preset: apply leaves team.md, casting/registry.json, and routing.md unwired — coordinator treats session as Init Mode #1288

Summary

squad preset apply <name> lays down agent folders and charters on disk, but does not populate the three coordinator-facing index files that make the team visible to the Squad coordinator. The result: a brand-new repo looks correctly scaffolded to squad doctor, but the coordinator's session-start mode-switch check sees an empty ## Members table and treats every session as Init Mode — i.e., "no team exists, let me propose one."

Verified on squad v0.10.0, Windows, with squad preset apply geektime.

Repro

mkdir test-preset && cd test-preset
squad init
squad preset apply geektime
# open any Copilot session in this dir and ask "show me the team"
# coordinator responds with empty roster and offers to cast a new team

Expected behavior

After squad preset apply <name>, the preset's agents are fully registered:

1. .squad/team.md ## Members table has one row per preset agent (Name | Role | Charter path | Status).
2. .squad/casting/registry.json has an entry per cast-eligible agent (excluding the always-named Scribe/Ralph/Rai) with persistent_name, universe, created_at, legacy_named: false, status: "active".
3. .squad/casting/history.json has the assignment snapshot recording the universe selection.
4. .squad/routing.md has its {Name} / {domain} placeholder tokens replaced with the preset's actual cast and role mapping.

Actual behavior

After squad preset apply geektime (which ships 7 agents — Picard, Data, Worf, Crusher, Scotty, Uhura, Scribe):

• .squad/agents/{picard,data,worf,crusher,scotty,uhura,scribe,ralph,Rai}/ — all created correctly with valid charter.md + history.md ✅
• .squad/team.md:

  ## Members
  
  | Name | Role | Charter | Status |
  |------|------|---------|--------|
                                          ← zero rows

• .squad/casting/registry.json: { "agents": {} }
• .squad/casting/history.json: { "universe_usage_history": [], "assignment_cast_snapshots": {} }
• .squad/routing.md: still contains {Name} and {domain 1} / {domain 2} placeholder tokens.

Coordinator impact

Per squad.agent.md mode-switch logic:

Yes, but ## Members has zero roster entries → Init Mode (treat as unconfigured — scaffold exists but no team was cast)

So even though the agents are on disk with full charters, the coordinator:

• Cannot see the team (every session opens in Init Mode and asks the user to propose a roster).
• Has no routing mapping (placeholder tokens — routing falls back to "pick someone").
• Has no persistent-name reservations (empty registry → a follow-up cast could collide with existing names).
• Has no universe lock on file (overflow handling / migration logic has nothing to reference).

squad doctor blind spot

Doctor reports everything green on this broken state:

✅  team.md found with ## Members header — file present, header found
✅  agents/ directory exists — directory present (9 agents)
✅  casting/registry.json exists — file present, valid JSON
Summary: 10 passed, 0 failed, 0 warnings, 2 info

Doctor checks file existence and ## Members header presence, but does not check that the Members table has any rows or that the registry is populated when cast-eligible agent folders exist.

Suggested fix

1. squad preset apply should finalize wiring

After copying agent folders, the apply step should:

• For each agent in the preset manifest:
  • Append a row to .squad/team.md Members table:

    | {name} | {role-from-charter} | .squad/agents/{name}/charter.md | active |
    

  • If the agent is cast-eligible (i.e., not Scribe/Ralph/Rai), upsert into .squad/casting/registry.json:

    "{name}": {
      "persistent_name": "{Name}",
      "universe": "{universe-from-preset-metadata}",
      "created_at": "<ISO timestamp>",
      "legacy_named": false,
      "status": "active"
    }

• Append the assignment snapshot to .squad/casting/history.json with a unique assignment_id, the chosen universe, and the cast list.
• Resolve {Name} / {domain} tokens in .squad/routing.md from the preset's role-to-name mapping. (Each preset should declare its routing table — or this can be derived from charters by matching **Role:** against the standard routing categories.)

2. Preset manifest needs a universe field

So the registry entry has something to record. For geektime, the universe is Star Trek: TNG. This should live in the preset metadata alongside name, version, description, agents.

3. squad doctor should catch this regression

Add at minimum:

• FAIL if .squad/agents/ contains any cast-eligible folder (not scribe/ralph/Rai) AND .squad/team.md ## Members table has zero rows. Suggested fix message: "Run squad preset apply <name> again, or run squad hire to wire agents into the roster."
• FAIL if .squad/agents/ contains cast-eligible folders AND .squad/casting/registry.json agents map is empty. Suggested fix message: "Casting registry is unpopulated — persistent name guarantees are not in effect."
• WARN if .squad/routing.md contains literal {Name} or {domain placeholder tokens.

4. Idempotency

squad preset apply --force should re-wire the index files cleanly even if partial state already exists. Worth adding a test that runs apply twice and asserts the Members table doesn't grow duplicate rows.

Environment

• squad v0.10.0
• Windows 11 (OS: Windows_NT)
• Node.js v23.5.0
• Preset: geektime
• Non-git directory (C:\temp\test-preset)
• State backend: local

Workaround

Manually populate the three files (about 30 lines of edits across team.md, casting/registry.json, routing.md) by reading each agent's charter.md. The coordinator's Init Mode Phase 2 logic in squad.agent.md already specifies the exact shape — the preset apply just isn't running it.