Glossary
The words Vago's code, docs and TUI use, each with what it means and the words it replaces.
Vago’s code, docs and TUI use these words exactly as defined here. Each term links by its name, such as /docs/glossary/#goal-step, and under Avoid are the words it replaces.
Vago
The whole system the human drives, spanning every Project it serves.
Avoid: factory, orchestrator, platform, AFK
Vago Alpha
The first, kernel-only release of Vago: it takes a Goal’s ready Tickets through the Workflow that Goal names on a Harness without the human present. Inside Vago docs it may be shortened to “alpha”.
Avoid: v1, MVP
Project
One repository Vago builds for, such as a TUI, a mini project or an iOS app.
Avoid: repo, app
Workflow
One of a Project’s named lists of ordered Steps, defined inside that Project. Each Goal names the Workflow its Tickets pass through, and a Ticket may name another for itself.
Avoid: pipeline, process
Step
One entry in a Workflow, either an agent Step, which a Harness performs as one Run, or a shell Step, which runs a command.
Avoid: stage, phase, task
Goal Step
A Step of a Workflow’s before_all or after_all list, run for the whole Goal in its worktree rather than for a Ticket, and recorded in goal.md. Only the Goal’s own Workflow’s Goal Steps run.
Avoid: hook, setup step
before_all
A Workflow’s list of Goal Steps that runs once, before the Goal’s first Ticket, and not again once it has gone through.
Avoid: on start, setup
after_all
A Workflow’s list of Goal Steps that runs once every Ticket is done, and again after any Tickets added since then are done. A Goal isn’t done until it has gone through.
Avoid: on end, teardown
Milestone
A large outcome made of several Goals, such as “build a Slack clone”; done when all its Goals are done. Not part of Alpha.
Avoid: mission, epic, initiative
Goal
An outcome the human wants for a Project, from a one-Ticket feature to a whole app launch; done when all its Tickets are done. Goals do not nest.
Avoid: epic, mission
Planning item
A Goal still being planned: a folder in .vago-goals/ with a planning/ folder and no goal.md. It shows in the Goals list as planning, with its planning activity, and has a name the human may change, and can be discarded. It is no Goal: vago run doesn’t find it, and it has no Workflow, Tickets or Runs. It holds its planning chat, whose agent runs on the Harness chosen when the item is made, Claude Code or Codex, Claude Code by default when it is installed; the accepted Goal’s Workflow picks its own Harnesses. Accepting it writes its goal.md, which turns it into a Goal that keeps its planning/ folder.
Avoid: draft, idea
Planning activity
How a planning item’s planning stands, as the Goals list says it: no session yet, its planning session open, a Proposal ready to accept, or waiting for the human’s reply.
Avoid: status (a Ticket’s), state
Planning chat
A planning item’s conversation with its planning agent, held in its planning session, whose id is saved under its planning/ folder. It is read-only once the item is accepted: the session still opens from the Goal, and nothing said there changes the Goal.
Avoid: thread; session for the chat itself (a planning session is the Harness’s own session it runs in)
Planning session
The Harness’s own interactive session a planning item’s agent runs in, inside the planning view. It is not a Run: it belongs to no Step, Ticket or Goal. It is open while the view is, and reopening the item resumes it by its saved session id. The time it is open and what it costs add up to the item’s planning cost, which stays apart from the build Runs: no Goal’s run time or cost, the Project’s spend or a Goal report counts it.
Avoid: chat session, terminal, Run
Proposal
The Goal, ordered Tickets with their blockers, and recommended Workflow that a planning item’s agent proposed last in its planning session, with the human’s Workflow choice. A revision replaces it. It is ready to accept when nothing in it would stop acceptance; decisions still open don’t.
Avoid: plan, draft, preview (the pane that shows it)
Accept
Turns a planning item whose Proposal is ready to accept into a ready Goal with ready Tickets, all at once. It starts nothing, and the planning chat stays with the Goal, read-only.
Avoid: approve, commit, publish
Run
One Harness session performing one agent Step on one Ticket, or for the Goal in a Goal Step, such as implement, review or discuss; a Ticket usually takes several.
Avoid: session, job, attempt
Pass
A Ticket’s, or a Goal Step list’s, way through its Steps from the first; a reset Ticket starts a new one, and a picked-up pass continues its latest.
Avoid: attempt, round
Lost
A Goal whose Ticket says running while no live vago run has the Goal. The next vago run ends that Ticket’s open Run with outcome lost and picks the Ticket up at that Run’s Step. A Goal Step Run left open is ended lost the same way, and its pass is picked up at that Step.
Avoid: crashed, orphaned
Resume
A Run that continues an earlier Run’s Harness session with a fixed message to continue, in place of the Step’s prompt, when a Ticket is picked up at an agent Step or the Step is retried. A resume that fails to start falls back to a fresh session once.
Avoid: restart, rerun
Retry
A Resume that vago run starts by itself after an agent Step fails, waiting 1, 1 and then 5 minutes before each of the three; the Ticket goes stuck when the last one fails. Shell Steps are never retried.
Avoid: attempt, rerun
Ticket
One unit of work that belongs to a Goal; done when it reaches the end of its Workflow.
Avoid: issue, task, story
Gate
A Workflow Step that pauses work until the human approves it. Not part of Alpha.
Avoid: checkpoint, approval step
Harness
The coding agent that performs an agent Step: Claude Code or Codex. A Workflow names one for all its agent Steps, and a Step may name its own, so one Ticket can be built on one Harness and reviewed on the other.
Avoid: runtime, worker, droid
Worktree
A Goal’s own checkout of the Project, outside it, on branch vago/<goal>, where the Goal’s Steps run. Vago removes it once the Goal is done and nothing in it would be lost; the branch stays.
Avoid: workspace, sandbox