[EPIC] 10x Velocity Improvement: Shift-Left Validation and Review Optimization

[rjmurillo]

Overview

This epic tracks work to improve PR delivery velocity by 10x through:

1. Shift-left validation (catch issues before CI)
2. Review noise reduction (83% fewer comments)
3. Quality gate optimization (50% fewer false positives)
4. Stale PR cleanup

Implementation Order

P0 (Immediate):
  #330 → Triage stale PRs (unblocks 4 PRs)

P1 (Next):
  #325 → Unified validation script (40% CI failure reduction)
  #326 → Bot config tuning (83% comment reduction)
  #328 → Retry logic (prerequisite for #329)
  #329 → Failure categorization (50% false positive reduction)

P2 (Later):
  #327 → @copilot directive relocation (documentation)

Dependency Graph

flowchart LR
    subgraph P0 ["P0 - Immediate"]
        330["#330<br/>Triage Stale PRs"]
    end

    subgraph P1 ["P1 - Next"]
        325["#325<br/>Unified Validation Script"]
        326["#326<br/>Bot Config Tuning"]
        328["#328<br/>Retry Logic"]
        329["#329<br/>Failure Categorization"]
    end

    subgraph P2 ["P2 - Later"]
        327["#327<br/>@copilot Directives"]
    end

    330 --> Done1((✓))
    325 --> Done2((✓))
    326 --> Done3((✓))
    328 --> 329
    329 --> Done4((✓))
    327 --> Done5((✓))

    style 330 fill:#ff6b6b,color:#fff
    style 325 fill:#4ecdc4,color:#fff
    style 326 fill:#4ecdc4,color:#fff
    style 328 fill:#4ecdc4,color:#fff
    style 329 fill:#ffe66d,color:#000
    style 327 fill:#95afc0,color:#fff

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Parallel Execution Summary

Issue	Dependencies	Can Start Immediately
#330	None	✅ Yes
#325	None	✅ Yes
#326	None	✅ Yes
#328	None	✅ Yes
#329	#328	❌ Wait for #328
#327	None	✅ Yes (but P2)

Recommended Parallel Lanes

gantt
    title Parallel Execution Lanes
    dateFormat X
    axisFormat %s

    section Lane 1: Cleanup
    #330 Triage stale PRs    :330, 0, 1

    section Lane 2: Tooling
    #325 Validation script   :325, 0, 2

    section Lane 3: Config
    #326 Bot config tuning   :326, 0, 2

    section Lane 4: Quality Gate
    #328 Retry logic         :328, 0, 2
    #329 Failure categorization :329, after 328, 2

    section Lane 5: Docs
    #327 @copilot directives :327, 0, 1

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Background

Analysis of 17 PRs and 200 workflow runs from Dec 20-23, 2025 revealed:

Bottleneck	Current State	Target	Improvement
CI failure rate	9.5%	<3%	68% reduction
Comments per PR	97	<20	83% reduction
Bugs post-implementation	7	<2	71% reduction
Stale PRs	4	0	100% reduction

Sub-Issue Hierarchy

Direct Sub-Issues (New Work)

#	Title	Priority	Dependencies
#330	Stale PR triage	P0	None
#325	Unified shift-left validation runner script	P1	None
#326	Bot review configuration tuning	P1	None
#328	Quality gate retry logic	P1	None
#329	Failure categorization	P1	#328
#327	@copilot directive relocation	P2	None

Nested Epics (Existing Work)

#	Title	Sub-Issues
#265	Pre-PR Validation System	#257, #258, #259, #260, #261, #262, #263
#272	PR Maintenance Follow-up	#273-#282 (10 issues)

Performance & Metrics

#	Title	Priority
#234	Automated reviewer signal quality stats	P1
#283	Batch reactions for faster PR reviews	P1
#289	GitHub MCP skill implementation	P1
#293	Merged-PR detection for empty diff	P2

Related Issues (Different Parent)

These issues are related but already have other parent issues:

#	Title	Parent
#284	Implement -NoProfile for pwsh	(has parent)
#286	Rewrite GitHub skills to use gh CLI	(has parent)

Success Criteria

• All stale PRs triaged (chore: Triage stale PRs (#143, #194, #199, #202) blocking velocity #330)
• Unified shift-left script created and documented (feat: Create unified shift-left validation runner script (Validate-PrePR.ps1) #325)
• Bot configurations tuned to reduce noise (config: Tune bot review configurations to reduce noise (gemini, copilot, coderabbit) #326)
• Quality gate retry logic implemented (feat: Add retry logic for infrastructure failures in AI Quality Gate #328)
• Failure categorization distinguishes infrastructure vs code (feat: Categorize AI Quality Gate failures (infrastructure vs code quality) #329)
• @copilot directive best practices documented (docs: Relocate @copilot directives from review comments to issue comments #327)

Analysis Artifacts

• .agents/planning/2025-12-23-velocity-improvement-plan.md
• .agents/sessions/2025-12-23-session-62-velocity-analysis.md
• Serena memory: velocity-analysis-2025-12-23

Related PRs

• PR docs: add velocity analysis and 10x improvement plan #331: Velocity analysis and improvement plan
• PR perf: Add -NoProfile to pwsh invocations for 82% faster execution #285: -NoProfile performance optimization
• PR docs(adr): add model routing policy to minimize false PASS #310: Model routing policy
• PR fix(pr-maintenance): remove exit code 1 for blocked PRs #313: PR Maintenance fix

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🔗 Similar Issues

Related Issues

• feat: Create unified shift-left validation runner script (Validate-PrePR.ps1) #325
• chore: Triage stale PRs (#143, #194, #199, #202) blocking velocity #330
• config: Tune bot review configurations to reduce noise (gemini, copilot, coderabbit) #326

🔗 Related PRs

#53 - Create PRD for Visual Studio 2026 install support [merged]
#100 - fix(ci): ensure Pester Tests workflow satisfies required checks for all PRs [merged]
#229 - fix: address PR #226 review comments and labeler workflow issues [merged]
#268 - feat(copilot-synthesis): AI-powered context synthesis with thin workflow pattern [merged]
#370 - fix(ci): RCA for Issue #357 + implement #338 retry logic [merged]

👤 Suggested Assignees

• rjmurillo
• rjmurillo-bot

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