oah helps you build an AI development workflow that fits you and keeps changing as AI improves. It is a working reference and a guide you can adapt.
A useful result needs more than generated code: the scope must be clear, the changes checked, and decisions kept for the next session. oah connects those steps so one request can carry through the work with a record of what happened.
002 / Why it keeps changing
Older rules and skills can hold a newer model back or make its results worse. Defaults should be easy to understand and change; a rule that gets in your way is a design problem to fix.
Keep the parts that help, remove what no longer helps, and revise the workflow as your tools improve. You can start with the full setup or take only the impact map, wiki, leases, evidence gates or review loop that your project needs.
003 / Why Claude builds and Codex reviews
This split comes from the author's own experience, not a measured comparison: Claude fills in details a beginner might miss in a first version; Codex checks and corrects within a fixed scope.
The current commands run Claude Code and Codex CLI. The ideas can also be adapted to another tool or harness, with one AI or several. Give each stage to the AI that suits your work.
004 / From one request to a checked change
Describe the result you want in plain language. The AI records the goal and scope, checks what the change touches, reserves its paths and chooses the tools for the task. Claude builds; Codex reviews, corrects and reviews again.
Gates record the checks and their results. The project wiki keeps the decisions and reasons beside the code. In v0.3.0, optional TypeSafe Jev can judge difficulty for model selection; rules remain the fallback when it is unavailable or uncertain.
005 / The decisions stay with you
You ask, answer when the AI needs a decision, and confirm before the change lands. If the same problem repeats or the work reaches a design choice, the loop stops to ask you.
Ask “Is the review done?” or “Did all the gates pass?” and inspect the evidence. The final confirmation belongs to you; writing code, checking it and approving its landing are separate steps.
006 / Free, open source, yours to adapt
oah is free, open-source software under the MIT license. Read the source, change it and bring the useful pieces into your own workflow. Your AI services and any optional services use their own accounts and billing.
The current v0.3.0 release supports macOS and native Windows, and expects familiarity with git and pull requests. Install it, run oah init in your project, then try the small hello-oah example. The installation and documentation sections explain each step.
oah offers hooks you install only if you want them: a Claude Code Stop hook that keeps a session from ending while gates are unmet, a session-start hook, a pre-push hook that refuses pushes during a task and scans pushed commits with gitleaks, and post-commit and post-merge hooks that keep the impact map fresh.
When you need it
The riskiest moments — ending a session early, pushing mid-task, pushing a key — happen between commands, where a check at the end of the task comes too late.
How it works
oah init asks about hooks, and oah hooks installs or removes the opt-in Claude Code and git hooks.
oah hooks install stop keeps a Claude Code session from ending while its gates are unmet; [gates] stop_agents limits it to leases held under the names you list.
oah hooks install pre-push refuses a push while any lease, active or stale, is recorded for the worktree (OAH_PUSH_REFUSED), and runs gitleaks over exactly the pushed commits (OAH_PUSH_SECRETS).
Opt-in post-commit and post-merge hooks keep the impact map fresh.
Claude Code also has a session-start hook; in v0.3.0 it keeps the generated oah-<tier> subagent files in step with the current model choice.
Example
Install the Claude Code Stop hook (from Concepts).
oah hooks install stop
Requirements
Claude Code for the Stop and session-start hooks; gitleaks for the pre-push scan.
Limits and recovery
Without gitleaks, the pre-push hook warns and permits an unscanned push; oah land still refuses without a scan (OAH_LAND_SCAN_REQUIRED).
A lease held under a name left off stop_agents no longer stops the session; oah finish still refuses unmet gates.
Hooks are opt-in; the shared rules block separately tells agents not to push or force-push.