Worktree Isolation

Isolate a change in a sibling Git worktree, then merge it from the main checkout and clean up. For records see work-tracker; for commit subjects see conventional-commits.

Steps

basicly worktree create NAME [--base BRANCH]          # add and provision .venv, node_modules and hooks
basicly worktree merge NAME --bead RECORD-ID          # from the main checkout; --bead is the old flag name for the record id
basicly worktree cleanup NAME                         # remove the worktree and its merged branch

1. Create the worktree when the work will commit. A plain git worktree add ../REPO.worktrees/NAME -b BRANCH leaves the hooks and environments missing, so it suits read-only work only.
2. Work and commit inside the worktree.
3. Merge from the main checkout. Git refuses to update a branch that another worktree has checked out.
4. Clean up. Without --force, cleanup refuses uncommitted changes and keeps an unmerged branch.

Rules

• Isolate every non-trivial change; skip a typo fix.
• Never set a relative core.hooksPath in a linked worktree. It silently skips the hooks.
• Inspect existing branches and worktrees first. Never replace or discard another session's work.
• Resolve a conflict against the whole task: keep unrelated work and rerun the affected checks.

For several merges in order, stale sessions, cleanup refusals, hook resolution in a linked worktree, protected destinations in an agent sandbox and the Claude Code background isolation setting, read lifecycle.