Setup Wizard

When Operator starts and no .tickets/ directory exists, the setup wizard guides you through first-time initialization. This reference documents each step of the wizard.

Steps Overview

Step	Name	Description
1	Welcome	Splash screen showing detected LLM tools and discovered projects
2	Collection Source	Choose which ticket template collection to use
3	Custom Collection	Select individual issue types (only shown if Custom Selection chosen)
4	Task Field Config	Configure optional fields for TASK issue type
5	Tmux Onboarding	Help and documentation about tmux session management
6	Startup Tickets	Optionally create tickets to bootstrap your projects
7	Confirm	Review settings and confirm initialization

Step Details

1. Welcome

Splash screen showing detected LLM tools and discovered projects

The welcome screen displays:

Detected LLM tools (Claude, Gemini, Codex, etc.) with version and model count
Discovered projects organized by which LLM tool marker files they contain
The path where the tickets directory will be created

This gives you an overview of your development environment before proceeding.

Navigation: Enter to continue, Esc to cancel

2. Collection Source

Choose which ticket template collection to use

Select a preset collection of issue types:

Simple: Just TASK - minimal setup for general work
Dev Kanban: 3 types (TASK, FEAT, FIX) for development workflows
DevOps Kanban: 5 types (TASK, SPIKE, INV, FEAT, FIX) for full DevOps
Import from Jira: (Coming soon)
Import from Notion: (Coming soon)
Custom Selection: Choose individual issue types

Navigation: ↑/↓ or j/k to navigate, Enter to select, Esc to go back

3. Custom Collection

Select individual issue types (only shown if Custom Selection chosen)

Toggle individual issue types to include:

TASK: Focused task that executes one specific thing
FEAT: New feature or enhancement
FIX: Bug fix, follow-up work, tech debt
SPIKE: Research or exploration (paired mode)
INV: Incident investigation (paired mode)

At least one issue type must be selected to proceed.

Navigation: ↑/↓ or j/k to navigate, Space to toggle, Enter to continue, Esc to go back

4. Task Field Config

Configure optional fields for TASK issue type

TASK is the foundational issue type. Configure which optional fields to include:

priority: Priority level (P0-critical to P3-low)
context: Background context for the task

These choices propagate to other issue types. The ‘summary’ field is always required, and ‘id’ is auto-generated.

Navigation: ↑/↓ or j/k to navigate, Space to toggle, Enter to continue, Esc to go back

5. Tmux Onboarding

Help and documentation about tmux session management

Operator launches Coding agents in tmux sessions. Essential commands:

Detach from session: Ctrl+a (quick, no prefix needed!)
Fallback detach: Ctrl+b then d
List sessions: tmux ls
Attach to session: tmux attach -t <name>

Operator session names start with ‘op-‘ for easy identification.

Navigation: Enter to continue, Esc to go back

6. Startup Tickets

Optionally create tickets to bootstrap your projects

Create startup tickets to help initialize your projects:

ASSESS tickets: Scan projects for catalog-info.yaml, create if missing
AGENT-SETUP tickets: Configure Claude agents for each project
PROJECT-INIT tickets: Run both ASSESS and AGENT-SETUP for each project

These tickets are optional and help automate common setup tasks.

Navigation: ↑/↓ or j/k to navigate, Space to toggle, Enter to continue, Esc to go back

7. Confirm

Review settings and confirm initialization

Review your configuration before initialization:

Path where .tickets/ will be created
Selected issue types and preset name
Directories that will be created: queue/, in-progress/, completed/, templates/

Choose Initialize to create the ticket queue, or Cancel to exit without changes.

Navigation: Tab or Space to toggle selection, Enter to confirm, Esc to go back

Keyboard Shortcuts

Common keys used throughout the setup wizard:

Key	Action
`Enter`	Confirm/Continue
`Esc`	Go back/Cancel
`↑`/`↓` or `j`/`k`	Navigate list items
`Space`	Toggle selection
`Tab`	Switch between options