# The Software Factory

One board that carries every piece of work from idea to production, with a person at the gates you choose and your rules checking every step.

Running several agents leaves work stranded between tools: an approved spec nobody started, a worktree merged locally but never pushed, a pull request open for a week. The Software Factory gives every piece of work one identity, from the moment it is filed to the moment it reaches production. It shows you where each item is and what is waiting on you.

The Factory lives in **Mission Control**. Open it from the sidebar or with {{kbd:⌘+K}} → **Software Factory**, then pick the **Factory** tab in the header. **Agents** is the other tab: it shows who is running right now. Warden remembers which tab you used last.

## The line

Every item moves along the same line of stages, left to right:

| Stage | What happens there |
|---|---|
| **Ideas** | Work comes in: typed by you, pulled from GitHub issues, Linear or Jira, or filed by an automation. |
| **Triage** | A read-only planner sizes the idea, picks a lane and lists risks and open questions. |
| **Shape** | The lane's plan or spec is drafted, and a person approves it. Skipped for lanes with no shaping. |
| **Build** | An agent builds it in its own git worktree: a sandboxed unattended run, or a chat you can watch and steer. |
| **Review** | The change is reviewed by the policy engine or by a person, optionally against the original ask by a separate reviewer. |
| **Main** | The change is merged locally or through a pull request. |
| **Staging, Production** | Observed, never driven: Warden reads a branch, tag or GitHub deployment you choose to tell you when the change got there. |
| **Shipped** | Every stage that applies is done. |

[What each stage means](factory-stages) has the detail and every status you can see on a tile.

> [!NOTE] The stage is worked out, not dragged
> An item's stage comes from real state: the decisions made on it, its plan or spec, its chat, and git itself. You never drag a card, and a card can't claim to be further along than it is. Merge a branch outside Warden and the item still moves to Main.

## Lanes: how much sign-off a piece of work gets

Not every change needs the same ceremony. Each item travels in a lane:

| Lane | For | Shape | Build | Review and merge |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| **Express** | Trivial, low-risk changes | None | Sandboxed run, starts by itself | Policy engine reviews; merges when policy allows |
| **Standard** | Most work | A plan a person approves | Chat in a worktree | A person reviews and merges |
| **Assured** | Risky or important work | A full spec, approved phase by phase | Chat in a worktree | A person reviews and merges, after a check against the spec |

Triage picks the lightest lane that is safe. Anything touching auth, permissions, migrations, payments, secrets, infrastructure, CI or public APIs never goes to the lightest lane. You can change the lane at any point until the build starts. See [Lanes and gates](factory-lanes).

## Needs you

Across the top of the Factory, the **Needs you** strip collects every decision that is waiting on a person, across all items: triage calls, plans and specs to approve, builds that need an answer, changes to review, merges held by policy. Each chip opens the exact place to act. Amber dots mean an item is waiting on a person; blue means an agent is working on it.

The same events reach the notifications inbox, and Telegram if you turn on **Settings → Notifications → Software Factory**.

## Your rules still apply

Every move the Factory makes (starting a build, approving a review, merging, opening a pull request) is checked live by the same policy engine that checks your agent's commands. A rule can hold any merge that touches `migrations/`, ban unattended merges on Fridays, or require a ticket before merge. Unattended builds run under the stricter [automated-runs rules](automated-runs). See [Lanes and gates](factory-lanes#gates-your-rules-at-every-step).

## Where to go next

:::cards
- [Set up the Factory](factory-setup) - Prerequisites, your first idea, connecting GitHub, Linear or Jira, and the pipeline editor.
- [What each stage means](factory-stages) - Every stage, what happens in it, and the statuses you will see.
- [Lanes and gates](factory-lanes) - How triage picks a lane, how to override it, and how rules hold work for a person.
- [Review, pull requests and merge](factory-review) - The review against the original ask, local merges and pull requests.
:::