Note → Automation

Write down how you want something handled next time, and the stack offers to do it for you.

notes/process.md: Next time I have a business idea, look up competitors and do a full market analysis, TAM included, so I know whether it's worth building.

A minute after you stop typing, your phone says: When I write down a new business idea, I can look up competitors; do a market analysis with TAM; say whether it's worth building. To build it, move ai/proposed/business_idea_research.md into notes/automations/. Move it, and a moment later: Automation built.

After that, each business idea you write is researched. Your phone gets the verdict first: favorable, unfavorable, or already done, by these people. The full analysis, with sources, is in ai/automations/business_idea_research/.

• Needs Core plus a chat model (Model endpoints). With no model it does nothing.
• Reads the web through Firecrawl when enabled. Without it, web steps come back as "where to look".

The proposal is a migration

ai/proposed/ gets a decree migration for the develop machine: what you want, not code.

• Overview: what you asked for
• Outcome: what starts it, what it produces, where results go
• Constraints: what it must not do
• Acceptance Criteria: how you'd know it works

Edit it in plain words before accepting. It stays the automation's desired state.

How it works

Step	Machine	What happens
A note settles	note_watch	The file handler for notes/**/*.md runs it a minute after the last save. One model call asks two things: is there a standing instruction here ("next time…", "whenever…"), and is this note the event an automation you accepted is waiting for?
A standing instruction	automation_propose	The model writes the migration, and you are told. Nothing is built.
You accept	reconcile	Moving the file to notes/automations/<name>.md files it as .decree/migrations/A<stamp>-<name>.md, which the daemon runs.
It is built	develop	The model reads the migration and answers with the trigger and the steps. develop writes .decree/machines/<name>.yml and .decree/scripts/<name>.sh and the trigger: a note event (note_watch matches your notes against it), a file handler in .decree/handlers.yml, or a schedule in .decree/cron/<name>.md. It must pass decree check and the trigger's own rules (a file trigger never matches its own output). A failed check is undone and shown to the model once more; a second failure reaches your phone like any failed run.
It runs	<name>	Its trigger starts it. It writes its results to ai/automations/<name>/<date>-<note>.md and sends their first lines to ntfy.

Research on the web, with Firecrawl

With Firecrawl on (EXIST_IS_AI_FIRECRAWL=true), automations can search and read the web, with no API key. Each search returns the pages' text. The steps develop writes for the example:

steps() {
    local sources
    sources="$(web_search "$(head -1 <<<"$NOTE") competitors" 5
               web_search "$(head -1 <<<"$NOTE") market size TAM" 5)"
    echo "## Verdict"
    ask "Favorable, unfavorable, or already done (by whom). One line, then why. \
Use only the sources below; cite URLs." "$NOTE

$sources"
    echo "## Existing solutions"
    ask "List who already does this, with what they charge. Cite URLs." "$sources"
    echo "## Market"
    ask "TAM, SAM and SOM, each with its source and how it was worked out." "$NOTE

$sources"
}

• web_search and web_read come from workspace/.decree/lib/firecrawl.sh; any decree script can use them. With Firecrawl off, develop refuses steps that use them.
• The verdict comes first because the first lines are what reach your phone.

Plugins: an automation that brings its own machine

An automation can arrive already written: a plugin, one markdown file whose frontmatter holds the whole machine. One offered by another stack waits in ai/proposed/; accept it the same way, by moving it into notes/automations/<name>.md, and the plugin machine installs it as written, asking no model. It is code that runs with the automation container's access, so read it before you accept it. Editing or deleting it reinstalls or removes all of it, endpoints included.

Changing or removing one

• Edit the file in notes/automations/ and develop rebuilds the automation to match.
• Delete it and the machine, script, trigger and migration are removed.
• Don't edit .decree/ directly; it's rebuilt from that file.

What it can do, and what to read first

• A built automation is a decree machine. The model writes only its steps function; the frame (automation/lib/automations/run.sh) gives it the triggering note or file, ask (one chat model answer), web_search and web_read, curl and jq.
• Steps that need you (pay, sign up, send, decide) come back under "For you".
• It runs unattended with access to your workspace and the stack's services. Read .decree/scripts/<name>.sh in code-server.
• A name decree already uses is refused, so it can't replace an existing machine.
• develop uses Claude when the automation container is signed in, otherwise the chat model. Built automations can then hand a step to Claude too.
• Your notes are read-only to the automation container, so nothing it reads can rewrite them.
• For bigger automations, ask Claude in code-server instead.