---
title: delegate-task — literal negative triggers beat abstract carve-outs
type: concept
updated: 2026-06-17
---

# delegate-task — literal negative triggers beat abstract carve-outs

## Symptom

`delegate-task` v0.2.0 false-positive-fired on **«создать задачу себе»** (create a task
for myself) — a self-assigned task that should route to `using-tasks`, not to cross-agent
delegation. The `delegate-task-test-trigger` run measured it at **5/5 trials** consistently
wrong (→ `delegate-task`).

## Root cause

The positive trigger list contained **«создать задачу на агента»**. A self-task phrase
**«создать задачу себе»** shares the stem **«создать задачу»**, so it literal-matched the
positive trigger. The negative clause was abstract — *"Does NOT apply when doing the work
yourself"* — and an abstract carve-out does **not** beat a literal stem-match under the
`using-superpowers` 1%-rule. Clean-context subagents *recognized* the «себе» exception in
their reasoning, yet still invoked `delegate-task` FIRST because the literal match outweighed
the abstract exclusion.

## Fix (v0.2.0 → v0.2.1, PATCH)

Make the negative **literal and routed**, so it competes head-on with the positive at the
same surface level:

> Does NOT apply to self-assigned tasks on your own board (**«создать задачу себе»**,
> **«task for myself»**, **«поставить себе задачу»** → using-tasks), to work you do
> yourself, or to workshop-internal tasks.

Plus a body disambiguator in the "Не применяется" section:
**«на агента» / «агенту» / «в проект X» = делегирование; «себе» / «myself» = своя доска.**

## Verification

Re-ran the `delegate-task-test-trigger` methodology (fresh-context subagents, simulated
available-skills registry with the new description + competitors `using-tasks` /
`using-projects-meta` / `setup-tasks` / `session-handoff`, no hint about the expected
answer):

- **Positives 5/5** — «создать задачу на агента», «поставить задачу агенту», «delegate task
  to the books project», «делегировать таску», «tasks_create для проекта X» → all
  `delegate-task`. No regression from the literal negative.
- **Negative «создать задачу себе на завтра» 4/5 → `using-tasks`** (was 0/5 before the fix).
  The single residual miss reasoned correctly («себе» → using-tasks) but was tripped by an
  eval-harness artifact (the prompt forced a skill name on line 1 *before* reasoning),
  not by ambiguity in the description.

## Reusable principle

When a skill's positive triggers contain a phrase whose **stem** also appears in a sibling
skill's domain, an abstract "does NOT apply when…" clause is too weak. Put the **exact
colliding negative phrase** in the description with an explicit **→ <sibling-skill>** route.
Literal beats abstract under the 1%-rule. See also [[tdd-criteria-design]] for another
"make the bright line literal, not a judgement call" pattern.

See [[session-inbox-monitor-received-msg-fp]] for the next clause: a literal+routed negative
still fails if its **route target isn't installed** — the carve-out then has no real competitor
and the nearest in-domain skill wins anyway.