Handoff Artifacts

A Handoff Artifact is a structured, immutable summary document created at a phase boundary to transfer essential state, decisions, and unblocked tasks from one context window or agent to another.

Why Raw Transcripts Fail

When migrating work across sessions or tools, passing the full unedited conversation transcript introduces immense noise, outdated assumptions, and token bloat. A handoff artifact acts as a lossy compression filter that preserves signal while discarding intermediate dead-ends.

Anatomy of a Great Handoff Artifact

1. Objective: A one-sentence summary of what was accomplished and what the next session must achieve.
2. Current State: Verifiable facts backed by tool output (git commit SHA, passing test counts, created file paths).
3. Decisions Made: Architectural choices and hard constraints established in the prior session.
4. Immediate Frontier: A concrete, ordered checklist of next actions with blockers clearly identified.

When to Use Handoffs

• Transitioning from an exploratory prototype branch back to the main feature branch.
• Crossing from planning/spec creation into ticket execution.
• Handing off tasks between different agent harnesses and sessions.

Related

smart zone, context rot, idea to ship flow, progressive disclosure, ai coding taxonomy.