autotask-mcp taskmaster.instructions.md

Taskmaster Tool & Command Reference

This document provides a detailed reference for interacting with Taskmaster, covering both the recommended MCP tools, suitable for integrations like VS Code, and the corresponding task-master CLI commands, designed for direct user interaction or fallback.

Note: For interacting with Taskmaster programmatically or via integrated tools, using the MCP tools is strongly recommended due to better performance, structured data, and error handling. The CLI commands serve as a user-friendly alternative and fallback.

Important: Several MCP tools involve AI processing... The AI-powered tools include parse_prd, analyze_project_complexity, update_subtask, update_task, update, expand_all, expand_task, and add_task.

🏷️ Tagged Task Lists System: Task Master now supports tagged task lists for multi-context task management. This allows you to maintain separate, isolated lists of tasks for different features, branches, or experiments. Existing projects are seamlessly migrated to use a default "master" tag. Most commands now support a --tag <name> flag to specify which context to operate on. If omitted, commands use the currently active tag.

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Initialization & Setup

1. Initialize Project (init)

• MCP Tool: initialize_project
• CLI Command: task-master init [options]
• Description: Set up the basic Taskmaster file structure and configuration in the current directory for a new project.
• Key CLI Options:
  • --name <name>: Set the name for your project in Taskmaster's configuration.
  • --description <text>: Provide a brief description for your project.
  • --version <version>: Set the initial version for your project, e.g., '0.1.0'.
  • -y, --yes: Initialize Taskmaster quickly using default settings without interactive prompts.
• Usage: Run this once at the beginning of a new project.
• MCP Variant Description: Set up the basic Taskmaster file structure and configuration in the current directory for a new project by running the 'task-master init' command.
• Key MCP Parameters/Options:
  • projectName: Set the name for your project. (CLI: --name <name>)
  • projectDescription: Provide a brief description for your project. (CLI: --description <text>)
  • projectVersion: Set the initial version for your project, e.g., '0.1.0'. (CLI: --version <version>)
  • authorName: Author name. (CLI: --author <author>)
  • skipInstall: Skip installing dependencies. Default is false. (CLI: --skip-install)
  • addAliases: Add shell aliases tm and taskmaster. Default is false. (CLI: --aliases)
  • yes: Skip prompts and use defaults/provided arguments. Default is false. (CLI: -y, --yes)
• Usage: Run this once at the beginning of a new project, typically via an integrated tool like VS Code. Operates on the current working directory of the MCP server.
• Important: Once complete, you MUST parse a prd in order to generate tasks. There will be no tasks files until then. The next step after initializing should be to create a PRD using the example PRD in .taskmaster/templates/example_prd.txt.
• Tagging: Use the --tag option to parse the PRD into a specific, non-default tag context. If the tag doesn't exist, it will be created automatically. Example: task-master parse-prd spec.txt --tag=new-feature.