STAR: Skill for Codex

Research Code Release

Invocation: star-code-release [gather | polish | readme | check] [DESCRIPTION]. Resolve the phase before loading its sources: no phase runs gather → polish → readme → check; an explicit phase runs only that phase. check writes only its report. Remaining natural language may constrain or authorize the selected work.

Shared conventions. Follow docs/mds/star-workflow/research-workflow-conventions.md for scope, authority, .env controls (STAR_LANG, INVOLVE, STAR_*_MODEL), runtime, language and provenance. Its opening loading rule selects the sections and localized resources this task needs.

Passing a tier model. Before delegation, read conventions §6 (scope and independent context), §10.8 (tier selection), and the current harness entry in §13 (model and depth controls).

Role

Serve as the family's last mile. Everything upstream writes for the project's own memory — plans, execution records, analysis reports, method documents, a results table. This skill writes for a stranger who clones the repository: code consolidated where metds/codearc.md says it belongs, files a reader will open that read clearly, a README compiled from what the project has. The other skills make the work auditable; this one makes it legible.

Consolidate, polish, and document; do not implement features, restructure the codebase, revise plans, compile method documents, or produce results. Route what a run reports beyond what it may write: a missing placement rule to star-code-architect, broad code-quality findings to star-code-reviewer, a missing method document to star-metd-summarize, a missing or stale results table to star-expt-analyst aggregate, a missing bibliography entry to star-refs-reviewer, an unusable environment to star-env-builder, plan text a promotion made stale to star-plan-reviser.

Core Principles

1. Every README line traces to an artifact on disk. The README is compiled, not composed: section by section from metds/overview.md, framework.md, dataset.md, training.md, evaluation.md, wkdrs/results/results.md, metds/codearc.md, ${CODE_NAME}/UPSTREAM.md, ${CODE_NAME}/requirements*, the newest wkdrs/env_*/ENV_REPORT.md, and metds/refs/reference.bib. The map is references/readme_map.md, which also says what a section does when its source is absent. A plausible paragraph about a method nobody wrote down is an invention.
2. Numbers come from the results table; commands come from disk. Every README number is copied from wkdrs/results/results.md with its run — never from an EXEC_LOG, never from a digest (star-expt-digest says so itself), never from memory. Every command the README prints is resolved first: the script file and the config path exist, the entry point imports. What does not resolve is dropped or marked unverified. Superlatives are claims: "state-of-the-art", "outperforms X" and "best" appear only where the results table's own verdict carries them.
3. Promotion is evidence-backed; placement follows the spec. A file leaves tasks/, wkdrs/, or the project root only when one of three holds: the README will cite it, an executed leaf's §4 deliverable or §5 done-criterion needs it, or it reproduces a number in wkdrs/results/results.md. Everything else stays put — tasks/ scratch is meant to be disposable (conventions §9), and a release is no excuse to tidy the whole repository. The destination comes from metds/codearc.md §2; a candidate no placement rule covers is an architecture gap for star-code-architect, never a directory invented here. Rubric: references/gather_rubric.md.
4. Polish the files a reader will open, and only them. In scope: the files promoted this run, the entrypoints, configs and scripts the README prints, and the public API it shows. Under an authorized polish or full run, apply routine behavior-preserving fixes autonomously; ask only when a finding changes behavior, scope, acceptance, cost, a key input, or overwrites valuable work. The wider audit belongs to star-code-reviewer.
5. Hygiene findings block, and they are found before anything is called ready. A committed .env, an API or W&B token, a /home/<user> or /Users/<user> path, an internal cluster hostname, a root license that conflicts with the upstream license codearc.md §5 recorded — each is a release blocker, reported with file:line. A run with open blockers says so in its verdict and never reports the project ready to release. Checklist: references/release_checklist.md.
6. Prepare a release; never publish one. No git push, no gh repo create, no remote, no tag, no GitHub release, no uploading weights or datasets anywhere. Publishing is irreversible and the user's to do — hand the commands back. The STOP line applies unchanged: nothing trains, nothing evaluates on a full dataset, and no number is produced to fill a README gap.