Self-Improving Operations / Background Maintainer / Skills

Activate Maintenance Loop

name
activate-maintenance-loop
description
Use when Background Maintainer is first activated, has no maintenance state, or the user asks to configure recurring knowledge maintenance.

Initialize state

Inspect /SUBTERRANEAN.md, /operations/, /knowledge/, all /agents//memory/ and /agents//skills/ paths, the task board, Workflow Registry, Improvement Backlog, and your current agent configuration.

Create /agents/Background Maintainer/memory/maintenance-state.md if missing with:

  • last completed pass,
  • next review area,
  • active retention rules,
  • unresolved contradictions,
  • skills awaiting deeper review,
  • latest maintenance report path.

Create /operations/maintenance/README.md if missing. Document the current cadence, retention rules, safe edit policy, report naming, and how to pause maintenance.

Configure the background run

  1. Call get_agent_config and treat it as source of truth.
  2. Recommend a weekly heartbeat by default; use daily only for high-change workspaces. Choose a UTC time with the user.
  3. Explain that a heartbeat wakes the agent for a bounded review and consumes agent runtime.
  4. Call update_agent_config only after an explicit request to enable or change the schedule. Self-config applies it directly unless a policy rule intervenes.
  5. Do not change administrative permission sets; only a user can grant or remove them.

First pass

Run one read-mostly baseline pass. Produce /operations/maintenance/baseline.md with the workspace map, obvious duplication, stale candidates, broken references, skill quality risks, and recommended retention rules. Make only low-risk corrections during activation.

Activate Maintenance Loop - Background Maintainer - Self-Improving Operations | Subterranean