Design.md has Open Questions at the end

[lance2k-da]

I just noticed my new spec created a design.md file with Open Questions at the end. Isn't this supposed to be asked by the Agent harness before creating the design.md file? or is it because i'm using the experimental opsx:continue workflow? My previous specs has None at the end of design.md (Using propose -> apply -> archive flow)

Lastly, should we address this Open Questions before we proceed to the next step (spec creation) or opxs:continue will handle this for us and choose the most recommended solution?

Thanks in advance, I'm new to this.

[clay-good]

Hi @lance2k-da, thanks for flagging this — you found a real gap, not something you did wrong.

To answer your questions directly:

1. It's not the experimental workflow. The design instruction in the default schema explicitly tells the agent to end design.md with an "Open Questions" section, but it never said what to do with those questions. So some runs list them and some write "None" — and either way nothing in the workflow resolves them.
2. Yes, you should address blocking questions before moving on. /opsx:continue won't do it for you today — it goes straight to the next artifact, and the agent quietly picks its own answers to any open questions along the way. Answering them yourself (edit design.md, or just tell the agent your decisions) before generating tasks is the right move.

I've opened #1366 to fix the underlying gap: the design instruction now tells the agent to resolve anything that would change the specs, approach, or task breakdown with you instead of parking it under Open Questions (which is now reserved for genuinely deferrable unknowns), and the tasks instruction adds a matching check so blocking questions get raised even when tasks are generated in a later session.

[lance2k-da]

Thank you for the clarification and for opening a fix! I really appreciate how streamlined the OpenSpec workflow is. While it's not quite as rapid as a direct 'plan -> implement' loop, it still feels incredibly fast

[clay-good]

Fixed on main, and to be clear you found a real gap rather than doing anything wrong. It was not the experimental workflow either.

The design instruction used to ask for an "Open Questions" section without ever saying what to do with the questions, so agents dutifully listed them and moved on. Two changes in #1366:

1. Open questions are now scoped to genuinely deferrable unknowns: "If a question would change the specs, the chosen approach, or the task breakdown, resolve it now - ask the user instead of guessing." (schemas/spec-driven/schema.yaml:148-153)
2. The tasks artifact checks them before writing: "Before writing tasks, check design.md for Open Questions. If any of them would change what gets built, resolve them with the user first - do not bake an unstated assumption into the task list." (same file, L171-L173)

So the direct answer to your second question is yes, address the blocking ones, and the workflow now asks instead of leaving it to you to remember. Merged to main, ships in the next release.