Conclude and Export a Debate

Time: ~3 minutes
Learning outcome: Extract a decision framework from a debate and export it in multiple formats.

What you’ll learn

By the end of this tutorial, you will:

• Generate a structured decision framework with council conclude
• Export debate transcripts as markdown, JSON, or Architecture Decision Records (ADRs)
• Understand when to use each export format

Prerequisites

• Completed Tutorial 1: Install and First Debate
• At least one debate saved (from council convene)

Step 1: Conclude a debate

After a debate completes, you can synthesize it into a structured decision framework:

council conclude

If you have multiple debates, Council will use the most recent one. To conclude a specific panel:

council conclude <panel-name>

Replace <panel-name> with the panel identifier from council sessions.

What you’ll see:

Council runs an LLM synthesis to produce:

• Decision dimensions — key trade-off axes identified by the panel
• Expert positions — where each expert stands on those dimensions
• Areas of consensus — points of agreement
• Areas of disagreement — unresolved tensions or competing priorities
• Recommendation — actionable next steps

Example output:

━━━ Decision Framework ━━━

Decision Dimensions:
  1. Cost (upfront vs. ongoing)
  2. Time to value (speed vs. control)
  3. Risk tolerance (vendor lock-in vs. maintenance burden)

Positions:
  • CTO (Priya): Build for control, accept 6-month delay
  • CFO (James): Buy to minimize TCO over 3 years
  • VP Product (Lisa): Buy to eliminate data gap

Consensus: 6-month data gap is the critical risk

Recommendation: Start with vendor (Mixpanel/Amplitude),
ring-fence build decision for year two if data ownership
becomes competitive advantage.

Step 2: Export as markdown (default)

Export the full debate transcript to share with your team:

council export <panel-name>

This outputs a readable markdown document to stdout with:

• Panel topic and status
• All expert turns from every round
• Expert names, roles, and models used

Redirect to a file:

council export <panel-name> --output decision.md

Step 3: Export as JSON (machine-readable)

For programmatic access or archiving:

council export <panel-name> --format json --output debate.json

The JSON format is NDJSON (newline-delimited JSON) — one event per line. Useful for:

• Feeding into analysis scripts
• Importing into other tools
• Long-term archival with structured metadata

Step 4: Export as an Architecture Decision Record (ADR)

For technical decisions, export in the ADR format:

council export <panel-name> --format adr --output adr-0001-analytics-platform.md

The ADR template includes:

• Status: Proposed, Accepted, Deprecated, Superseded
• Context: The problem and constraints
• Options Considered: The alternatives debated
• Discussion: Summary of expert arguments
• Decision: The chosen path

ADRs are widely used in software projects to document significant architectural choices.

When to use each format

Format	Best for…
markdown	Sharing with humans — readable, searchable, presentable
json	Automation, analysis, archival — machine-readable events
adr	Technical decisions — standardized decision record format

What you accomplished

• Synthesized a debate into a structured decision framework
• Exported debate transcripts in three formats
• Learned when each format is most useful

Next steps

• Tutorial 3: Built-in Templates — Use pre-configured expert panels for common scenarios
• Explore other panels: Run council sessions to see all your saved debates
• Resume a debate: Use council resume <panel-name> to continue a prior discussion

Commands introduced

Command	Purpose
council conclude	Generate decision framework from debate
council export	Export debate transcript (markdown/json/adr)