Entry 24

An entry written in one command, prose on stdin

2026-09-24cliskill

Filescrates/cairns/src/main.rsmcp.rscrates/cairns/templates/SKILL.md

Writing an entry was two steps: cairns new made a stub, then the prose went into it by editing the file. A model doing this got the second step wrong often enough to matter - looking for the file, rewriting the front matter, or repeating the heading. And the **Still unknown:** line was the part it got wrong most: left blank, written twice, or put somewhere other than the end.

cairns new now takes the prose directly:

cairns new "Title" --area cli --unknown "what is open" --body - <<'EOF2'
The prose.
EOF2

--body - reads stdin, and --body "text" takes it inline. The command writes the front matter, the # N. Title heading and the trailer, so nothing has to be opened afterwards. Without --body it writes the stub exactly as before - without_a_body_the_stub_is_unchanged.

One way for the trailer to arrive

The trailer comes from --unknown, or from a **Still unknown:** line already at the end of the body. Never both, and never neither:

Refusing the last case rather than defaulting to nothing is deliberate. A default of nothing would close out every entry whose writer forgot, which is the silent hole 17 made check close. The refusal happens before a number is taken, so a refused body leaves no stub behind.

"Has a trailer" means the marker begins a line, as the spec requires. The first version of the MCP check used contains, which counts a sentence that merely mentions the marker - this entry is one. Both paths now share has_trailer.

A body that starts with a # heading loses it, because the command writes the entry's own and a repeated heading is the most common thing handed over with the prose. Tests: a_body_takes_its_trailer_from_unknown, a_body_that_ends_with_a_trailer_keeps_it, a_body_with_no_trailer_at_all_is_refused_with_the_fix, a_body_that_repeats_the_heading_loses_it.

The MCP tool

worklog_new already took a body, but always appended its own trailer, so a body that ended with one got two. It now goes through the same compose_body. Its default is unchanged - an absent still_unknown still means nothing, because its schema has always said so - except that a trailer in the body now takes precedence over that default.

The skill now leads with the one-command form, and says to quote the heredoc marker so backticks and $ in the prose arrive as written.