Worker Presets & Creation Wizard

Spawn a production-grade AI worker for your project in 30 seconds. 12 polished presets with smart defaults + 3-step wizard with warnings + live preview.

TL;DR

1. Open Workspace → click + Add in the pill bar
2. Pick preset card (e.g. "Market Analyst") — usually closest match
3. Tweak if needed → Create
4. Worker ready with a clean role-prompt + relevant skills auto-attached

If no preset fits — the From scratch tile creates a blank worker. Power users can use Show advanced form → for full control.

What is a preset

A preset = pre-configured worker template with tuned defaults:

• Label + icon (can be changed)
• Model (Sonnet / Opus / Haiku) — sensible default per role
• Tools (Read, Write, Bash etc.) — minimal set for the role
• Max turns — reasonable per task complexity
• System prompt — role-specific expertise (TAM/SAM/SOM for analyst, story arc for pitch-coach, etc.)
• Context skills — relevant skills auto-attached (for example market-analysis for Market Analyst)

All 12 presets are generic templates: no brand references, no character names, no references to our internal infrastructure. Spawn an analyst — you get a Market Analyst for your product, not for Arc OS.

The 12 canonical presets

Engineering / Core (6)

Startup operations (6 — added in Phase 66)

The 3-step wizard

Step 1 — Identity

Grid of 12 preset cards + "From scratch" tile. Pick one → you move to Step 2 with everything pre-filled. The picked preset is highlighted with role-specific color tokens (analyst = indigo, growth = clay, cfo = sage green…).

The Label field is editable — change it to something specific to your product (e.g. "Acme Market Analyst").

Step 2 — Capabilities

3 groups of settings:

Model:

• Sonnet — balanced, recommended default (most cases)
• Opus — slow + expensive, best reasoning (security audits, complex refactors)
• Haiku — fast + cheap, simple tasks (formatting, classification)

Tools (toggle buttons):

• Read / Glob / Grep — file inspection (read-only)
• Write / Edit — file modification (write tools)
• Bash — shell commands (execution)
• WebSearch / WebFetch — external research

The All toggle enables all tools at once (for an unrestricted dev/exec role).

Max turns — how many tool-use cycles per response. Defaults are sensible per role (chat=10, terminal=20).

Warnings

The wizard auto-detects suspicious combos:

• ⚠️ "Read-only role with write tool" — for example the consultant preset + checked Write. Likely misconfiguration.
• ⚠️ "Worker has tools but cannot Read" — without the Read tool — most prompts will fail.

You can ignore them (force pick) — the warning is informational, not blocking.

Step 3 — Instructions

A text field with the system prompt (preset auto-filled, editable). Plus a Skills picker — multi-select from your project's skills_global (40+ generic + project-specific).

The Live preview block shows what the worker will actually see on the first message:

# 📊 Market Analyst
Model: claude-sonnet-4-5
Tools: Read, Glob, Grep, WebSearch, WebFetch
Skills: market-analysis

--- System Prompt ---
You are the Market Analyst of this project...

Click Create worker → the preset is saved into workers_registry, and the worker appears in the WorkerSelector pill bar.

What happens behind the scenes

When the worker is spawned and you chat with it:

PROMPT TO CLAUDE = 
  SYSTEM_PROTOCOL (15 baseline rules — same for all workers)
  + worker.system_prompt (preset-specific role)
  + CLAUDE.md (your project context)
  + Context-router skills (auto-matched by your message triggers)
  + USER MESSAGE

The baseline (workflow + quality rules) is injected automatically — your preset focuses only on role-specific expertise without duplicating "P0>P1>P2", "Cite sources", "DoD includes docs" and so on.

Architecture deep-dive

Customizing a preset

"I want pitch-coach but with my own B2B focus"

1. Step 1 → pick Pitch Coach
2. Step 3 → edit system prompt → add "Focus exclusively on B2B SaaS pitches (enterprise sales cycle)" after the existing core directives
3. Add skills if you have project-specific knowledge

The customized worker is saved into YOUR project's workers_registry.json — independent of the canonical preset. Future preset updates won't override your customization.

"I want a worker NOT covered by any preset"

Click From scratch tile (Step 1):

• Label/icon empty
• Sonnet default
• Read+Glob+Grep tools default
• Empty system prompt

Fill in Step 2 + Step 3 manually. The same wizard warnings apply.

"I want the old monolithic form"

Click Show advanced form → in the wizard header. Opens the legacy form with all fields at once. Useful when:

• Bulk-creating presets via JSON-like input
• Configuring prompt_style: 'gsd' (not exposed in the wizard)
• Setting the focus_dirs array (not yet in the wizard)

Editing existing workers

WorkerSelector pill bar → click the ⚙️ icon on a worker → opens the WorkerStudio modal with a form (not the wizard — edit mode always uses the full form). All fields editable, changes saved on Save.

Built-in workers (builtin: true in the registry) can NOT be deleted — only their config can be overridden.

API access

For programmatic worker creation:

# List presets
curl -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
     https://your-domain/api/crm/workers/presets

# Create worker in a project
curl -X POST -H "Authorization: Bearer $TOKEN" \
     -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
     -d '{"label":"My Worker","icon":"🤖","model":"claude-sonnet-4-5","tools":["Read"],"system_prompt":"..."}' \
     https://your-domain/api/crm/projects/myproject/workers

Full API reference

FAQ

Q: Can I publish my custom preset as a global template?

A: Not yet. Custom presets live in your project's workers_registry.json. Roadmap: preset marketplace (#228 part 2 — separate issue).

Q: Can worker presets update automatically?

A: No — once saved, your config is independent. This is intentional (no surprise behavior changes). If you want the latest preset — delete + recreate.

Q: How many workers can I have in a project?

A: Depends on the plan: Free=5, Starter=25, Starter Cloud=150. Billing & Plans.

Q: Worker icon — emoji or custom image?

A: Both. Emoji is the default. Via Show advanced form → Upload PNG/GIF/WebP — the image is stored as a project asset and rendered in the pill bar.