/openspec-explore loves to transition to implementation, skipping all the SDD part

[clay-good]

Note

Moved from issue #875, originally opened by @MiloszKrajewski on 2026-03-25. Continuing the conversation here in Discussions — the original issue thread (including any comments) stays available at #875 for the record.

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I don't know is it me, or intended or bug but when I use /openspec-explore (github copilot) we have a nice change about what it learned... and then out of nowhere does this:

Good. Now I have all the information I need. Let me write the plan and start implementing.

Whoa! Where is the whole proposal, design, apply flow?

Am I using it wrong?

[MrC8559]

Based on the current OpenSpec docs, what you describe is not the intended Explore workflow.

explore is supposed to remain a thinking/investigation phase. The documentation is quite explicit that it should not:

• create a change folder;
• write proposal/spec/design/task artifacts;
• modify code.

The normal core workflow is:

explore -> propose -> apply -> sync -> archive

When exploration has clarified the problem, the handoff should be to propose, not directly to implementation.

propose is then responsible for creating the planning artifacts — proposal, specs, design and tasks — and it should stop when the change is ready for apply. Actual implementation belongs to the separate apply step.

So if the assistant says something like:

"I have all the information I need. Let me write the plan and start implementing."

and then immediately edits production code while still in Explore, I would consider that a workflow/instruction-following bug rather than expected behaviour.

One detail worth checking is that the current command names have changed. The canonical command is /opsx:explore; for GitHub Copilot the docs say it is registered as /opsx-explore. I would make sure the generated OpenSpec instructions in the repository are current (openspec update) before reproducing it.

A deterministic workaround is to make the boundary explicit while exploring:

Stay in exploration mode. Do not create or modify files and do not implement anything.
When we have enough information, stop and let me invoke /opsx-propose myself.

Then run propose manually and review the generated artifacts before invoking apply.

If an up-to-date /opsx-explore still edits code without an explicit handoff, a small reproduction with the assistant/version and generated OpenSpec instruction files would probably be useful as a bug report, because it contradicts the documented contract of Explore.

[MiloszKrajewski]

It definitely stopped happening quite some time ago, so whatever it was, it has been fixed.

[clay-good]

Thanks for opening this, @MiloszKrajewski. The fix has shipped, and your confirmation that it is resolved is appreciated. Closing this out.