Battam1111/Myco

v0.5.19 — 2026-04-23 — Cowork plugin install: the permanent onboarding fix

Contract-layer patch with zero R1–R7 surface deltas. Everything in
v0.5.19 lives at the host-axis of the extensibility model (see
docs/architecture/L3_IMPLEMENTATION/symbiont_protocol.md), not at
the contract itself.

What changed

• Nothing in R1–R7 rule text.
• Nothing in the category enum / exit-policy / exit codes.
• Nothing in the 18-verb manifest surface.
• Nothing in the dimension roster count (still 25).

The problem this release fixes

Cowork (Claude Desktop's local-agent-mode) is a first-class Myco
host, but until now the agent wouldn't recognize a Myco substrate
without the user explicitly asking for it. Unlike Claude Code, Cowork
does not implement the SessionStart / PreCompact hook contract the
.claude/hooks/ entries ride on — those hooks never fire in Cowork
sessions.

Diagnostically: the user opens a Cowork workspace with _canon.yaml
at its root, and the agent's first turn proceeds as if Myco isn't
there. Only after the user says "run myco hunger" does the agent
connect the dots. R1 is effectively unenforced.

The fix

Cowork does honor Skills — markdown files with YAML frontmatter
that the host matches against user intent + agent context. v0.5.19
ships a .cowork-plugin/ template carrying a single skill
(myco-substrate) plus an installer that drops it into every Cowork
workspace registry on this machine.

New surface:

• .cowork-plugin/ template tree (plugin.json + skills/myco-
  substrate/SKILL.md + .mcp.json + README.md). The SKILL.md body is
  the full onboarding brief: what Myco is (cognitive substrate, NOT
  memory tool — this framing is enforced by
  test_cowork_skill_body_asserts_correct_framing), 18 verbs by
  subsystem, R1-R7 contract text, how to read substrate_pulse,
  first-call checklist, multi-project pattern with project_dir=
  override, and a "what NOT to do" guardrail list.
• src/myco/install/cowork_plugin.py — library installer.
• scripts/install_cowork_plugin.py — thin shim over the library
  for users who clone the repo without running pip install -e ..
• myco-install cowork-plugin — first-class subcommand with
  --dry-run / --uninstall / --cowork-root.
• myco-install host cowork now writes the MCP config and
  installs the plugin tree in one step.
• myco-install host --all-hosts auto-runs the Cowork plugin
  install whenever it detects Claude Desktop — one command, every
  host on this machine primed, Cowork onboarding included.

The installer is idempotent: re-running upserts the manifest row and
refreshes the plugin tree without creating duplicates. --uninstall
is symmetric — removes the tree + manifest row, preserves sibling
entries (e.g. cowork-plugin-management, productivity from the Anthropic
marketplace).

Cross-cutting infrastructure

• _canon.yaml::system.write_surface.allowed adds
  .cowork-plugin/**.
• scripts/bump_version.py now bumps .cowork-plugin/plugin.json
  in lockstep with the repo-root .claude-plugin/plugin.json, so
  both plugin bundles always carry the same version as the Python
  package + PyPI release + MCP Registry entry.
• tests/integration/test_cowork_plugin_bundle.py — template
  structural invariants (plugin.json + .mcp.json parse; SKILL.md
  frontmatter shape; skill body carries the correct framing + R1-R7
  • pulse contract).
• tests/integration/test_install_cowork_plugin.py — installer
  behavior on synthetic appdata: discovery walks the glob correctly,
  idempotent upsert preserves sibling plugins, dry-run never writes,
  uninstall is symmetric, OS-specific appdata resolution on Windows
  / macOS / Linux, --all-hosts side-effect fires when Claude
  Desktop is detected.
• README + README_zh + README_ja + docs/INSTALL.md — corrected
  the Cowork install instruction (was wrongly pointing at the
  Claude Code /plugin marketplace command; Cowork does not
  support it).

Why a contract bump if R1–R7 didn't change?

Precedent set at v0.5.17: onboarding-surface changes that shift
which rule the agent sees first at boot time (R1 → skill-mediated
vs R1 → hook-mediated) count as contract-adjacent and earn a bump.
The skill body in .cowork-plugin/skills/myco-substrate/SKILL.md
is agent-facing contract material — if Myco's framing changes in
future releases (e.g. "cognitive substrate" → something else),
that is a contract change even though no rule number moves.

Break from v0.5.18

None. Pure additive. Claude Code users unaffected (the old
.claude-plugin/ bundle still ships). Cowork users who previously
got by on ad-hoc reminder prompts will now see the agent
auto-orient at session start.

Operator action

After pip install -U myco (or restart of an editable install),
users who want the Cowork fix should run:

myco-install cowork-plugin           # installs skill + manifest entries
# or
myco-install host --all-hosts        # does everything else too

then restart Claude Desktop. On the next Cowork session the agent
will follow R1-R7 the moment it sees _canon.yaml or the user
mentions Myco.