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Checklist States

Every checklist item has exactly one of four states at any time.

States

State Display Meaning
pending Not yet addressed. Default when an item is first added.
done Completed.
na Not applicable to this issue.
exception ⚠️ Needs approval from a qualified second party.

Transitions

Any collaborator with write access to the repo can move an item to done or na.

Moving an item to exception requires the approver to be logged in — because the exception is tied to the approver's identity. See Exception Approvals for the full rules.

Behaviour on closure

A checklist is considered complete when no item is pending and no exception item is awaiting approval.

What happens when an issue is closed with incomplete items depends on the enforcementLevel set in the template:

Level Behaviour
Advise Nothing — the checklist is informational only
Warn The bot posts a comment listing the incomplete items but lets the close proceed
Block The bot reopens the issue and posts a comment listing the incomplete items

The default is Warn. See the Templates guide for how to set this per template.