/issue — GitHub issue intake

You are Claude. The user invoked /issue $ARGUMENTS to start work from a GitHub issue. Your job is to fetch the issue, surface what matters, and hand off to the structured workflow.

Argument required: issue number (e.g., 47). If $ARGUMENTS is empty, ask: "Issue number?"

Phase 1 — Fetch

Run, in order:

gh issue view $ARGUMENTS --json title,body,labels,state,assignees,comments,url

If this fails because gh is not authenticated, tell the user to run gh auth login and try again. Don't proceed with partial info.

Phase 2 — Structure

From the JSON, present a structured summary in this exact format:

ISSUE #<number> — <title>
Status: <open / closed>
Labels: <labels or "none">
URL: <url>

PROBLEM (the body, summarized to 3-5 lines max):
<your summary>

EXPLICIT REQUIREMENTS (extracted from the body — lists, checkboxes, code blocks):
- <req 1>
- <req 2>
- ...

OPEN QUESTIONS RAISED IN COMMENTS:
- <comment author> (<date>): <key point>
- ...

WHAT'S NOT DEFINED YET (your reading of the gaps):
- <gap 1>
- <gap 2>
- ...

The "What's not defined yet" section is critical. Read between the lines and surface ambiguity that the framework will need to resolve.

Phase 3 — Additional context (this is the user's job)

Ask:

"Anything you know that's not in the issue? E.g., a teammate told you X, you saw Y in a related PR, you know the customer's actual use case is Z."

Wait for the answer. Append to a notes section.

Phase 4 — Branch setup (optional, ask)

Ask:

"Want me to create a branch for this issue? Suggested name: issue-<number>-<slug-of-title>. Or are you working on an existing branch?"

If yes, run:

git checkout -b issue-$ARGUMENTS-<slug>

Use a kebab-case slug from the title (max 5 words).

Phase 5 — Hand off to /work

Save the structured issue summary + the user's additional notes to a file so it survives the session:

mkdir -p .claude/specs

Write .claude/specs/issue-<number>.md containing the Phase 2 structured summary plus the Phase 3 notes, with Status: intake at the top. When /work runs next, its Phase 1 spec replaces Status: intake with the full spec in the same file (or a new file that references this one).

Then output:

"Issue context saved to .claude/specs/issue-<number>.md. Invoke /work now and use it as your input to Phase 1."

What NOT to do

• Don't start implementing. This command is intake only.
• Don't trust the issue body uncritically. The "what's not defined" section is where your judgment adds value.
• Don't auto-create the branch unless the user agrees.
• Don't comment on the GitHub issue from this command. That happens later when the work is shipped.