a generated JS bridge at .opencode/plugins/easy-claude-hooks.js produced by /sync-opencode from .claude/settings.json. /sync-opencode also reconciles the framework's recommended opencode defaults (.opencode/opencode.recommended.json) into the project-root opencode.json. Because a project running opencode expects both surfaces to track the framework, a full /sync-codex run automatically hands off to the opencode pipeline once the 19 Codex stages pass:

# Runs automatically at the end of a full codex sync when .opencode/ exists:
node .claude/skills/sync-opencode/scripts/run-opencode-sync.mjs

• The handoff is skipped silently when the project has no .opencode/ directory, and skipped with an explicit message when .opencode/ exists but the opencode runner is absent.
• Under --verify-only the handoff inherits the read-only contract (run-opencode-sync.mjs --verify-only), so no invocation of the codex runner ever mutates the opencode surface in verify mode.
• A handoff failure fails the codex run with the opencode stage's exit code — a green /sync-codex never hides a red opencode surface.
• opencode discovers skills directly from .claude/skills and .agents/skills, so the handoff syncs hooks + recommended config + the sub-agent mirror — no skill mirror is produced (sub-agents are not auto-discovered, so .claude/agents/*.md is mirrored into .opencode/agent/*.md).

Bootstrap Gate (when AGENTS.md is missing)

This skill is the route the agent-files bootstrap gate offers for a missing root AGENTS.md, the generated Codex projection of CLAUDE.md. The projection holds project information only (Doc Lookup, project rules, naming and development commands); the framework rules every agent follows are delivered by the universal hook, and the workflow route only by the workflow-route-inject and workflow-catalog-inject hooks (in each person's route mode). Stage 4 writes the projection; no protocol text and no route pointer is stamped.

Detection is existence-only and shared with the CLAUDE.md route via .claude/hooks/lib/agent-files-state.cjs; skip init dismisses both hooks for 24h. The stage-1 preflight generates or updates CLAUDE.md before the mirror stages. A markerless root is project-owned and is left as it is; /ai-context-refresh --mode update adds generated sections around it through an AI smart-merge. When /ai-context-refresh has just completed source editing, it calls this same runner with --skip=claude-md so the root is not processed twice.

Coordination with ai-context-refresh

When preflight changes root instruction content, read .claude/skills/shared/protocols/context-engineering-principles.md and apply its Instruction-file audit before claiming completion. Fix findings at the canonical owner and regenerate affected outputs; an unchanged mirror-only run needs no editorial audit.

sync-codex owns generated Codex surfaces; ai-context-refresh owns the root AI-context lifecycle. Keep the user-facing skills separate, but use this runner as their one portable executable coordinator:

• A full /sync-codex run performs the CLAUDE.md preflight first. Missing roots are initialized; marker-managed roots are updated; markerless roots are project-owned and preserved.
• After an explicit /ai-context-refresh init/update/refactor, that skill calls node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --skip=claude-md after its final AI edits.
• Do not recursively invoke the other skill or hand-edit mirrors. If .claude (and optionally stale .codex) is copied into another project, run the full runner from the copied bundle; .claude is authoritative and .codex, .agents, and AGENTS.md are disposable generated outputs.

Skill profile on Codex

Stage 2 maps the project config's skillProfile onto each skill mirror's agents/openai.yaml. The host-independent rules (presets, lists, the called set, refusals) belong to resolveProfile() in .claude/scripts/sync-skill-profile.cjs; read .claude/config/README.md → Skill profile for them. The called set is every workflow step, every agent skills: entry, and the curated calledByOthers and entrySkills lists in .claude/config/skill-profiles.json.

Profile list	Skill nothing starts	Called skill
nameOnly	policy.allow_implicit_invocation: false (Codex has no name-only listing)	Keeps implicit invocation, with one kept implicit invocation for <name> ... note line — a workflow step does not reach a Codex skill whose implicit invocation is off (CODEX_STEP_REACHES_HIDDEN_SKILL = false), so preset standard hides nothing on Codex
commandOnly / off	allow_implicit_invocation: false; $name still runs it	Refused, unless allowHidingCalledSkills: true; with the opt-in, allow_implicit_invocation: false plus a warning line

• No profile, no change. The resolver loads only when skillProfile is declared, so a project without one gets a byte-identical mirror.
• Refused profile stops everything. A refusal prints the resolver's message and skill-profile: nothing was written, then exits 1 before any mirror, agent or config write — --no-skills included. The stage-19 divergence oracle fails the same way.
• Fail-closed inputs. A project config that exists but is not valid JSON fails the sync, because it cannot tell whether the config hides skills; a .claude/workflows.json without a workflows map fails the resolver.
• A skill that ships its own agents/openai.yaml without the policy is kept as it is: the profile is skipped for it with one conflict: line.

Stages

19 stages, sequential — the complete sync + verify pipeline, owned entirely by this runner. Stage 1 reconciles CLAUDE.md; stages 2-4 mutate mirrors; 5-19 verify (read-only) and are exactly what --verify-only selects, derived from each stage's own mutate marker rather than any transcribed list. Tech-spec freshness and feature-registry are optional capabilities: if their configuration contract is absent, the runner records an explicit skip and continues; if declared but malformed, their direct verifier fails closed:

#	Stage	Script	Effect
1	claude-md	.claude/skills/ai-context-refresh/scripts/generate-claude-md.cjs --check	Preflight CLAUDE.md; init missing or update marker-managed stale; a markerless root is left as written
2	migrate	.claude/scripts/codex/migrate-claude-to-codex.mjs	Refresh registry-derived workflow call blocks via .claude/scripts/lib/workflow-skill-contract.cjs, then migrate agents → .codex/agents/, mirror skills → .agents/skills/, and setup Codex notifications
3	hooks	.claude/scripts/codex/sync-hooks.mjs	Generate .codex/hooks.json + sync report
4	context	.claude/scripts/codex/sync-context-workflows.mjs	Regenerate the AGENTS.md project projection of CLAUDE.md; remove the retired .codex/CODEX_CONTEXT.md
5	tests	Runner discovers .claude/scripts/codex/tests/*.test.{mjs,cjs}	Run Codex tooling tests; missing or empty discovery fails
6	scripts-tests	Runner discovers .claude/scripts/tests/*.test.{mjs,cjs}	Run repo-script tests, including review and experience policies; missing or empty discovery fails
7	tech-spec-freshness	.claude/skills/tech-spec/scripts/generate-tech-specs.mjs --check	Verify configured derived technical views; explicit skip when techSpecScan is absent
8	feature-registry	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-feature-registry.mjs --configured-roots	Verify configured canonical TC/BR identity, continuation parts, split limits, links, ranges, summaries, and coverage; explicit skip when specSystem.featureRegistryRoots is absent
9	hooks-count-drift	.claude/hooks/tests/run-all-tests.cjs --filter=count-drift	Verify the <!-- COUNT:… --> inventory markers have not drifted from the real skill/hook/agent/workflow counts
10	hooks-parity	.claude/hooks/tests/run-all-tests.cjs --filter=parity	Verify hook parity across the Claude/Codex/Copilot surfaces
11	hooks-doc-sync	.claude/hooks/tests/run-all-tests.cjs --filter=doc-sync-gate	Verify hook documentation stays in sync with the wired hook set
12	wf-cycle	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-workflow-cycle-compliance.mjs	Verify workflow sequences, all-mode linked skill calls, todo-first bootstrap, roles/conditions and registry reverse pointers
13	sk-proto	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-skill-protocol-compliance.mjs	Verify skill strict-execution-contract
14	residue	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-no-project-residue.mjs	Verify no project residue in generated and generic source artifacts
15	sdd	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-sdd-semantic-compliance.mjs	Verify AI-SDD semantic contract coverage
16	review-validate-coverage	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-review-validate-coverage.mjs	Verify every review-family skill carries the /why-review --validate-findings route; graders never embed the fix-loop (Self-Review Convergence Loop sensor)
17	sync-adoption-parity	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-sync-adoption-parity.mjs	Verify SYNC tag ↔ carrier adoption parity: declared carriers carry both main + :reminder blocks, no undeclared skill carries a matrix tag, every injected body byte-matches canonical
18	provenance-markers	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-provenance-markers.mjs	Verify provenance-marker discipline in architecture-knowledge.md: declared tags only · — VERIFY only on a declared tag · §3/§8/§9/§10 each carry a default-basis banner · no banner enumerates row-level exceptions · a [model-knowledge] marker carries — VERIFY. Fail-soft when the catalog is absent
19	sync-divergence	.claude/scripts/codex/verify-sync-divergence.mjs	Byte-equality oracle over FOUR mirrors: .agents/skills, .codex/agents/*.toml, the context mirror (AGENTS.md; a leftover .codex/CODEX_CONTEXT.md is an orphan), and .codex/hooks.json — each re-materialized by the REAL writer into a temp dir, then diffed

Usage

# Discover the stage roster (MUTATE vs verify) — no need to read this file or any package.json:
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --list-stages

# Full sync (standalone, no npm):
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs

# Stream live child output:
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --verbose

# Full sync while forcing skill copy mode:
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --copy-skills

# Every read-only gate (no mutation) — derived from the mutate markers, never a transcribed id list:
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --verify-only

# Self-test the framework (both suites ship inside the bundle):
node .claude/hooks/tests/test-all-hooks.cjs
node .claude/hooks/tests/run-all-tests.cjs

# Configured feature-registry adoption roots (continuation parts discovered automatically):
node .claude/scripts/codex/verify-feature-registry.mjs --configured-roots

# Explicit paths or the whole tree remain available for audits (omit paths for whole-tree mode).
# {spec-root} = specRoots.business.path from docs/project-config.json, default docs/specs:
node .claude/scripts/codex/verify-feature-registry.mjs {spec-root}/Area/README.Feature.md

# Skip stages while debugging:
node .claude/skills/sync-codex/scripts/run-codex-sync.mjs --skip=migrate,hooks

Exit codes: 0 all pass · 1 orchestrator failure · non-zero propagates from failing stage.

Closing Reminders

MUST ATTENTION /sync-codex is model-invocable: run it once, after the .claude/** source edits are final and verified, when they leave mirrors stale — why: the pipeline rewrites every generated surface, so a run over half-finished source has to be repeated. An /ai-context-refresh completion calls the runner with --skip=claude-md; /project-skill-protocol may run its documented completion handoff. Never call it from inside its own stages, and never hand-edit a mirror instead. MUST ATTENTION edit source .claude/skills/sync-codex/**, NEVER the .agents/skills/sync-codex/** mirror MUST ATTENTION never reinstall a Codex legacy notify command — it runs for every thread, subagents included; alerts belong to the main-thread Stop/SessionEnd hooks MUST ATTENTION keep Codex config upserts surgical; preserve unrelated .codex/config.toml keys and tables while updating the managed notification/status-line keys; retire the old compaction budget only on an exact bundled-value match MUST ATTENTION keep AGENTS.md sync comprehensive for project information: mirror the project projection of CLAUDE.md (never framework or universal rules — hooks deliver those) and preserve unmanaged AGENTS.md preface text MUST ATTENTION keep AGENTS.md discoverable under Codex's read budget — Doc Lookup and the project rules project first; a discovery defect in AGENTS.md is fixed in CLAUDE.md, its template or the projection script (never by adding a framework or universal rule to the root), then re-synced MUST ATTENTION keep learned-lessons content out of .agents/skills/**; skills may point to lessons.md in the project-reference docs root (default docs/project-reference/; path from docsRoots.projectReference.path in docs/project-config.json) but must not embed its entries MUST ATTENTION orchestrator fails fast — re-run single failing stage with --only=<id> --verbose to debug MUST ATTENTION working directory auto-resolves to repo root from script path — do not pass --cwd MUST ATTENTION stage 1 may reconcile CLAUDE.md, stages 2-4 mutate mirrors; stages 5-19 verify only — use --only= for non-destructive validation

Anti-Rationalization:

Evasion	Rebuttal
"Just edit the .agents mirror directly"	Next sync overwrites it. Always edit .claude/skills/sync-codex/ source
"Skip a stage to save time"	Read-only gates (5-19) catch drift; skipping = silent regression risk
"Sync looks idempotent, skip verify"	Timestamp diffs are normal; structural diffs = bug. Always run verifiers

[FAILS FAST] First non-zero stage exit aborts chain. Re-run failing stage manually to debug. [REPO ROOT] Orchestrator auto-resolves repo root from its own path. NEVER pass --cwd.