divide-task

A workflow for breaking a completed software specification into smaller GitHub issues. It also records those tasks in a TODO file and links them back to the parent issue.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it after a specification is complete to define numbered subtasks, mark whether each needs human decisions, record blockers, and create linked GitHub issues.
Why use it?
It turns a large implementation into independently trackable work with clear ownership, dependencies, and readiness for autonomous coding. The workflow also requires reviewing the breakdown before issues are created.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/retz8/pastiche/divide-task
Any agent
npx skills add retz8/pastiche --skill divide-task
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/retz8/pastiche

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 60 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 481 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00060 $0.00481
Opus 5 $0.00030 $0.00241
Sonnet 5 $0.00012 $0.00096
Haiku 4.5 $0.00006 $0.00048

Measured 2d ago against content hash d2a8ac79bc73, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

divide-task scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 2d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

.claude/skills/divide-task/SKILL.md · 32 lines

What it actually says

divide-task

Harness conventions: _dev/docs/harness.md. Requires: task spec written, task [WIP], feature branch checked out.

Workflow

  1. Derive sub-tasks from the spec. Each sub-task is one implementation step, sized for a single overnight session. Number them N.1, N.2, … where N is the task's TODO number.

  2. Analyze each sub-task:

    • Autonomy — purely mechanical, mergeable without human judgment → autonomous-ready; otherwise → decision-needed. When in doubt, decision-needed.
    • Dependencies — which sub-tasks must land first. Independent sub-tasks that touch disjoint files/logic may run in parallel; note the execution order.
  3. Review with the user before creating anything: list sub-tasks, labels, and dependency order. Adjust until approved.

  4. Create child issues. For each sub-task:

    • Title [N.x] <name>; body: one-paragraph scope + pointer to the spec path; same milestone as the parent; autonomy label.
    • For blocked ones: create blocked-by-<blocker-issue-number> labels on demand (gh label create) and apply them. Blockers must be created first so their issue numbers exist.
    • Link each as a sub-issue of the parent (GitHub sub-issue, or a task-list in the parent body if unavailable).
  5. Mirror into _dev/TODO.md. Under the task line, add an indented checklist: - [ ] **N.x** <name> (#<issue>).

  6. Update the parent issue. Add the sub-issue links and the spec reference.

Label lifecycle (for whoever completes a sub-task)

When a blocking sub-task closes, remove its blocked-by-<its-number> label from every issue carrying it, and tick the sub-task checkbox in TODO.md.

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 32 lines · 60 tokens per session scan A d2a8ac79bc73

Subscribe to this mod's changes

divide-task is a skill published in the GitHub repository retz8/pastiche (4 stars, last pushed 2mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 60 tokens to every session and 481 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-31.

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