Deep Work

A knowledge-work mode for DeepSeek Harness. Deep Work turns a session into a small delivery studio: understand the brief, make a plan, gather evidence, produce the artifact, verify it, and hand back a file — not just a chat answer.

What it is for

• assignments and essays
• research briefs and market scans
• reports and proposals
• Word documents, spreadsheets, slide decks, and PDFs
• analysis of existing files
• structured plans, SOPs, and recurring reports

What it adds

• A Deep Work agent preset with a delivery-oriented persona.
• The deep-work skill, a repeatable protocol for evidence-backed knowledge work.
• A workspace task protocol under .deep-work/ so long tasks can be resumed.
• A deliverables convention: deliverables/ in the session workspace.
• A verify_deliverable tool that checks a file's existence, size, and container signature before the agent claims it is ready.
• Time context and scheduling tools for time-aware research and recurring reports.
• Verification rules for .docx, .xlsx, .pptx, .pdf, HTML, and data files.

Install

Install the directory with the Harness plugin manager:

plugin_manager install_bundle D:\Codebase\dsh-plugins\deep-work

The bundle declares a deep-work preset. Start a new session, choose Deep Work from the mode selector, select a workspace, and describe the deliverable.

A Deep Work cockpit is added to the right sidebar. It reads the current session workspace and shows:

• the task objective, deliverable, status, and next step from .deep-work/task.md
• the checklist and progress bar from .deep-work/plan.md
• files in deliverables/, clickable into the document preview
• source count from .deep-work/sources.md
• working files in .deep-work/
• a live activity timeline from the current session's chat nodes, so the panel shows what is happening even before the task brief is written

The cockpit opens once when a Deep Work session begins. The small Deep Work chip in the conversation header reopens it. The existing right-sidebar Files tab remains available for the raw directory tree.

Use

Examples:

Read the notes in notes/ and write a five-page assignment as a formatted .docx. Include a short reference list and verify the document opens.

Analyse sales.xlsx, identify the three strongest trends, and produce a nine-slide presentation with charts and speaker notes.

Research the market in brief.md and produce a report plus a one-page summary. Cite every factual claim and flag anything you could not verify.

For a substantial task, Deep Work keeps its working state in .deep-work/:

.deep-work/
  task.md          # objective, constraints, state
  plan.md          # current plan
  sources.md       # source ledger and verification notes
deliverables/
  final.docx

Short requests may not need a task file. Long or multi-session requests should.

Boundaries

• Deep Work produces local files. It does not provide a cloud worker that continues after the Harness process exits.
• External side effects — sending email, publishing, paying, deleting, or sharing — still require the user's explicit approval.
• Web research uses the deployment's configured web providers.
• Browser automation and computer use are optional providers in Harness, not requirements of this plugin.

See docs/VERIFICATION.md for the test and installation record.

License

MIT