Use Taskhold with Factory Droid

What you get with Factory Droid and Taskhold

• Droid claims tasks as "Droid in <repo>".
• Steps, progress and questions on the live board.
• Summaries on finished work.

Connect Factory Droid to Taskhold

1. Start the 7-day trial, open Settings > API keys and create a key for this machine. It starts with atd_sk_. One key per tool and machine lets you revoke each one on its own.
2. Export it in your shell profile: export TASKHOLD_API_KEY=atd_sk_...
3. Add the server with the command below, or put the JSON in ~/.factory/mcp.json.

droid mcp add taskhold https://taskhold.com/api/mcp --type http --header "Authorization: Bearer <your atd_sk_ key>"

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "taskhold": {
      "type": "http",
      "url": "https://taskhold.com/api/mcp",
      "headers": { "Authorization": "Bearer ${TASKHOLD_API_KEY}" },
      "disabled": false
    }
  }
}

Tell Factory Droid how to use the list

Droid reads AGENTS.md at the project root. Add the workflow there:

## Tasks (Taskhold)

The person and I share a task list through the taskhold MCP tools. They watch a live board while I work.
- Session start: taskhold_get_current, then taskhold_updates for replies. Nothing in progress? taskhold_list status:todo and take the highest priority.
- taskhold_start before working on a task (agent: "Droid in <repo>").
- More than a couple of steps: taskhold_plan, then taskhold_start and taskhold_complete each step.
- taskhold_progress at milestones (N of M, or a percent) with a short message. Every few minutes at most.
- Need a decision: taskhold_block with one specific question, then check taskhold_updates.
- Done: taskhold_complete with what changed and how I checked it.
- A TODO or bug I'm not fixing now: taskhold_create (or taskhold_create_from_todo with file and line).

One limit to know

Factory's docs warn against putting auth headers in a project .factory/mcp.json. Keep the Taskhold entry in ~/.factory/mcp.json, and start Droid from a shell where TASKHOLD_API_KEY is exported, or the header goes out empty.

What leaves your machine, and how to disconnect

Taskhold receives task titles, steps, progress messages, questions and summaries, whatever the agent or script sends. Taskhold never sends code or commands to your machine, and it doesn't read your repository.

To cut a tool off, open Settings > API keys and revoke its key. The next call fails with 401. Then remove the Taskhold entry from the tool's config so it stops trying.