Plan to Issues

Convert a completed PLAN into GitHub parent + sub-issues using native sub-issue API.

Follow every step in order. Stop and report if any step fails.

Three Principles

1. Independent — Each sub-issue is self-contained. A new session with zero context can start work from the issue alone.
2. Deployable — Each sub-issue can be independently branched, PRed, and merged without breaking existing functionality.
3. Structured — Issue body has essentials only. Technical details and background go into comments.

Step 1: Determine Plan Source

Check if $ARGUMENTS is provided:

• With file (/plan-to-issues docs/plans/my-plan.md): Verify the file exists (test -f "$ARGUMENTS"), then read it. Save the path: PLAN_FILE="$ARGUMENTS" (used later for bidirectional linking).
• With text (/plan-to-issues "Add caching layer"): If $ARGUMENTS is not a valid file path, use it as plan description. Set PLAN_FILE="" (no file to link back to).
• Without arguments (/plan-to-issues): Read docs/codingbuddy/context.md and extract the most recent PLAN section's decisions and notes. Set PLAN_FILE="" (no file to link back to).

If no plan source is found, stop and ask the user to run PLAN first.

Step 2: Check GitHub Environment

REPO=$(gh repo view --json nameWithOwner --jq .nameWithOwner)
gh label list --json name --jq '.[].name'

Search for existing issues with similar titles to prevent duplicates:

gh issue list --state open --search "<plan-title-keywords>" --json number,title --jq '.[] | "#\(.number) \(.title)"'

If duplicates found, inform the user and ask whether to continue or update existing issues.

Step 3: Decompose into Deployable Units

Extract work units from the plan. For each candidate unit, verify:

For each unit:
  Can this be merged independently without breaking existing features?
  ├── YES → Keep as separate sub-issue
  └── NO  → Merge with related unit(s) into one sub-issue

  Does this modify the same files as another unit?
  ├── YES → Consider merging or enforce ordering
  └── NO  → Safe for parallel work

Classify dependencies:

• Parallel — No shared files, no ordering needed
• Sequential — Must complete A before B (note in comment, but both are independently deployable)

Step 3b: Determine Labels

Parent issue labels

Infer type from plan content:

• New functionality → feat
• Improving existing code → refactor or chore
• Fixing a problem → fix
• Documentation only → documentation

Sub-issue labels

• Inherit the type label from parent
• Add priority based on plan ordering and dependencies:
  • No dependencies, foundational work → priority:must
  • Depends on other sub-issues → priority:should
  • Nice-to-have, can be deferred → priority:could
• Use only labels that already exist in the repository (from Step 2)
• Do NOT create new labels

Step 4: Draft Issue Content

Parent issue body (overview only)

## Overview
[1-2 sentences: what and why]

## Background
[2-3 sentences: context and motivation]

## Plan Document
<!-- Include ONLY when PLAN_FILE is non-empty -->
Source plan: [`<PLAN_FILE>`](<permalink>) <!-- permalink = GitHub blob URL for the file -->

## Sub-issues
Linked via GitHub native sub-issues (see Sub-issues section below).

| # | Title | Deployable | Depends on |
|---|-------|-----------|------------|
| 1 | ... | Yes | — |
| 2 | ... | Yes | — |
| 3 | ... | Yes | #1 recommended |

Conditional: Omit the ## Plan Document section entirely when PLAN_FILE is empty (text or context-based plans).

Issue content rules

• Titles: Always in English, under 70 characters
• Body/comments: Follow the project's configured language (check codingbuddy config or recent issues)
• Labels: Use only existing labels from Step 2, do NOT create new labels

Sub-issue body (essentials only)

## Purpose
[1-2 sentences: why this work item exists]

## Changes
- `path/to/file.ts` — what changes
- `path/to/other.ts` — what changes

## Acceptance Criteria
- [ ] Specific, verifiable criterion 1
- [ ] Specific, verifiable criterion 2
- [ ] Existing tests pass
- [ ] Can be merged independently

Sub-issue comments (details and background)

Comment 1 — Technical Details:

## Technical Details

### Exact Changes
[Precise code/config/YAML changes to make]

### Steps
1. [Concrete step]
2. [Concrete step]

Comment 2 — Background & References (if needed):

## Background
[Why this approach was chosen]

## References
- [Link 1](url)
- [Link 2](url)

## Dependencies
- Precedes: #NNN depends on this
- Follows: Recommended after #NNN (but independently deployable)

Step 5: Confirm with User

Present a summary before creating anything:

Plan: "<title>"

Parent: "<parent title>" (labels: <detected labels>)
  Sub-1: "<title>" — <files> (deploy: independent)
  Sub-2: "<title>" — <files> (deploy: independent)
  Sub-3: "<title>" — <files> (deploy: independent, after Sub-1 recommended)

Total: <N> sub-issues, all independently deployable

Proceed?

Wait for user approval. Apply any requested changes.

Step 6: Create Issues on GitHub

6a. Create parent issue

Build the parent body from Step 4. When PLAN_FILE is non-empty, include the ## Plan Document section with a permalink constructed as:

BRANCH=$(git rev-parse --abbrev-ref HEAD)
PLAN_LINK="https://github.com/$REPO/blob/$BRANCH/$PLAN_FILE"

PARENT_URL=$(gh issue create \
  --title "<title>" \
  --label "<labels>" \
  --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
<parent body from Step 4, with Plan Document section if PLAN_FILE is set>
EOF
)")
PARENT_NUM=$(echo "$PARENT_URL" | grep -o '[0-9]*$')

6b. Create sub-issues (in parallel if independent)

For each sub-issue:

SUB_URL=$(gh issue create \
  --title "<title>" \
  --label "<labels>" \
  --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
<sub-issue body from Step 4>
EOF
)")
SUB_NUM=$(echo "$SUB_URL" | grep -o '[0-9]*$')

6c. Add comments to each sub-issue

gh issue comment $SUB_NUM --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
<Comment 1: Technical Details>
EOF
)"

# Only if background/references exist:
gh issue comment $SUB_NUM --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
<Comment 2: Background & References>
EOF
)"

6d. Link sub-issues to parent via GitHub native API

# Get the internal ID (not node_id) for the sub-issue
SUB_ID=$(gh api /repos/$REPO/issues/$SUB_NUM --jq .id)

# Create native sub-issue relationship
gh api /repos/$REPO/issues/$PARENT_NUM/sub_issues \
  -X POST -F sub_issue_id=$SUB_ID --jq '.id'

Repeat for every sub-issue.

If the sub-issue API fails (HTTP 500, 422, or 404):

1. Add sub-issue label to the sub-issue (if the label exists)
2. Add a comment on the parent issue listing the sub-issue: Sub-issue: #NNN — <title>
3. Add a comment on the sub-issue: Parent: #PARENT_NUM
4. Inform the user: "Native sub-issue linking failed. Linked via labels and comments instead. You can manually link at github.com."
5. Continue with remaining sub-issues — do NOT stop the entire process

6e. Update parent body with sub-issue numbers

Edit the parent issue body to include actual sub-issue numbers in the table.

gh issue edit $PARENT_NUM --body "$(cat <<'EOF'
<updated body with #NNN references>
EOF
)"

6f. Update plan document with issue references

Skip this step if PLAN_FILE is empty.

Append a ## Created Issues section to the plan document so the plan links forward to its issues:

if [ -n "$PLAN_FILE" ]; then
  cat >> "$PLAN_FILE" <<EOF

---

## Created Issues

> Auto-generated by \`/plan-to-issues\` — do not edit manually.

- **Parent**: #${PARENT_NUM} — <parent title>
$(for i in $(seq 1 ${#SUB_NUMS[@]}); do
  echo "- **Sub-issue**: #${SUB_NUMS[$i]} — <sub-issue $i title>"
done)

**Created**: $(date -u +"%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ")
EOF
fi

This creates a bidirectional link: the parent issue points to the plan (via ## Plan Document), and the plan points back to all created issues (via ## Created Issues).

Step 7: Report Result

Registered <N> issues:

Parent: #<num> — "<title>"
  Sub: #<num> — "<title>" (deploy: independent)
  Sub: #<num> — "<title>" (deploy: independent)
  Sub: #<num> — "<title>" (deploy: independent, after #<num> recommended)

Comments: Technical details added to each sub-issue
Hierarchy: GitHub native sub-issues linked
Bidirectional links: <status>
  - Parent issue → plan document: <YES if PLAN_FILE was set, otherwise SKIPPED>
  - Plan document → issues: <YES if PLAN_FILE was set, otherwise SKIPPED>

Print all issue URLs.

Step 7b: Update Context Document

Record the created issues in docs/codingbuddy/context.md for cross-session continuity.

Collect all sub-issue numbers from Step 6 into a space-separated variable SUB_NUMS.

TIMESTAMP=$(date -u +"%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ")
mkdir -p docs/codingbuddy

cat >> docs/codingbuddy/context.md <<EOF

## Plan-to-Issues Result (${TIMESTAMP})

- **Parent Issue**: #${PARENT_NUM}
- **Sub-issues**: $(for n in $SUB_NUMS; do printf "#%s " "$n"; done)
- **Created At**: ${TIMESTAMP}
- **Total**: $(echo $SUB_NUMS | wc -w | tr -d ' ') sub-issues
EOF

If the codingbuddy MCP server is available, prefer calling update_context instead:

update_context({
  mode: <current_mode>,
  progress: ["Plan-to-Issues: parent #PARENT_NUM, sub-issues #N1 #N2 ..."],
  notes: ["Issues created at TIMESTAMP via plan-to-issues skill"]
})