How-to: Change Repo Priority or Pause a Repo

This guide explains how to update your repository priorities so the Copilot PM workflow prompts surface the right work at the right time.

Steps

1. Open plan/REPO_PRIORITIES.md in your repo.
2. To promote or demote a repo:
   • Move its row to the appropriate tier table (Active Focus, Medium, Low).
   • Update the Notes column if needed.
3. To pause a repo:
   • Move it to the Paused table.
   • Add a reason and a resume condition.
   • When ready to resume, move it back to its previous tier.
4. To change how a repo participates in PM:
   • Update plan/REPO_PM_PARTICIPATION.md.
   • Use observe if the repo should stay visible in planning but keep its own triage process.
   • Use exclude if it should be ignored completely.
5. To change OSS suitability behaviour for a public repo:
   • In plan/REPO_PM_PARTICIPATION.md, set OSS Override to non-oss for that repo.
   • Leave OSS Override as default for normal behaviour.
   • OSS suitability checks run in /pm-backlog-review only.
6. Save and commit your changes.
7. Next time you run /pm-backlog-review or /pm-iteration-plan, the prompts will use your updated priorities.

Tips

• Keep Tier 1 (Active Focus) small for best results.
• Paused repos are skipped for issue scanning, but PRs are still surfaced unless the repo’s participation mode is exclude.
• Participation mode is separate from priority. Use plan/REPO_PM_PARTICIPATION.md for full / observe / exclude.
• Public repos are treated as OSS by default for backlog-review suitability checks. Private repos are never OSS.
• See Repository Priorities Reference for full details.