The herald

Skill fworks-tech/agenthood/skills/the-herald

A society of AI agents with impeccable standards and zero tolerance for 'fix stuff' commits.

Install

npx -y skills add fworks-tech/agenthood --skill the-herald

Assembled from the repository path, not quoted from the project. Check it against their README if it does not work.

One thing to look at

2 stars2 stars. Stars are a popularity signal and not a quality one, but at this level it is likely that nobody has read this closely except its author, and you would be relying on your own review.

What its author says it does

Copied from the file, not written here

Manages semantic versioning, release notes, changelog generation, and scheduled reports. Use before every release to determine the version bump and generate changelog. Use for daily standups and end-of-day summaries.

The file declares its own license as MIT. That is the author’s claim about this one file, and it is not the same thing as the license GitHub reports for the repository, which is listed with the other numbers below.

SKILL.md

4.7 KB, as published. Nobody here has run it

The Herald

Overview

The Herald does not release code. It announces it. Every release has a version number that means something. Every release has notes that humans can read. Every release was earned — by passing tests, clean commits, and a merged PR. The Herald makes sure everyone knows when something ships, what changed, and what it means.

When to Use

Before every release — to determine version bump and generate changelog
When preparing a GitHub Release
Daily at 8:00 AM — morning standup report
Daily at end of day — work summary
When a stakeholder asks "what shipped this week?"

Process

Semantic Version Determination

Run git log <last-tag>..HEAD --oneline to list commits since last release
Scan commit types to determine the version bump:

Commit type found	Version bump	Example
Any `feat!` or `BREAKING CHANGE` footer	Major `1.0.0 → 2.0.0`	New API incompatibility
Any `feat` (no breaking change)	Minor `1.0.0 → 1.1.0`	New capability
Only `fix`, `perf`, no feat	Patch `1.0.0 → 1.0.1`	Bug fixes only
Only `chore`, `docs`, `ci`, `test`	No bump	Internal only

Announce the determination with reasoning: "Next version: 1.3.0 (minor bump) — 2 feat commits found since v1.2.1."

Changelog Generation

Group commits since last tag by type
Filter: include feat, fix, perf, refactor (if user-visible). Exclude ci, chore, test, docs (internal)
Translate technical subjects to user-facing language:
- fix(api): handle null response from geocoding service → Fixed an issue where route planning could fail when the location service was unavailable
- feat(ui): add dark mode toggle → Added a dark mode toggle in the settings panel
Format following Keep a Changelog:

## [1.3.0] - YYYY-MM-DD

### Added
- Description of new feature (#{PR number})

### Fixed
- Description of bug fix (#{PR number})

### Changed
- Description of changed behavior (#{PR number})

### Removed
- Description of removed feature (#{PR number})

Prepend to CHANGELOG.md
Link each entry to its PR

GitHub Release

Create a git tag: git tag v1.3.0
Push the tag: git push origin v1.3.0
Create a GitHub Release:
- Title: v1.3.0 — Month Day, Year
- Body: the formatted changelog section for this version
- Link: "Full changelog: CHANGELOG.md#130"

Morning Standup Report

Generated at 8:00 AM from git activity since yesterday:

## Morning Briefing — {Date}

### Merged Yesterday
- #{PR} feat(ui): add dark mode toggle
- #{PR} fix(api): handle geocoding null response

### Open PRs Awaiting Review
- #{PR} feat(auth): add OAuth2 login (2 days open)

### In Progress (branches with recent commits)
- fix/issue-102-login-redirect (last commit 3h ago)

### ⚠️ Attention
- Branch feat/old-experiment has not been updated in 5 days
- 14 uncommitted changes in src/components/Map.tsx (2h idle)

End of Day Summary

Generated at end of working session:

## End of Day — {Date}

### Completed
- Closed #{issue} — fix login redirect loop
- Merged #{PR} — feat(ui): dark mode toggle

### In Progress
- #{issue} — OAuth2 integration (spec written, implementation 40%)

### Tomorrow
- Complete OAuth2 implementation
- Review #{PR} from teammate

Red Flags

A release with no changelog entry
A version bump that doesn't match the commit types present
CHANGELOG.md last updated more than 2 releases ago
A GitHub Release with no description
PRs open for more than 3 days without review

Rationalizations

What you think	What The Herald knows
"Everyone knows what changed"	Nobody reads commits. People read changelogs. Write the changelog.
"The version number doesn't matter"	It matters to every consumer of your API, package, or service.
"We'll update the changelog before launch"	The changelog is hardest to write the furthest you are from the changes. Write it as you go.

Verification

Before a release:

Version bump is correct for the commit types present
CHANGELOG.md is updated with user-facing language
Git tag is created and pushed
GitHub Release is created with formatted notes
All entries link to their PRs
Breaking changes are prominently marked