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Merulan

Tasks

Tasks keep an assignment, its lifecycle, and local history so an owner can track a result and recover stalled work.

Tasks are durable assignments in Work & Settings. Each Task keeps its owner, state, due time, and evidence for the result someone must deliver.

Ownership

A Task owns one assignment and the history of changes to it. Comments carry context. Progress and evidence describe the work. A Task may point to a Workflow, which still owns its execution. The Console opens the Task collection at /tasks. Assign an eligible principal so the Task has an owner who can act on the required result.

Lifecycle

A Task follows the lifecycle revision pinned to it. Its allowed transitions come from that revision, rather than a fixed list of states. A comment does not transition the Task. Scheduling changes the due time. Omitting the due time clears it. Terminal work leaves that state through the dedicated reopen action. Read the transition contract before making a state change through another Surface.

Boundaries

Task history belongs to one assignment. Activity follows executions across kinds. The Governance Audit Log records access and governance evidence. A Task comment is not a substitute for either view. A review Task also points to a decision owned by the waiting approval gate. Changing the Task's context does not bypass that gate or grant permission to the work it controls.

Failures

A Task returns TASK_STATE_STALE when its state changed after your read. The code TASK_TRANSITION_NOT_SUPPORTED means the move is not allowed now. The code TASK_PRINCIPAL_NOT_ASSIGNABLE means the chosen owner cannot take the assignment. A failed lifecycle read can return TASK_CAPABILITY_UNAVAILABLE. Treat each refusal as a failed change, even if the Task still appears in the collection.

Recovery

A Task with stale state needs a fresh read before another transition. Choose an action from the current lifecycle and an eligible assignee. If lifecycle configuration is unavailable, restore that service and read again. A missed due time needs a revised work decision, not only a new date. Follow Coordinate and recover work to check the Task and the work it points to.