macOS parity maintenance loop

Scoped autonomous worker for closing native acceptance gaps and ingesting web product changes after the frozen baseline. This loop is separate from AGENT_LOOP; never enable both for the same work package.

Kill switch

Variable	Meaning
MACOS_PARITY_LOOP_ENABLED	Repo variable. String "true" enables the workflow. Default off.

Operator commands

Pause (stop launching workers):

gh variable set MACOS_PARITY_LOOP_ENABLED --body false

Resume:

gh variable set MACOS_PARITY_LOOP_ENABLED --body true

Dispatch one task immediately:

gh workflow run macos-parity-loop.yml -f stable_key=native-go-to-date-announcements

Let the hourly watchdog pick the next queued task:

gh workflow run macos-parity-loop.yml

Hard stop while a worker is mid-flight:

1. Set MACOS_PARITY_LOOP_ENABLED=false.
2. Remove label macos-parity-loop-running from issue #4783 if it is stale.
3. Cancel the Cursor cloud agent from the dashboard if needed.

Secrets and one-time setup

1. CURSOR_API_KEY secret (same Cloud Agents API key as agent-loop).
2. Labels: macos-parity-loop-running, macos-parity-loop-waiting-for-credits, macos-parity-loop-needs-human.
3. Parent tracking issue #4783.

Do not flip MACOS_PARITY_LOOP_ENABLED from this document alone; confirm Tyler wants the scoped worker active.

Sources of truth

Concern	Location
Frozen baseline behaviors	docs/acceptance/macos-parity/inventory.json
Incremental merge stream	docs/acceptance/macos-parity/incremental-stream.json
Durable task queue	docs/acceptance/macos-parity/maintenance-queue.json
Queue logic and tests	docs/acceptance/macos-parity/parity_loop.py
Pick / launch / ingest	.github/scripts/macos-parity-loop-*.sh
Workflow	.github/workflows/macos-parity-loop.yml
Agent instructions	.github/prompts/macos-parity-loop.md

Leases and quota retry timestamps live on issue #4783 labels and HTML comment markers, not in checkpoint-only commits on product branches.

Recovery

• Stale lease: the watchdog clears macos-parity-loop-running when issue #4783 has not updated in three hours.
• HTTP 429: launch adds macos-parity-loop-waiting-for-credits and a macos-parity-quota-retry-at= marker; the next eligible hourly run retries.
• Changed head: tasks with recorded evidenceHead revert to pending when the head moves (see parity_loop.py tests).

Verify locally

python3 -B docs/acceptance/macos-parity/parity_loop.py validate
python3 -B -m unittest discover -s docs/acceptance/macos-parity -p '*_test.py'