Software EngineeringOpen accessPublished 3 Oct 2026
Diagnose whether an incoming work-request — a casual task handed to an agent, a ticket, or an ask handed to a teammate — is clear enough to act on, before guessing. Runs a gate (request vs goal vs question vs complaint), counts how many materially-different deliverables the request could mean, and checks six concrete elements (target, now-state→outcome, done-check, acceptor, bounds), then emits the specific clarifying questions to close the gaps rather than fabricating a sharper version. Use when a handed-over task/request is genuinely ambiguous or visibly thin, or the user asks "is this clear enough to act on?", "what's missing from this ask?", "sharpen this request befo…