Project Completion Verification Automation

Overview

Automates the verification of project completion status by scanning GOAL.md for checked and unchecked items, providing categorized summaries and completion counts.

Core principle: Systematic verification over manual checking, evidence-based completion reporting.

When to Use

• •Before marking work as complete or creating PRs
• •When coordinator needs quick project status overview
• •When manually checking GOAL.md line by line
• •When needing counts of completed vs pending tasks by category
• •Before final deliverables or milestone completion
• •Symptoms: spending significant time manually verifying task completion, uncertainty about project status

Core Pattern

Use bash commands to parse GOAL.md and generate completion report:

# Get overall completion status
rg "\[ \]" GOAL.md -c && rg "\[x\]" GOAL.md -c

# Get completion by section
awk '/^#/{section=$0} /\[ \]/{pending[section]++} /\[x\]/{completed[section]++} END{for(s in pending) print s ": " completed[s] "/" (completed[s]+pending[s]) " completed"}' GOAL.md

# List pending items by section
awk '/^#/{section=$0} /\[ \]/{print section ": " $0}' GOAL.md

Quick Reference

Implementation Details

The skill uses ripgrep (rg) and awk to:

1. •Count unchecked items ([ ]) and checked items ([x])
2. •Group by markdown sections (categories)
3. •Provide completion percentages
4. •List specific pending items for action

Marking Items as Complete (Coordinator Only)

Note: This capability is for the coordinator agent ONLY. Non-coordinator agents must NOT use this section. Instead, non-coordinator agents should send a message to the coordinator with "GOAL COMPLETE:" prefix when they finish a task.

Workflow

1. •Run the status check commands above to see current state of GOAL.md (pending vs completed counts, specific pending items)
2. •For each item to mark, use the Edit tool to change - [ ] to - [x] for the specific line in GOAL.md
3. •Re-run status check to verify the mark was applied correctly
4. •Log the change in .sgai/PROJECT_MANAGEMENT.md with timestamp

Example

# Step 1: Check current status
rg "\[ \]" GOAL.md -c && rg "\[x\]" GOAL.md -c

# Step 2: Mark specific item using Edit tool
# oldString: "- [ ] Implement authentication endpoint"
# newString: "- [x] Implement authentication endpoint"

# Step 3: Re-run status check to verify
rg "\[ \]" GOAL.md -c && rg "\[x\]" GOAL.md -c

# Step 4: Log in PROJECT_MANAGEMENT.md
# "2026-02-01: Marked 'Implement authentication endpoint' as complete after verifying tests pass"

Common Mistakes

• •Not checking both unchecked [ ] and checked [x] patterns
• •Missing section-level analysis for categorized reporting
• •Forgetting to handle edge cases (empty sections, mixed formatting)
• •Not providing actionable output (just counts without context)
• •Non-coordinator agents attempting to use the marking capability
• •Marking items without verifying the work is actually complete
• •Forgetting to log the marking in PROJECT_MANAGEMENT.md

Expected Output Format

Project Completion Status:
Overall: 45/50 tasks completed (90%)

By Category:
- sgai-server: 23/25 completed (92%)
- bug fixes: 8/8 completed (100%)
- code quality issues: 14/17 completed (82%)

Pending Items:
- code quality issues: - [ ] endpoint error handling
- code quality issues: - [ ] test coverage improvements

Real-World Impact

Saves significant manual verification time by:

• •Eliminating line-by-line GOAL.md scanning
• •Providing immediate completion percentages
• •Highlighting specific pending work by category
• •Enabling quick status checks before milestones
• •Reducing human error in completion verification