ak watch start

ak watch start

Start watching a repository for new issues

Synopsis

What it does: Poll a GitHub repository for new issues matching the configured filters, then invoke the specified agent skill for each matched issue and post a reply comment. Runs once by default; use --daemon for continuous background polling.

Who it's for: Power devs building automated GitHub triage workflows; non-technical users via the matching dashboard surface.

When to use it: When you want AgentKit to automatically respond to new GitHub issues in a repository. Use --daemon for persistent background operation; omit it for a single-pass CI trigger.

Examples: ak watch start owner/repo # single pass, all new issues ak watch start owner/repo --label bug # filter to label 'bug' ak watch start owner/repo --daemon # run continuously in background ak watch start owner/repo --max-per-hour 10 # rate-limit responses ak watch start owner/repo --json # emit tick summary as JSON

What changes on disk: Reads and writes ~/.agentkit/watch/<repo-slug>/state.json to track responded issues and rate-limit counters.

Output modes: pretty default on TTY (colors, ASCII markers) plain auto when stdout piped or --no-interactive json --json (single-object envelope, NDJSON-safe)

Exit codes: 0 success 1 runtime error 2 invalid flags 3 user-cancel (SIGINT, prompt-cancel)

ak watch start <owner/repo> [flags]

Options

      --agent string        Agent skill to run for each matched issue (default "engineer/scout")
      --author strings      Filter to issues by these GitHub logins (repeatable)
      --daemon              Run as a background daemon (continuous polling)
  -h, --help                help for start
      --json                Emit machine-readable JSON (implies --no-interactive)
      --keyword strings     Filter to issues containing any of these keywords (repeatable)
      --kits-dir string     Override kits directory (default: ./kits or $AGENTKIT_KITS_DIR)
      --label strings       Filter to issues with any of these labels (repeatable)
      --max-per-hour int    Maximum responses per rolling hour (safety ceiling) (default 10)
      --no-interactive      Disable interactive prompts (CI-safe)
      --poll-interval int   Seconds between polls in daemon mode (default 60)
  -q, --quiet               Suppress non-error output on stderr
  -V, --verbose             Extra diagnostic output on stderr (loses to --quiet)
  -y, --yes                 Assume yes for all prompts

SEE ALSO

• ak watch - Watch a GitHub repository and auto-respond to issues