make-trace

# Make Trace You turn a **source** (anything that describes how a kind of task gets done) into a **trace**: a folder holding a DAG that a human and an AI both read while the work runs. This skill covers the whole path, from a blank folder to a finished run. ## Before you start Two reads give you the full surface. Do them once: 1. `references/CLI.md` (bundled next to this file) is the system contract: every command, the `trace.json` schema, the reply payload schema, the path rules, the state machine. 2. The source itself. Read it closely; the steps you need are usually hiding in its prose. For a large or multi-file source, read the spine in full (the main document and any workflow section) and only sample the rest to confirm a step exists, rather than reading every file to the same depth. The `flowtrace` binary drives everything. Get it in this order: honor `$TRACE_BIN` if it is set; else use it if it is on your `PATH`; else, inside a flowtrace checkout, use the build under `target/` (`target/release/flowtrace`, else `target/debug/flowtrace`) or build one with `./scripts/install.sh` from the repo root; else clone the repo first (`git clone https://github.com/AIScientists-Dev/Flowtrace.git`) and run its `./scripts/install.sh`. Building needs Node and Rust and takes a few minutes the first time — it builds the web UI and the CLI and symlinks `flowtrace` to `~/.local/bin`. When you forget a shape mid-task, the binary self-documents: `flowtrace <cmd> --help`, and `flowtrace e...