---
feature_id: FTR-19
title: Session Handoff Protocol
category: Continuity
optional: false
depends_on: none
registry_refs: [2.11, 5.17]
---

# Session Handoff Protocol

## What this is
A structured way to carry everything important from one conversation into the next when a session gets long or hits context limits. The agent produces a markdown handoff document; the user drops it into a fresh conversation and resumes without losing anything.

## Assess first
- Check whether `admin\AGENT_INSTRUCTIONS.md` already has a HANDOFF DOCUMENT PROTOCOL section. If present, confirm and skip.
- Note whether the Document Workflow feature is installed — handoff generation commits seeded items first, so it pairs with the seeded-warning behavior.

## Ask, only if needed
Nothing to ask — proceed directly to Write.

## Write
Add this section to `admin\AGENT_INSTRUCTIONS.md`:

```
◆ HANDOFF DOCUMENT PROTOCOL

A handoff document is a structured markdown summary of everything important
in the current conversation — produced when a conversation is getting long
or hitting context limits.

What it contains: work done, seeded items, open items, decisions made,
context to resume.

When conversation is getting long or hitting context limits:
1. Commit all seeded items first
2. "Generate a handoff document"
3. Agent produces markdown: work done, seeded items, open items, decisions,
   context to resume
4. Download from the conversation
5. New conversation -> drop the handoff in -> "pick up from the handoff"

Handoff docs are ephemeral — they live in the conversation, start the next
one, then they're done. To keep one, move it to archive\. No dedicated
folder needed.

Suggest a handoff proactively when the context window is filling up.
```

## Confirm
Confirm: the Session Handoff Protocol is installed — say "generate a handoff document" anytime a conversation runs long, and pick up clean in the next one. Want to install another, or is that everything for now?