fix: start nudge-queue poller for all agents, including Claude (gt-dgf) (#3304)

Queued nudges to idle Claude agents were silently dropping. Root cause:
a circular dependency between the nudge queue and Claude's
UserPromptSubmit hook.

Claude agents drain queued nudges via the UserPromptSubmit hook
(gt mail check --inject). But that hook only fires when the agent
submits a prompt. An idle agent waiting at the prompt never submits,
so the hook never fires, and the nudge never drains. The agent waits
for the nudge; the nudge waits for agent input. Deadlock.

The nudge-queue poller was designed for exactly this case — it polls
every 10s and delivers when the agent is idle. But it was only started
for non-Claude agents, under the assumption that Claude's hook made it
unnecessary. That assumption fails for idle agents.

Fix: start the poller for ALL agents (crew, witness, refinery). The
poller coexists safely with the UserPromptSubmit hook because Drain()
is atomic — whoever drains first wins, the other sees an empty queue.

The poller's idle detection is Claude-aware: checks for "esc to
interrupt" busy indicator, requires prompt prefix visible with 2x
confirmation, and skips drain entirely if the agent appears busy.

Reported by the mayor. Bead: gt-dgf.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.6 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>

Executed-By: gastown/crew/woodhouse

Co-authored-by: gastown/crew/woodhouse <cherub.chopra@gmail.com>

Author: A3Ackerman

internal/crew/manager.go

@@ -878,14 +878,16 @@ func (m *Manager) Start(name string, opts StartOptions) error {
 			_ = t.AcceptStartupDialogs(sessionID)
 		}
 
-		// Start background nudge-queue poller for agents that lack turn-boundary
-		// drain hooks (e.g., Gemini, Codex). Claude drains its queue via
-		// UserPromptSubmit hook so it doesn't need the poller.
-		if preset != nil && !preset.HasTurnBoundaryDrain {
-			if _, pollerErr := nudge.StartPoller(townRoot, sessionID); pollerErr != nil {
-				// Non-fatal — nudges may be delayed but the agent still works.
-				style.PrintWarning("could not start nudge poller for %s: %v", name, pollerErr)
-			}
+		// Start background nudge-queue poller for ALL agents (gt-dgf).
+		// Claude drains its queue via UserPromptSubmit hook, but that hook only
+		// fires when the agent submits a prompt. Idle agents (waiting at prompt
+		// for work) never submit, so queued nudges deadlock: agent waits for
+		// nudge, nudge waits for agent input. The poller breaks this cycle by
+		// polling every 10s and delivering when idle. Drain() is atomic so the
+		// poller and UserPromptSubmit hook coexist safely.
+		if _, pollerErr := nudge.StartPoller(townRoot, sessionID); pollerErr != nil {
+			// Non-fatal — nudges may be delayed but the agent still works.
+			style.PrintWarning("could not start nudge poller for %s: %v", name, pollerErr)
 		}
 	}
 

internal/refinery/manager.go

@@ -18,6 +18,7 @@ import (
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/config"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/constants"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/git"
+	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/nudge"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/rig"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/runtime"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/session"
@@ -239,6 +240,13 @@ func (m *Manager) Start(foreground bool, agentOverride string) error {
 		return fmt.Errorf("waiting for refinery to start: %w", err)
 	}
 
+	// Start nudge-queue poller (gt-dgf). Claude's UserPromptSubmit hook only
+	// drains when the agent submits a prompt. Idle agents never submit, so
+	// queued nudges deadlock. The poller breaks the cycle by polling every 10s.
+	if _, pollerErr := nudge.StartPoller(townRoot, sessionID); pollerErr != nil {
+		log.Printf("warning: could not start nudge poller for %s: %v", sessionID, pollerErr)
+	}
+
 	_ = runtime.RunStartupFallback(t, sessionID, "refinery", runtimeConfig)
 	_ = runtime.DeliverStartupPromptFallback(t, sessionID, initialPrompt, runtimeConfig, constants.ClaudeStartTimeout)
 

internal/witness/manager.go

@@ -14,6 +14,7 @@ import (
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/beads"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/config"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/constants"
+	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/nudge"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/rig"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/runtime"
 	"github.com/steveyegge/gastown/internal/session"
@@ -246,6 +247,13 @@ func (m *Manager) Start(foreground bool, agentOverride string, envOverrides []st
 		log.Printf("warning: tracking session PID for %s: %v", sessionID, err)
 	}
 
+	// Start nudge-queue poller (gt-dgf). Claude's UserPromptSubmit hook only
+	// drains when the agent submits a prompt. Idle agents never submit, so
+	// queued nudges deadlock. The poller breaks the cycle by polling every 10s.
+	if _, pollerErr := nudge.StartPoller(townRoot, sessionID); pollerErr != nil {
+		log.Printf("warning: could not start nudge poller for %s: %v", sessionID, pollerErr)
+	}
+
 	_ = runtime.RunStartupFallback(t, sessionID, "witness", runtimeConfig)
 	initialPrompt := session.BuildStartupPrompt(session.BeaconConfig{
 		Recipient: session.BeaconRecipient("witness", "", m.rig.Name),