Spec Orchestrator — Cross-Feature Coordination for Spec Kit

Track state, select tasks, and detect conflicts across parallel spec-driven features — without waiting for merges.

Solves spec-kit#2238 — cross-feature orchestration as an extension.

The Problem

Spec Kit's philosophy supports parallel feature branches, but each feature lives in isolation:

• No unified view of which features are where in the SDD lifecycle
• No way to query tasks across features (e.g., "all database-layer tasks")
• No detection when two features plan to modify the same files

As features accumulate, complexity grows exponentially and merge conflicts become inevitable.

The Solution

Four read-only commands that give you a project-wide view of every active spec:

Command	Purpose
/speckit.orchestrator.status	Dashboard of all features and their SDD phase (spec → plan → tasks → implementation)
/speckit.orchestrator.next	Query tasks across all features — filter by tag, layer, blocker status, or priority
/speckit.orchestrator.conflicts	Detect file overlaps between features before they become merge conflicts
/speckit.orchestrator.sync	Write consolidated state to specs/status.json for CI, dashboards, or external tools

Installation

specify install https://github.com/Quratulain-bilal/spec-kit-orchestrator/archive/refs/tags/v1.0.0.zip

Usage

See every feature at a glance

/speckit.orchestrator.status

Output:

Feature Lifecycle Overview
==========================
001-user-auth        [implementation]  60% tasks done
002-payments         [tasks]           ready to implement
003-notifications    [plan]            awaiting tasks
004-admin-dashboard  [spec]            needs planning

Stalled: 1 feature (plan phase, no updates in 5 days)

Find your next task across features

/speckit.orchestrator.next --layer database
/speckit.orchestrator.next --tag security
/speckit.orchestrator.next --unblocked

Output:

Cross-Feature Task Queue
========================
[002-payments]      T014  Create payments schema         (unblocked)
[001-user-auth]     T023  Add user session indexes       (unblocked)
[003-notifications] T008  Design notification queue      (blocked by T007)

Detect file conflicts before they happen

/speckit.orchestrator.conflicts

Output:

File Conflict Analysis
======================
WARN: src/api/users.ts
  modified by: 001-user-auth (T012)
  modified by: 004-admin-dashboard (T005)
  Recommendation: merge 001-user-auth first, then rebase 004

INFO: src/db/schema.sql
  modified by: 002-payments (additive)
  modified by: 001-user-auth (additive)
  No conflict expected (both add new tables)

Export state for CI or dashboards

/speckit.orchestrator.sync

Writes specs/status.json:

{
  "generated_at": "2026-04-17T10:00:00Z",
  "features": [
    {
      "id": "001-user-auth",
      "phase": "implementation",
      "progress": 0.60,
      "blocked_tasks": [],
      "files_touched": ["src/auth/*", "src/db/users.sql"]
    }
  ]
}

How It Works

The extension is 100% read-only on your specs:

1. Scans all specs/*/ directories
2. Reads spec.md, plan.md, tasks.md, and checks implementation status
3. Parses task headers for tags, layers, and dependencies
4. Cross-references file paths mentioned in tasks to detect overlaps
5. Optionally writes a single consolidated specs/status.json (the only file it writes)

No hooks. No spec modifications. No surprises.

Requirements

• spec-kit >= 0.4.0
• Standard specs/ directory structure (one folder per feature)

License

MIT