close-pr — keep the live status lean, land on green

The live status file is read in full every session, so finished work must not accumulate there. Closing a PR is a mechanical ritual — this is it.

Procedure

1. Move status → history: cut the completed items out of the live status

file (e.g. plans/STATUS.md) and append a terse timeline row to the archive (e.g. plans/HISTORY.md): date · milestone · → domain plan + PR. Never leave ✅ DONE bullets in the live "Now" section — that append-only drift is exactly what bloats it.

1. Detail lives at the source: the authoritative "what was done" is the

domain plan + module README. Status/history only link to them; do not duplicate detail.

1. Freshness pass over the blind spots nothing else forces a look at:

• root README status line + layout,
• the closed domain's module README status headers,
• any consumer's §who-uses-me list you touched.

1. Epic closer? Widen the sweep. If this PR ships the last slice of a

multi-PR epic — signals: it flips the last open [ ] action item of an ADR / design doc to [x], the PR body closes #<epic-issue>, or it's the final numbered slice — then a single-slice freshness pass is not enough. This is the classic drift: a mid-epic slice updates the authoritative source, but the summaries scattered across the repo lag, and the final slice never triggers a "the whole epic is done now" sweep. So:

• Keep one source of truth per epic status (the ADR header, or the roadmap

bullet; the live status file while in flight). Flip that to complete.

• Every other doc that mentions the epic must _link_, not restate — sweep the

root README status list, any plan index/map (keep it statusless), the domain plan header, and the ADR's own status line so none still says "in flight" / "deferred". Fewer restatements is the fix, not more edits.

• Consult the repo's coupling registry (e.g. .skills/change-map.yaml) for which

summary docs are wired to that epic.

1. Drift gate: run the check-drift skill. Do not merge with open drift.
2. Merge on green: confirm CI is green, then squash-merge and delete the

branch (only if the project authorizes self-merge — check its rules first). Never direct-push to the default branch.

Output

What moved to history, what the freshness pass changed, drift verdict, and the merge result (or why merge was withheld). If CI is not green, stop and report — do not merge.