/sdd-archive

Close the SDD cycle. Merge specs into canonical and move to archive.

Usage

/sdd-archive                # Archive active change
/sdd-archive {change-name}

Prerequisites

• All tasks in tasks.md marked [x]
• /sdd-verify passed
• PR created

What it does

1. Merge delta specs into canonical

For each domain in the change specs:

• Reads the canonical spec at openspec/specs/{domain}/spec.md
• Merges the delta (new behaviors, updated rules, decisions)
• If no canonical exists, creates it from the delta

After this step, canonical specs reflect the current system state.

2. Update INDEX.md

• Creates openspec/INDEX.md if it doesn't exist
• Adds new domains, updates existing entries
• Verifies all domains have entries

3. Update learnings

Appends a new entry to openspec/steering/learnings.md (creates the file on first run).

Captures non-obvious signals from the cycle:

• Decisions and the reasoning behind them
• Alternatives that were discarded and why
• Unexpected couplings between modules
• Anti-patterns that were observed or corrected
• Open questions that were deferred

This file is read first by /sdd-recall to surface relevant context before searching the full archive.

4. Move to archive

mv openspec/changes/{change} openspec/changes/archive/{date}-{change}

5. Summary

ARCHIVE COMPLETE: {change-name}
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
Canonical specs updated: core, auth
INDEX.md: updated (2 domains)
Learnings updated: openspec/steering/learnings.md
Archived to: openspec/changes/archive/2026-03-15-add-user-auth/
Active changes remaining: 1

After archive

• Canonical specs are up to date
• Change artifacts are preserved in archive for history
• Start next change with /sdd-new

Post-archive bugs

If a bug is found after archive, document it in the archived tasks.md as POST-BUGxx and start a new change with /sdd-new to fix it.