A
Sendercoding harness
READYIssues the handoff and expectations
RELAYREADY, IN 60 SECONDS
Pass the work.
Keep the context.
Two agents. One unfinished task.
Watch the handoff—then change the story.
ILLUSTRATED SIMULATION01 / THE HANDOFF
AGENT ASenderWork in progress
AGENT BReceiverA fresh session
01
A new agent should not mean a fresh start.
An unfinished staging review moves from one agent to another. The next agent needs more than a chat summary.
What if something changed?
Choose a version of the story. Jump straight to its check.
Preparing the local demonstration…
Illustrated agents, not live AI. Local browser checks use fixed example records and a fixed demonstration clock. A result is not permission to act.
Try the full workbench ↗Read the story and its three endings
- The problem. A new agent takes over an unfinished staging review. A chat summary alone can leave critical details implicit.
- The handoff. The sender records the goal, standing constraints, evidence, rejected approaches and next action in an immutable HANDOFF.md.
- The readback. The receiver restates the goal, echoes the exact constraints, acknowledges dead ends, addresses facts needing recheck, and carries forward human questions.
- The check. The core validator checks the handoff and readback. The experimental Continuation Gate additionally binds their bytes and compares declared revisions, pinned inputs and prior action status with supplied observations.
- The decision. Matching declarations can produce resume; a changed revision produces recheck; an uncertain prior action produces escalate. These are mechanical checks, not proof of understanding, truth or authorization. The executor must still verify permissions and current state.
This illustration reuses the supplied staging-review fixtures. It does not run agents or access a real database.
OPEN HANDOFF CONTRACT · EXPERIMENTAL CONTINUATION GATE
Ready for
the next agent.
A handoff says where work stopped. RelayReady checks the receiver’s readback and records whether the declared state supports resuming, rechecking, or escalating.
INTERACTIVE DEMONSTRATION
Does this work
resume?
Simulated observations · recorded local validator results. Explore how a changed revision or uncertain effect changes the decision.
Loading the inspectable demonstration fixtures.
B
Receiverfresh harness
WAITINGReads back and records observations
RELAY EVENTSSTEP 0 / 4
- 01Sender prepares the handoffIssued task state and expectations.
- 02Receiver produces a readbackInvariants, stale facts and open questions.
- 03Compare the observationsCheckpoint binds the readback, then observations are checked.
- 04Inspect the recorded decisionThe local validator’s receipt and reasons.
RECORDED VALIDATIONPENDING
—waiting for replay
- ○ Handoff and readback artifacts
- ○ Checkpoint and expected revisions
- ○ Observed inputs and effect status
- ○ Decision and input bindings
EXPERIMENTAL PROFILE · 0.1-DRAFT
One handoff. Three possible decisions.
Resume when declared checks are consistent, recheck changed state, or escalate uncertainty that needs a decision.
Loading recorded artifacts…The receipt binds exact artifact bytes and observations. Authorization and conditional writes remain with the executor. This lab replays saved Python validator output; it does not run a model, invoke tools, or execute the Python validator.
PROPOSED OPEN CONTRIBUTION
Make the checkpoint
reviewable.
The experimental Continuation Gate adds a small sidecar to the frozen 0.1 handoff contract: declared expectations, receiver observations and a reproducible receipt.
Receipts bound to bytes
SHA-256 bindings identify the exact handoff, readback, checkpoint and observation used for a recorded decision.
Revision checks
Compare the expected resource revision with what the receiver observed. A mismatch requests a recheck before continuation.
Pinned inputs
Record digests for relevant inputs, including skill or instruction artifacts. A matching version label alone does not establish unchanged bytes.
Uncertain effects
If the outcome of an earlier side effect is unknown, escalate it. The executor must establish what happened before considering a retry.
Resume consistent declarationsRecheck state needs reviewEscalate a decision is required
An executable contribution candidate for discussion and review. A receipt records mechanical consistency, not semantic understanding or permission to act.
PROTOCOL
The contract travels.
Private sessions do not.
RelayReady transfers the minimum inspectable task state. It does not scrape vendor session stores, orchestrate agents, or call a model during validation.
SENDER
Write
Capture goal, state, constraints and unresolved decisions.
ARTIFACT
Issue
Make the handoff immutable and link successors by ID.
RECEIVER
Read back
Echo invariants, recheck stale facts and surface conflicts.
VALIDATOR
Check
Report mechanical acknowledgements; the draft gate adds a continuation decision.
Invariants
Standing rules are hashed, echoed verbatim and inherited across a chain.
Stale facts
Time-sensitive state is explicitly rechecked instead of silently trusted.
Dead ends
Rejected approaches travel with their reasons so the next agent does not repeat them.
Human questions
Decisions requiring judgment remain visible; the receiver may not guess them.
ARCHITECTURE
A small protocol between large systems.
RelayReady sits at the boundary between harnesses. The local core checks the 0.1 handoff contract. The experimental gate consumes a checkpoint and observations to produce a decision receipt.
- 01Vendor-neutralHarness and model identities stay separate.
- 02Local by defaultLint, readback and chain checks make no network calls.
- 03Evidence-boundedMissing results remain “not run,” never estimates.
HARNESS ASender agent
HANDOFF.mdREADBACK.yaml
RELAYREADY CORE + DRAFT GATEContract · Checkpoint · Observationdeterministic / local
BOUND RECEIPTRESUME / RECHECK / ESCALATE
HARNESS BReceiver agent
COMPLEMENTARY LAYER
A shared checkpoint
before work resumes.
Conference discussions of durable delegation, versioned skills and recoverable effects point toward a useful contribution: reusable checks and portable test cases for the continuation boundary.
DELEGATE
A2A & workflow engines
Assign work and own transitions.
CHECK
RelayReady
Bind artifacts, compare observations, record a decision.
EXECUTE
MCP & tool protocols
Expose bounded capabilities.
AUTHORIZE
Identity & policy
Decide who may perform each action.
PERSIST
Resources & filesystems
Store artifacts with lifecycle and revision rules.
Continuation conformance
An experimental profile and reference validator that different harnesses can exercise against shared fixtures.
Portable artifact pattern
Store HANDOFF.md and READBACK.yaml in any resource system that supports revision-aware writes.
Executor-owned authority
The receipt informs continuation. Identity checks, permissions, freshness and conditional execution remain with the surrounding system.
Deterministic test vectors
Exercise unchanged state, revision drift, changed inputs, unknown effects and unresolved human decisions.
Inspired by shared engineering patterns; no exclusive novelty, standards-body affiliation, adoption or endorsement is claimed.
PORTABLE INTEGRATIONS
One contract. Native instructions.
The same L1 Writer and L2 Reader behavior is packaged for each harness’s documented extension mechanism.
Codex
Project skill
SKILL.mdClaude Code
Project skill
SKILL.mdKimi Code
Project skill
SKILL.mdgoose
Project recipe
relayready.yamlPackaging follows documented native formats. Live cross-vendor relay acceptance remains an explicit owner-run gate.
LOCAL BUILD EVIDENCE
Claims stay attached to inspectable results.
Every result in the control room comes from a recorded local validator receipt, paired with its exact demonstration inputs. Inspect the artifacts before interpreting a decision.
NOT YET CLAIMED
- Production adoption
- Real-runner advantage
- Live two-vendor acceptance
0.1 COMPATIBILITY
A new name without a broken contract.
The public product is RelayReady. The accepted serialization keeps its original field names so existing handoffs remain valid. The Continuation Gate is an additional experimental profile, not a change to the frozen 0.1 wire format.
PRIMARY CLI
relayready lint HANDOFF.mdLEGACY ALIAS
stafeta lint HANDOFF.mdFROZEN WIRE KEYS
stafeta · stafeta_readback