briefs-groomlisted

# Briefs: Groom the Backlog A backlog rots quietly. Items ship without being removed, two people write the same item twice, a "highest-value outstanding" note stays after the work landed, and the top of the list stops matching what you are actually doing. This walks the list with the user and fixes that. It is a working session, not a report — expect to edit BACKLOG.md several times. **Not the same as `/briefs-health`.** Health asks *"is this system working?"* — am I closing tasks, planning before coding, letting a queue rot. Groom asks *"is this list still true?"*. Run health when a project feels stalled; run groom when the backlog has grown long enough that you skim past it. ## The honest constraint **You have less context than the backlog does.** These items were written across weeks by sessions that had read the code. A fresh session cannot tell "stale" from "still true" by reading alone, and guessing produces confident nonsense that costs the user more than leaving the item. So: **verify what is verifiable, ask about the rest.** Never delete an item because it *looks* done. Say what you checked and what you found, then let the user decide. ## Step 1: Read Find the briefs folder (`.claude/briefs-path` → `.briefs/` → ask). Read BACKLOG.md, PROGRESS.md, and CURRENT.md. PROGRESS.md is the useful one — it is evidence of what actually shipped, with commit SHAs. Most of the checks below lean on it. Count the items and say so before starting: *"38 items in # Backlog, 5