Add NOTES.md for recording user preferences and teaching notes

Enhance lesson guidelines by emphasizing the importance of citations and interactive elements for improved user engagement
Merge branch 'main' of github.com:mattpocock/skills
2026-07-30 03:22:34 +07:00 · 2026-06-06 10:12:27 +01:00 · 2026-06-06 10:10:38 +01:00 · 2026-06-06 10:09:36 +01:00 · 2026-06-06 10:06:03 +01:00 · 2026-05-31 10:08:36 +01:00
47 changed files with 1398 additions and 330 deletions
@@ -3,14 +3,17 @@
  "skills": [
    "./skills/engineering/diagnose",
    "./skills/engineering/grill-with-docs",
-    "./skills/engineering/github-triage",
+    "./skills/engineering/triage",
    "./skills/engineering/improve-codebase-architecture",
+    "./skills/engineering/setup-matt-pocock-skills",
    "./skills/engineering/tdd",
    "./skills/engineering/to-issues",
    "./skills/engineering/to-prd",
    "./skills/engineering/zoom-out",
+    "./skills/engineering/prototype",
    "./skills/productivity/caveman",
    "./skills/productivity/grill-me",
+    "./skills/productivity/handoff",
    "./skills/productivity/write-a-skill"
  ]
 }
@@ -0,0 +1,25 @@
+# Issue tracker integrations are limited to mainstream tools
+
+`setup-matt-pocock-skills` only offers first-class support for **mainstream** issue trackers. Requests to add support for niche, new, or single-vendor experimental trackers are out of scope.
+
+## Why this is out of scope
+
+Every issue-tracker backend hard-codes a CLI shape into the skills (commands, flags, output parsing). Each new backend is permanent maintenance surface — it has to keep working as the tool's CLI evolves, and it has to keep being tested against `/to-prd`, `/to-issues`, `/triage`, and friends. That cost is only worth paying for trackers a meaningful fraction of users actually have.
+
+"Mainstream" is a judgment call, not a numeric bar:
+
+- GitHub, GitLab, and Backlog.md are the kind of tools we'd consider mainstream — broadly known, widely used, well past the experimental phase.
+- A brand-new agent-focused tool with a few hundred GitHub stars is not, no matter how interesting the design.
+
+Stars, age, and download counts are useful signals when making the call but none of them is the rule. The rule is: would a typical engineer recognise this tool and have plausibly chosen it for their team?
+
+The escape hatches for non-mainstream trackers already exist:
+
+- `local markdown` for lightweight in-repo tracking.
+- `other/custom` for users who want to wire something up themselves.
+
+Neither requires the core skills to know about the specific tool.
+
+## Prior requests
+
+- #99 — "Add dex as an issue tracker backend" (dex was ~3 months old and ~300 stars at the time of the request)
@@ -0,0 +1,18 @@
+# Hard limits on the number of questions during grilling
+
+The `/grill-me` skill (and grilling sessions inside other skills) does not enforce a maximum number of questions. Requests to add a configurable cap or hard ceiling are out of scope.
+
+## Why this is out of scope
+
+Grilling is intentionally open-ended. The point is to keep digging until each branch of the decision tree is resolved — some plans need three questions, some need fifty. A fixed cap would either cut off useful exploration on hard problems or feel arbitrary on easy ones.
+
+If a session feels too long, the right escape hatches already exist:
+
+- The user can stop the session at any time and accept the current state of the plan.
+- The user can tell the model to wrap up, summarise, and move on — natural-language steering is the intended control surface, not a numeric limit.
+
+Adding a hard cap would also conflate two different failure modes: a model that asks too many questions because the plan is genuinely under-specified (working as intended) vs. a model that asks redundant or low-value questions (a prompt-quality issue, not a quantity issue). The fix for the latter belongs in the skill prompt, not in a counter.
+
+## Prior requests
+
+- #44 — "Codex just asked me 200 questions"
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+# Verify/Check Mode for `setup-matt-pocock-skills`
+
+This project will not add a dedicated verify/check mode (or a separate verify skill) for `setup-matt-pocock-skills`.
+
+## Why this is out of scope
+
+A second skill — or a `--verify` flag — for checking whether `docs/agents/*.md` artifacts still match the seed-template schema would duplicate work the existing setup skill already handles in conversation.
+
+The intended workflow is: **run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` and tell it to verify your current setup.** The skill is prompt-driven, so the maintainer can scope it to a verification pass ("don't rewrite anything, just check my existing files against the current seed templates and report drift") without needing a separate code path. Adding a flag or a sibling skill would split the surface area of a feature that's already expressible through the natural-language entry point.
+
+Keeping configuration management to a single skill also avoids the maintenance cost of two skills drifting from each other when seed templates evolve.
+
+## Prior requests
+
+- #106 — Feature request: verify/check mode for setup-matt-pocock-skills
@@ -4,9 +4,10 @@ Skills are organized into bucket folders under `skills/`:
 - `productivity/` — daily non-code workflow tools
 - `misc/` — kept around but rarely used
 - `personal/` — tied to my own setup, not promoted
+- `in-progress/` — drafts not yet ready to ship
 - `deprecated/` — no longer used

-Every skill in `engineering/`, `productivity/`, or `misc/` must have a reference in the top-level `README.md` and an entry in `.claude-plugin/plugin.json`. Skills in `personal/` and `deprecated/` must not appear in either.
+Every skill in `engineering/`, `productivity/`, or `misc/` must have a reference in the top-level `README.md` and an entry in `.claude-plugin/plugin.json`. Skills in `personal/`, `in-progress/`, and `deprecated/` must not appear in either.

 Each skill entry in the top-level `README.md` must link the skill name to its `SKILL.md`.

@@ -0,0 +1,26 @@
+# Matt Pocock Skills
+
+A collection of agent skills (slash commands and behaviors) loaded by Claude Code. Skills are organized into buckets and consumed by per-repo configuration emitted by `/setup-matt-pocock-skills`.
+
+## Language
+
+**Issue tracker**:
+The tool that hosts a repo's issues — GitHub Issues, Linear, a local `.scratch/` markdown convention, or similar. Skills like `to-issues`, `to-prd`, `triage`, and `qa` read from and write to it.
+_Avoid_: backlog manager, backlog backend, issue host
+
+**Issue**:
+A single tracked unit of work inside an **Issue tracker** — a bug, task, PRD, or slice produced by `to-issues`.
+_Avoid_: ticket (use only when quoting external systems that call them tickets)
+
+**Triage role**:
+A canonical state-machine label applied to an **Issue** during triage (e.g. `needs-triage`, `ready-for-afk`). Each role maps to a real label string in the **Issue tracker** via `docs/agents/triage-labels.md`.
+
+## Relationships
+
+- An **Issue tracker** holds many **Issues**
+- An **Issue** carries one **Triage role** at a time
+
+## Flagged ambiguities
+
+- "backlog" was previously used to mean both the *tool* hosting issues and the *body of work* inside it — resolved: the tool is the **Issue tracker**; "backlog" is no longer used as a domain term.
+- "backlog backend" / "backlog manager" — resolved: collapsed into **Issue tracker**.
@@ -1,4 +1,16 @@
-# Agent Skills For Real Engineers
+<p>
+  <a href="https://www.aihero.dev/s/skills-newsletter">
+    <picture>
+      <source media="(prefers-color-scheme: dark)" srcset="https://res.cloudinary.com/total-typescript/image/upload/v1777382277/skills-repo-dark_2x.png">
+      <source media="(prefers-color-scheme: light)" srcset="https://res.cloudinary.com/total-typescript/image/upload/v1777382277/skill-repo-light_2x.png">
+      <img alt="Skills" src="https://res.cloudinary.com/total-typescript/image/upload/v1777382277/skill-repo-light_2x.png" width="369">
+    </picture>
+  </a>
+</p>
+
+# Skills For Real Engineers
+
+[![skills.sh](https://skills.sh/b/mattpocock/skills)](https://skills.sh/mattpocock/skills)

 My agent skills that I use every day to do real engineering - not vibe coding.

@@ -18,9 +30,14 @@ If you want to keep up with changes to these skills, and any new ones I create,
 npx skills@latest add mattpocock/skills
 ```

-2. Pick the skills you want, and which coding agents you want to install them on.
+2. Pick the skills you want, and which coding agents you want to install them on. **Make sure you select `/setup-matt-pocock-skills`**.

-3. Bam - you're ready to go.
+3. Run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` in your agent. It will:
+   - Ask you which issue tracker you want to use (GitHub, Linear, or local files)
+   - Ask you what labels you apply to tickets when you triage them (`/triage` uses labels)
+   - Ask you where you want to save any docs we create
+
+4. Bam - you're ready to go.

 ## Why These Skills Exist

@@ -131,12 +148,14 @@ Skills I use daily for code work.

 - **[diagnose](./skills/engineering/diagnose/SKILL.md)** — Disciplined diagnosis loop for hard bugs and performance regressions: reproduce → minimise → hypothesise → instrument → fix → regression-test.
 - **[grill-with-docs](./skills/engineering/grill-with-docs/SKILL.md)** — Grilling session that challenges your plan against the existing domain model, sharpens terminology, and updates `CONTEXT.md` and ADRs inline.
- **[github-triage](./skills/engineering/github-triage/SKILL.md)** — Triage GitHub issues through a label-based state machine.
+- **[triage](./skills/engineering/triage/SKILL.md)** — Triage issues through a state machine of triage roles.
 - **[improve-codebase-architecture](./skills/engineering/improve-codebase-architecture/SKILL.md)** — Find deepening opportunities in a codebase, informed by the domain language in `CONTEXT.md` and the decisions in `docs/adr/`.
+- **[setup-matt-pocock-skills](./skills/engineering/setup-matt-pocock-skills/SKILL.md)** — Scaffold the per-repo config (issue tracker, triage label vocabulary, domain doc layout) that the other engineering skills consume. Run once per repo before using `to-issues`, `to-prd`, `triage`, `diagnose`, `tdd`, `improve-codebase-architecture`, or `zoom-out`.
 - **[tdd](./skills/engineering/tdd/SKILL.md)** — Test-driven development with a red-green-refactor loop. Builds features or fixes bugs one vertical slice at a time.
 - **[to-issues](./skills/engineering/to-issues/SKILL.md)** — Break any plan, spec, or PRD into independently-grabbable GitHub issues using vertical slices.
 - **[to-prd](./skills/engineering/to-prd/SKILL.md)** — Turn the current conversation context into a PRD and submit it as a GitHub issue. No interview — just synthesizes what you've already discussed.
 - **[zoom-out](./skills/engineering/zoom-out/SKILL.md)** — Tell the agent to zoom out and give broader context or a higher-level perspective on an unfamiliar section of code.
+- **[prototype](./skills/engineering/prototype/SKILL.md)** — Build a throwaway prototype to flesh out a design — either a runnable terminal app for state/business-logic questions, or several radically different UI variations toggleable from one route.

 ### Productivity

@@ -144,6 +163,7 @@ General workflow tools, not code-specific.

 - **[caveman](./skills/productivity/caveman/SKILL.md)** — Ultra-compressed communication mode. Cuts token usage ~75% by dropping filler while keeping full technical accuracy.
 - **[grill-me](./skills/productivity/grill-me/SKILL.md)** — Get relentlessly interviewed about a plan or design until every branch of the decision tree is resolved.
+- **[handoff](./skills/productivity/handoff/SKILL.md)** — Compact the current conversation into a handoff document so another agent can continue the work.
 - **[write-a-skill](./skills/productivity/write-a-skill/SKILL.md)** — Create new skills with proper structure, progressive disclosure, and bundled resources.

 ### Misc
@@ -0,0 +1,10 @@
+# Explicit `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` pointer only for hard dependencies
+
+Engineering skills depend on per-repo config (issue tracker, triage label vocabulary, domain doc layout) seeded by `/setup-matt-pocock-skills`. Some skills cannot meaningfully function without that config — they have to publish to a specific issue tracker or apply a specific label string. Others only use it to sharpen output (vocabulary, ADR awareness) and degrade gracefully without it.
+
+We split these into **hard-dependency** and **soft-dependency** skills:
+
+- **Hard dependency** (`to-issues`, `to-prd`, `triage`) — include an explicit one-liner: _"… should have been provided to you — run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` if not."_ Without the mapping, output is wrong, not just fuzzy.
+- **Soft dependency** (`diagnose`, `tdd`, `improve-codebase-architecture`, `zoom-out`) — reference "the project's domain glossary" and "ADRs in the area you're touching" in vague prose only. If the docs aren't there, the skill still works; output is just less sharp.
+
+The split keeps soft-dependency skills token-light and avoids cargo-culting the setup pointer into places where it isn't load-bearing.
@@ -6,9 +6,24 @@ set -euo pipefail

 REPO="$(cd "$(dirname "$0")/.." && pwd)"
 DEST="$HOME/.claude/skills"
+
+# If ~/.claude/skills is a symlink that resolves into this repo, we'd end up
+# writing the per-skill symlinks back into the repo's own skills/ tree. Detect
+# and bail out instead of polluting the working copy.
+if [ -L "$DEST" ]; then
+  resolved="$(readlink -f "$DEST")"
+  case "$resolved" in
+    "$REPO"|"$REPO"/*)
+      echo "error: $DEST is a symlink into this repo ($resolved)." >&2
+      echo "Remove it (rm \"$DEST\") and re-run; the script will recreate it as a real dir." >&2
+      exit 1
+      ;;
+  esac
+fi
+
 mkdir -p "$DEST"

-find "$REPO/skills" -name SKILL.md -not -path '*/node_modules/*' -print0 |
+find "$REPO/skills" -name SKILL.md -not -path '*/node_modules/*' -not -path '*/deprecated/*' -print0 |
 while IFS= read -r -d '' skill_md; do
  src="$(dirname "$skill_md")"
  name="$(basename "$src")"
@@ -0,0 +1,7 @@
+#!/usr/bin/env bash
+set -euo pipefail
+
+REPO="$(cd "$(dirname "$0")/.." && pwd)"
+
+cd "$REPO"
+find . -name SKILL.md -not -path '*/node_modules/*' | sed 's|^\./||' | sort
@@ -5,5 +5,4 @@ Skills I no longer use.
 - **[design-an-interface](./design-an-interface/SKILL.md)** — Generate multiple radically different interface designs for a module using parallel sub-agents.
 - **[qa](./qa/SKILL.md)** — Interactive QA session where user reports bugs conversationally and the agent files GitHub issues.
 - **[request-refactor-plan](./request-refactor-plan/SKILL.md)** — Create a detailed refactor plan with tiny commits via user interview, then file it as a GitHub issue.
- **[triage-issue](./triage-issue/SKILL.md)** — Investigate a bug by exploring the codebase, identify the root cause, and file a GitHub issue with a TDD-based fix plan.
 - **[ubiquitous-language](./ubiquitous-language/SKILL.md)** — Extract a DDD-style ubiquitous language glossary from the current conversation.
@@ -1,102 +0,0 @@
---
-name: triage-issue
-description: Triage a bug or issue by exploring the codebase to find root cause, then create a GitHub issue with a TDD-based fix plan. Use when user reports a bug, wants to file an issue, mentions "triage", or wants to investigate and plan a fix for a problem.
---
-
-# Triage Issue
-
-Investigate a reported problem, find its root cause, and create a GitHub issue with a TDD fix plan. This is a mostly hands-off workflow - minimize questions to the user.
-
-## Process
-
-### 1. Capture the problem
-
-Get a brief description of the issue from the user. If they haven't provided one, ask ONE question: "What's the problem you're seeing?"
-
-Do NOT ask follow-up questions yet. Start investigating immediately.
-
-### 2. Explore and diagnose
-
-Use the Agent tool with subagent_type=Explore to deeply investigate the codebase. Your goal is to find:
-
- **Where** the bug manifests (entry points, UI, API responses)
- **What** code path is involved (trace the flow)
- **Why** it fails (the root cause, not just the symptom)
- **What** related code exists (similar patterns, tests, adjacent modules)
-
-Look at:
- Related source files and their dependencies
- Existing tests (what's tested, what's missing)
- Recent changes to affected files (`git log` on relevant files)
- Error handling in the code path
- Similar patterns elsewhere in the codebase that work correctly
-
-### 3. Identify the fix approach
-
-Based on your investigation, determine:
-
- The minimal change needed to fix the root cause
- Which modules/interfaces are affected
- What behaviors need to be verified via tests
- Whether this is a regression, missing feature, or design flaw
-
-### 4. Design TDD fix plan
-
-Create a concrete, ordered list of RED-GREEN cycles. Each cycle is one vertical slice:
-
- **RED**: Describe a specific test that captures the broken/missing behavior
- **GREEN**: Describe the minimal code change to make that test pass
-
-Rules:
- Tests verify behavior through public interfaces, not implementation details
- One test at a time, vertical slices (NOT all tests first, then all code)
- Each test should survive internal refactors
- Include a final refactor step if needed
- **Durability**: Only suggest fixes that would survive radical codebase changes. Describe behaviors and contracts, not internal structure. Tests assert on observable outcomes (API responses, UI state, user-visible effects), not internal state. A good suggestion reads like a spec; a bad one reads like a diff.
-
-### 5. Create the GitHub issue
-
-Create a GitHub issue using `gh issue create` with the template below. Do NOT ask the user to review before creating - just create it and share the URL.
-
-<issue-template>
-
-## Problem
-
-A clear description of the bug or issue, including:
- What happens (actual behavior)
- What should happen (expected behavior)
- How to reproduce (if applicable)
-
-## Root Cause Analysis
-
-Describe what you found during investigation:
- The code path involved
- Why the current code fails
- Any contributing factors
-
-Do NOT include specific file paths, line numbers, or implementation details that couple to current code layout. Describe modules, behaviors, and contracts instead. The issue should remain useful even after major refactors.
-
-## TDD Fix Plan
-
-A numbered list of RED-GREEN cycles:
-
-1. **RED**: Write a test that [describes expected behavior]
-   **GREEN**: [Minimal change to make it pass]
-
-2. **RED**: Write a test that [describes next behavior]
-   **GREEN**: [Minimal change to make it pass]
-
-...
-
-**REFACTOR**: [Any cleanup needed after all tests pass]
-
-## Acceptance Criteria
-
- [ ] Criterion 1
- [ ] Criterion 2
- [ ] All new tests pass
- [ ] Existing tests still pass
-
-</issue-template>
-
-After creating the issue, print the issue URL and a one-line summary of the root cause.
@@ -4,9 +4,11 @@ Skills I use daily for code work.

 - **[diagnose](./diagnose/SKILL.md)** — Disciplined diagnosis loop for hard bugs and performance regressions: reproduce → minimise → hypothesise → instrument → fix → regression-test.
 - **[grill-with-docs](./grill-with-docs/SKILL.md)** — Grilling session that challenges your plan against the existing domain model, sharpens terminology, and updates `CONTEXT.md` and ADRs inline.
- **[github-triage](./github-triage/SKILL.md)** — Triage GitHub issues through a label-based state machine.
+- **[triage](./triage/SKILL.md)** — Triage issues through a state machine of triage roles.
 - **[improve-codebase-architecture](./improve-codebase-architecture/SKILL.md)** — Find deepening opportunities in a codebase, informed by the domain language in `CONTEXT.md` and the decisions in `docs/adr/`.
+- **[setup-matt-pocock-skills](./setup-matt-pocock-skills/SKILL.md)** — Scaffold the per-repo config (issue tracker, triage label vocabulary, domain doc layout) that the other engineering skills consume.
 - **[tdd](./tdd/SKILL.md)** — Test-driven development with a red-green-refactor loop. Builds features or fixes bugs one vertical slice at a time.
 - **[to-issues](./to-issues/SKILL.md)** — Break any plan, spec, or PRD into independently-grabbable GitHub issues using vertical slices.
 - **[to-prd](./to-prd/SKILL.md)** — Turn the current conversation context into a PRD and submit it as a GitHub issue.
 - **[zoom-out](./zoom-out/SKILL.md)** — Tell the agent to zoom out and give broader context or a higher-level perspective on an unfamiliar section of code.
+- **[prototype](./prototype/SKILL.md)** — Build a throwaway prototype to flesh out a design — either a runnable terminal app for state/business-logic questions, or several radically different UI variations toggleable from one route.
@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ description: Disciplined diagnosis loop for hard bugs and performance regression

 A discipline for hard bugs. Skip phases only when explicitly justified.

-Before exploring the codebase, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md). Use the `CONTEXT.md` vocabulary to get a clear mental model of the relevant modules.
+When exploring the codebase, use the project's domain glossary to get a clear mental model of the relevant modules, and check ADRs in the area you're touching.

 ## Phase 1 — Build a feedback loop

@@ -1,168 +0,0 @@
---
-name: github-triage
-description: Triage GitHub issues through a label-based state machine. Use when user wants to create an issue, triage issues, review incoming bugs or feature requests, prepare issues for an AFK agent, or manage issue workflow.
---
-
-# GitHub Issue Triage
-
-Triage issues in the current repo using a label-based state machine. Infer the repo from `git remote`. Use `gh` for all GitHub operations.
-
-## AI Disclaimer
-
-Every comment or issue posted to GitHub during triage **must** include the following disclaimer at the top of the comment body, before any other content:
-
-```
-> *This was generated by AI during triage.*
-```
-
-## Reference docs
-
- [AGENT-BRIEF.md](AGENT-BRIEF.md) — how to write durable agent briefs
- [OUT-OF-SCOPE.md](OUT-OF-SCOPE.md) — how the `.out-of-scope/` knowledge base works
-
-## Labels
-
-| Label             | Type     | Description                              |
-| ----------------- | -------- | ---------------------------------------- |
-| `bug`             | Category | Something is broken                      |
-| `enhancement`     | Category | New feature or improvement               |
-| `needs-triage`    | State    | Maintainer needs to evaluate this issue  |
-| `needs-info`      | State    | Waiting on reporter for more information |
-| `ready-for-agent` | State    | Fully specified, ready for AFK agent     |
-| `ready-for-human` | State    | Requires human implementation            |
-| `wontfix`         | State    | Will not be actioned                     |
-
-Every issue should have exactly **one** state label and **one** category label. If an issue has conflicting state labels (e.g. both `needs-triage` and `ready-for-agent`), flag the conflict and ask the maintainer which state is correct before doing anything else. Provide a recommendation.
-
-## State Machine
-
-| Current State  | Can transition to | Who triggers it        | What happens                                                                                                         |
-| -------------- | ----------------- | ---------------------- | -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- |
-| `unlabeled`    | `needs-triage`    | Skill (on first look)  | Issue needs maintainer evaluation. Skill applies label after presenting recommendation.                              |
-| `unlabeled`    | `ready-for-agent` | Maintainer (via skill) | Issue is already well-specified and agent-suitable. Skill writes agent brief comment, applies label.                 |
-| `unlabeled`    | `ready-for-human` | Maintainer (via skill) | Issue requires human implementation. Skill writes a brief comment summarizing the task, applies label.               |
-| `unlabeled`    | `wontfix`         | Maintainer (via skill) | Issue is spam, duplicate, or out of scope. Skill closes with comment (and writes `.out-of-scope/` for enhancements). |
-| `needs-triage` | `needs-info`      | Maintainer (via skill) | Issue is underspecified. Skill posts triage notes capturing progress so far + questions for reporter.                |
-| `needs-triage` | `ready-for-agent` | Maintainer (via skill) | Grilling session complete, agent-suitable. Skill writes agent brief comment, applies label.                          |
-| `needs-triage` | `ready-for-human` | Maintainer (via skill) | Grilling session complete, needs human. Skill writes a brief comment summarizing the task, applies label.            |
-| `needs-triage` | `wontfix`         | Maintainer (via skill) | Maintainer decides not to action. Skill closes with comment (and writes `.out-of-scope/` for enhancements).          |
-| `needs-info`   | `needs-triage`    | Skill (detects reply)  | Reporter has replied. Skill surfaces to maintainer for re-evaluation.                                                |
-
-An issue can only move along these transitions. The maintainer can override any state directly (see Quick State Override below), but the skill should flag if the transition is unusual.
-
-## Invocation
-
-The maintainer invokes `/github-triage` then describes what they want in natural language. The skill interprets the request and takes the appropriate action.
-
-Example requests:
-
- "Show me anything that needs my attention"
- "Let's look at #42"
- "Move #42 to ready-for-agent"
- "What's ready for agents to pick up?"
- "Are there any unlabeled issues?"
-
-## Workflow: Show What Needs Attention
-
-When the maintainer asks for an overview, query GitHub and present a summary grouped into three buckets:
-
-1. **Unlabeled issues** — new, no labels at all. These have never been triaged.
-2. **`needs-triage` issues** — maintainer needs to evaluate or continue evaluating.
-3. **`needs-info` issues with new activity** — the reporter has commented since the last triage notes comment. Check comment timestamps to determine this.
-
-Display counts per group. Within each group, show issues oldest first (longest-waiting gets attention first). For each issue, show: number, title, age, and a one-line summary of the issue body.
-
-Let the maintainer pick which issue to dive into.
-
-## Workflow: Triage a Specific Issue
-
-### Step 1: Gather context
-
-Before presenting anything to the maintainer:
-
- Read the full issue: body, all comments, all labels, who reported it, when
- If there are prior triage notes comments (from previous sessions), parse them to understand what has already been established
- Explore the codebase to build context — understand the domain, relevant interfaces, and existing behavior related to the issue. Before exploring, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md).
- Read `.out-of-scope/*.md` files and check if this issue matches or is similar to a previously rejected concept
-
-### Step 2: Present a recommendation
-
-Tell the maintainer:
-
- **Category recommendation:** bug or enhancement, with reasoning
- **State recommendation:** where this issue should go, with reasoning
- If it matches a prior out-of-scope rejection, surface that: "This is similar to `.out-of-scope/concept-name.md` — we rejected this before because X. Do you still feel the same way?"
- A brief summary of what you found in the codebase that's relevant
-
-Then wait for the maintainer's direction. They may:
-
- Agree and ask you to apply labels → do it
- Want to flesh it out → start a /grill-with-docs session
- Override with a different state → apply their choice
- Want to discuss → have a conversation
-
-### Step 3: Bug reproduction (bugs only)
-
-If the issue is categorized as a bug, attempt to reproduce it before starting a /grill-with-docs session. This will vary by codebase, but do your best:
-
- Read the reporter's reproduction steps (if provided)
- Explore the codebase to understand the relevant code paths
- Try to reproduce the bug: run tests, execute commands, or trace the logic to confirm the reported behavior
- If reproduction succeeds, report what you found to the maintainer — include the specific behavior you observed and where in the code it originates
- If reproduction fails, report that too — the bug may be environment-specific, already fixed, or the report may be inaccurate
- If the report lacks enough detail to attempt reproduction, note that — this is a strong signal the issue should move to `needs-info`
-
-The reproduction attempt informs the /grill-with-docs session and the agent brief. A confirmed reproduction with a known code path makes for a much stronger brief.
-
-### Step 4: /grill-with-docs session (if needed)
-
-If the issue needs to be fleshed out before it's ready for an agent, interview the maintainer to build a complete specification. Use the /grill-with-docs skill.
-
-### Step 5: Apply the outcome
-
-Depending on the outcome:
-
- **ready-for-agent** — post an agent brief comment (see [AGENT-BRIEF.md](AGENT-BRIEF.md))
- **ready-for-human** — post a comment summarizing the task, what was established during triage, and why it needs human implementation. Use the same structure as an agent brief but note the reason it can't be delegated to an agent (e.g. requires judgment calls, external system access, design decisions, or manual testing).
- **needs-info** — post triage notes with progress so far and questions for the reporter (see Needs Info Output below)
- **wontfix (bug)** — post a polite comment explaining why, then close the issue
- **wontfix (enhancement)** — write to `.out-of-scope/`, post a comment linking to it, then close the issue (see [OUT-OF-SCOPE.md](OUT-OF-SCOPE.md))
- **needs-triage** — apply the label. Optionally leave a comment if there's partial progress to capture.
-
-## Workflow: Quick State Override
-
-When the maintainer explicitly tells you to move an issue to a specific state (e.g. "move #42 to ready-for-agent"), trust their judgment and apply the label directly.
-
-Still show a confirmation of what you're about to do: which labels will be added/removed, and whether you'll post a comment or close the issue. But skip the /grill-with-docs session entirely.
-
-If moving to `ready-for-agent` without a /grill-with-docs session, ask the maintainer if they want to write a brief agent brief comment or skip it.
-
-## Needs Info Output
-
-When moving an issue to `needs-info`, post a comment that captures the interview progress and tells the reporter what's needed:
-
-```markdown
-## Triage Notes
-
-**What we've established so far:**
-
- point 1
- point 2
-
-**What we still need from you (@reporter):**
-
- question 1
- question 2
-```
-
-Include everything resolved during the /grill-with-docs session in "established so far" — this work should not be lost. The questions for the reporter should be specific and actionable, not vague ("please provide more info").
-
-## Resuming Previous Sessions
-
-When triaging an issue that already has triage notes from a previous session:
-
-1. Read all comments to find prior triage notes
-2. Parse what was already established
-3. Check if the reporter has answered any outstanding questions
-4. Present the maintainer with an updated picture: "Here's where we left off, and here's what the reporter has said since"
-5. Continue the /grill-with-docs session from where it stopped — do not re-ask resolved questions
@@ -10,7 +10,7 @@
 ## Language

 **Order**:
-{A concise description of the term}
+{A one or two sentence description of the term}
 _Avoid_: Purchase, transaction

 **Invoice**:
@@ -20,31 +20,14 @@ _Avoid_: Bill, payment request
 **Customer**:
 A person or organization that places orders.
 _Avoid_: Client, buyer, account
-
-## Relationships
-
- An **Order** produces one or more **Invoices**
- An **Invoice** belongs to exactly one **Customer**
-
-## Example dialogue
-
-> **Dev:** "When a **Customer** places an **Order**, do we create the **Invoice** immediately?"
-> **Domain expert:** "No — an **Invoice** is only generated once a **Fulfillment** is confirmed."
-
-## Flagged ambiguities
-
- "account" was used to mean both **Customer** and **User** — resolved: these are distinct concepts.
 ```

 ## Rules

- **Be opinionated.** When multiple words exist for the same concept, pick the best one and list the others as aliases to avoid.
- **Flag conflicts explicitly.** If a term is used ambiguously, call it out in "Flagged ambiguities" with a clear resolution.
- **Keep definitions tight.** One sentence max. Define what it IS, not what it does.
- **Show relationships.** Use bold term names and express cardinality where obvious.
+- **Be opinionated.** When multiple words exist for the same concept, pick the best one and list the others under `_Avoid_`.
+- **Keep definitions tight.** One or two sentences max. Define what it IS, not what it does.
 - **Only include terms specific to this project's context.** General programming concepts (timeouts, error types, utility patterns) don't belong even if the project uses them extensively. Before adding a term, ask: is this a concept unique to this context, or a general programming concept? Only the former belongs.
 - **Group terms under subheadings** when natural clusters emerge. If all terms belong to a single cohesive area, a flat list is fine.
- **Write an example dialogue.** A conversation between a dev and a domain expert that demonstrates how the terms interact naturally and clarifies boundaries between related concepts.

 ## Single vs multi-context repos

@@ -1,15 +1,20 @@
 ---
 name: grill-with-docs
 description: Grilling session that challenges your plan against the existing domain model, sharpens terminology, and updates documentation (CONTEXT.md, ADRs) inline as decisions crystallise. Use when user wants to stress-test a plan against their project's language and documented decisions.
-disable-model-invocation: true
 ---

+<what-to-do>
+
 Interview me relentlessly about every aspect of this plan until we reach a shared understanding. Walk down each branch of the design tree, resolving dependencies between decisions one-by-one. For each question, provide your recommended answer.

 Ask the questions one at a time, waiting for feedback on each question before continuing.

 If a question can be answered by exploring the codebase, explore the codebase instead.

+</what-to-do>
+
+<supporting-info>
+
 ## Domain awareness

 During codebase exploration, also look for existing documentation:
@@ -68,7 +73,7 @@ When the user states how something works, check whether the code agrees. If you

 When a term is resolved, update `CONTEXT.md` right there. Don't batch these up — capture them as they happen. Use the format in [CONTEXT-FORMAT.md](./CONTEXT-FORMAT.md).

-Don't couple `CONTEXT.md` to implementation details. Only include terms that are meaningful to domain experts.
+`CONTEXT.md` should be totally devoid of implementation details. Do not treat `CONTEXT.md` as a spec, a scratch pad, or a repository for implementation decisions. It is a glossary and nothing else.

 ### Offer ADRs sparingly

@@ -79,3 +84,5 @@ Only offer to create an ADR when all three are true:
 3. **The result of a real trade-off** — there were genuine alternatives and you picked one for specific reasons

 If any of the three is missing, skip the ADR. Use the format in [ADR-FORMAT.md](./ADR-FORMAT.md).
+
+</supporting-info>
@@ -0,0 +1,123 @@
+# HTML Report Format
+
+The architectural review is rendered as a single self-contained HTML file in the OS temp directory. Tailwind and Mermaid both come from CDNs. Mermaid handles graph-shaped diagrams reliably; hand-built divs and inline SVG handle the more editorial visuals (mass diagrams, cross-sections). Mix the two — don't lean on Mermaid for everything, it'll start to look generic.
+
+## Scaffold
+
+```html
+<!doctype html>
+<html lang="en">
+  <head>
+    <meta charset="utf-8" />
+    <title>Architecture review — {{repo name}}</title>
+    <script src="https://cdn.tailwindcss.com"></script>
+    <script type="module">
+      import mermaid from "https://cdn.jsdelivr.net/npm/mermaid@11/dist/mermaid.esm.min.mjs";
+      mermaid.initialize({ startOnLoad: true, theme: "neutral", securityLevel: "loose" });
+    </script>
+    <style>
+      /* small custom layer for things Tailwind doesn't cover cleanly:
+         dashed seam lines, hand-drawn-feeling arrow heads, etc. */
+      .seam { stroke-dasharray: 4 4; }
+      .leak { stroke: #dc2626; }
+      .deep { background: linear-gradient(135deg, #0f172a, #1e293b); }
+    </style>
+  </head>
+  <body class="bg-stone-50 text-slate-900 font-sans">
+    <main class="max-w-5xl mx-auto px-6 py-12 space-y-12">
+      <header>...</header>
+      <section id="candidates" class="space-y-10">...</section>
+      <section id="top-recommendation">...</section>
+    </main>
+  </body>
+</html>
+```
+
+## Header
+
+Repo name, date, and a compact legend: solid box = module, dashed line = seam, red arrow = leakage, thick dark box = deep module. No introduction paragraph — straight into the candidates.
+
+## Candidate card
+
+The diagrams carry the weight. Prose is sparse, plain, and uses the glossary terms ([LANGUAGE.md](LANGUAGE.md)) without ceremony.
+
+Each candidate is one `<article>`:
+
+- **Title** — short, names the deepening (e.g. "Collapse the Order intake pipeline").
+- **Badge row** — recommendation strength (`Strong` = emerald, `Worth exploring` = amber, `Speculative` = slate), plus a tag for the dependency category (`in-process`, `local-substitutable`, `ports & adapters`, `mock`).
+- **Files** — monospaced list, `font-mono text-sm`.
+- **Before / After diagram** — the centrepiece. Two columns, side by side. See patterns below.
+- **Problem** — one sentence. What hurts.
+- **Solution** — one sentence. What changes.
+- **Wins** — bullets, ≤6 words each. e.g. "Tests hit one interface", "Pricing logic stops leaking", "Delete 4 shallow wrappers".
+- **ADR callout** (if applicable) — one line in an amber-tinted box.
+
+No paragraphs of explanation. If the diagram needs a paragraph to be understood, redraw the diagram.
+
+## Diagram patterns
+
+Pick the pattern that fits the candidate. Mix them. Don't make every diagram look the same — variety is part of the point.
+
+### Mermaid graph (the workhorse for dependencies / call flow)
+
+Use a Mermaid `flowchart` or `graph` when the point is "X calls Y calls Z, and look at the mess." Wrap it in a Tailwind-styled card so it doesn't feel parachuted in. Style with classDef to colour leakage edges red and the deep module dark. Sequence diagrams work well for "before: 6 round-trips; after: 1."
+
+```html
+<div class="rounded-lg border border-slate-200 bg-white p-4">
+  <pre class="mermaid">
+    flowchart LR
+      A[OrderHandler] --> B[OrderValidator]
+      B --> C[OrderRepo]
+      C -.leak.-> D[PricingClient]
+      classDef leak stroke:#dc2626,stroke-width:2px;
+      class C,D leak
+  </pre>
+</div>
+```
+
+### Hand-built boxes-and-arrows (when Mermaid's layout fights you)
+
+Modules as `<div>`s with borders and labels. Arrows as inline SVG `<line>` or `<path>` elements positioned absolutely over a relative container. Reach for this when you want the "after" diagram to feel like one thick-bordered deep module with greyed-out internals — Mermaid won't render that with the right weight.
+
+### Cross-section (good for layered shallowness)
+
+Stack horizontal bands (`h-12 border-l-4`) to show layers a call passes through. Before: 6 thin layers each doing nothing. After: 1 thick band labelled with the consolidated responsibility.
+
+### Mass diagram (good for "interface as wide as implementation")
+
+Two rectangles per module — one for interface surface area, one for implementation. Before: interface rectangle is nearly as tall as the implementation rectangle (shallow). After: interface rectangle is short, implementation rectangle is tall (deep).
+
+### Call-graph collapse
+
+Before: a tree of function calls rendered as nested boxes. After: the same tree collapsed into one box, with the now-internal calls shown faded inside it.
+
+## Style guidance
+
+- Lean editorial, not corporate-dashboard. Generous whitespace. Serif optional for headings (`font-serif` works well with stone/slate).
+- Colour sparingly: one accent (emerald or indigo) plus red for leakage and amber for warnings.
+- Keep diagrams ~320px tall so before/after sits comfortably side by side without scrolling.
+- Use `text-xs uppercase tracking-wider` for module labels inside diagrams — they should read as schematic, not as UI.
+- The only scripts are the Tailwind CDN and the Mermaid ESM import. The report is otherwise static — no app code, no interactivity beyond Mermaid's own rendering.
+
+## Top recommendation section
+
+One larger card. Candidate name, one sentence on why, anchor link to its card. That's it.
+
+## Tone
+
+Plain English, concise — but the architectural nouns and verbs come straight from [LANGUAGE.md](LANGUAGE.md). Concision is not an excuse to drift.
+
+**Use exactly:** module, interface, implementation, depth, deep, shallow, seam, adapter, leverage, locality.
+
+**Never substitute:** component, service, unit (for module) · API, signature (for interface) · boundary (for seam) · layer, wrapper (for module, when you mean module).
+
+**Phrasings that fit the style:**
+
+- "Order intake module is shallow — interface nearly matches the implementation."
+- "Pricing leaks across the seam."
+- "Deepen: one interface, one place to test."
+- "Two adapters justify the seam: HTTP in prod, in-memory in tests."
+
+**Wins bullets** name the gain in glossary terms: *"locality: bugs concentrate in one module"*, *"leverage: one interface, N call sites"*, *"interface shrinks; implementation absorbs the wrappers"*. Don't write *"easier to maintain"* or *"cleaner code"* — those terms aren't in the glossary and don't earn their place.
+
+No hedging, no throat-clearing, no "it's worth noting that…". If a sentence could be a bullet, make it a bullet. If a bullet could be cut, cut it. If a term isn't in [LANGUAGE.md](LANGUAGE.md), reach for one that is before inventing a new one.
@@ -32,7 +32,7 @@ This skill is _informed_ by the project's domain model. The domain language give

 ### 1. Explore

-Before exploring, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md) — read `CONTEXT.md` and relevant ADRs first.
+Read the project's domain glossary and any ADRs in the area you're touching first.

 Then use the Agent tool with `subagent_type=Explore` to walk the codebase. Don't follow rigid heuristics — explore organically and note where you experience friction:

@@ -44,20 +44,30 @@ Then use the Agent tool with `subagent_type=Explore` to walk the codebase. Don't

 Apply the **deletion test** to anything you suspect is shallow: would deleting it concentrate complexity, or just move it? A "yes, concentrates" is the signal you want.

-### 2. Present candidates
+### 2. Present candidates as an HTML report

-Present a numbered list of deepening opportunities. For each candidate:
+Write a self-contained HTML file to the OS temp directory so nothing lands in the repo. Resolve the temp dir from `$TMPDIR`, falling back to `/tmp` (or `%TEMP%` on Windows), and write to `<tmpdir>/architecture-review-<timestamp>.html` so each run gets a fresh file. Open it for the user — `xdg-open <path>` on Linux, `open <path>` on macOS, `start <path>` on Windows — and tell them the absolute path.
+
+The report uses **Tailwind via CDN** for layout and styling, and **Mermaid via CDN** for diagrams where a graph/flow/sequence reliably communicates the structure. Mix Mermaid with hand-crafted CSS/SVG visuals — use Mermaid when relationships are graph-shaped (call graphs, dependencies, sequences), and hand-built divs/SVG when you want something more editorial (mass diagrams, cross-sections, collapse animations). Each candidate gets a **before/after visualisation**. Be visual.
+
+For each candidate, the same template as before, but rendered as a card:

 - **Files** — which files/modules are involved
 - **Problem** — why the current architecture is causing friction
 - **Solution** — plain English description of what would change
- **Benefits** — explained in terms of locality and leverage, and also in how tests would improve
+- **Benefits** — explained in terms of locality and leverage, and how tests would improve
+- **Before / After diagram** — side-by-side, custom-drawn, illustrating the shallowness and the deepening
+- **Recommendation strength** — one of `Strong`, `Worth exploring`, `Speculative`, rendered as a badge
+
+End the report with a **Top recommendation** section: which candidate you'd tackle first and why.

 **Use CONTEXT.md vocabulary for the domain, and [LANGUAGE.md](LANGUAGE.md) vocabulary for the architecture.** If `CONTEXT.md` defines "Order," talk about "the Order intake module" — not "the FooBarHandler," and not "the Order service."

-**ADR conflicts**: if a candidate contradicts an existing ADR, only surface it when the friction is real enough to warrant revisiting the ADR. Mark it clearly (e.g. _"contradicts ADR-0007 — but worth reopening because…"_). Don't list every theoretical refactor an ADR forbids.
+**ADR conflicts**: if a candidate contradicts an existing ADR, only surface it when the friction is real enough to warrant revisiting the ADR. Mark it clearly in the card (e.g. a warning callout: _"contradicts ADR-0007 — but worth reopening because…"_). Don't list every theoretical refactor an ADR forbids.

-Do NOT propose interfaces yet. Ask the user: "Which of these would you like to explore?"
+See [HTML-REPORT.md](HTML-REPORT.md) for the full HTML scaffold, diagram patterns, and styling guidance.
+
+Do NOT propose interfaces yet. After the file is written, ask the user: "Which of these would you like to explore?"

 ### 3. Grilling loop

@@ -0,0 +1,79 @@
+# Logic Prototype
+
+A tiny interactive terminal app that lets the user drive a state model by hand. Use this when the question is about **business logic, state transitions, or data shape** — the kind of thing that looks reasonable on paper but only feels wrong once you push it through real cases.
+
+## When this is the right shape
+
+- "I'm not sure if this state machine handles the edge case where X then Y."
+- "Does this data model actually let me represent the case where..."
+- "I want to feel out what the API should look like before writing it."
+- Anything where the user wants to **press buttons and watch state change**.
+
+If the question is "what should this look like" — wrong branch. Use [UI.md](UI.md).
+
+## Process
+
+### 1. State the question
+
+Before writing code, write down what state model and what question you're prototyping. One paragraph, in the prototype's README or a comment at the top of the file. A logic prototype that answers the wrong question is pure waste — make the question explicit so it can be checked later, whether the user is watching now or returning to it AFK.
+
+### 2. Pick the language
+
+Use whatever the host project uses. If the project has no obvious runtime (e.g. a docs repo), ask.
+
+Match the project's existing conventions for tooling — don't add a new package manager or runtime just for the prototype.
+
+### 3. Isolate the logic in a portable module
+
+Put the actual logic — the bit that's answering the question — behind a small, pure interface that could be lifted out and dropped into the real codebase later. The TUI around it is throwaway; the logic module shouldn't be.
+
+The right shape depends on the question:
+
+- **A pure reducer** — `(state, action) => state`. Good when actions are discrete events and state is a single value.
+- **A state machine** — explicit states and transitions. Good when "which actions are even legal right now" is part of the question.
+- **A small set of pure functions** over a plain data type. Good when there's no implicit current state — just transformations.
+- **A class or module with a clear method surface** when the logic genuinely owns ongoing internal state.
+
+Pick whichever shape best fits the question being asked, *not* whichever is easiest to wire to a TUI. Keep it pure: no I/O, no terminal code, no `console.log` for control flow. The TUI imports it and calls into it; nothing flows the other direction.
+
+This is what makes the prototype useful past its own lifetime. When the question's been answered, the validated reducer / machine / function set can be lifted into the real module — the TUI shell gets deleted.
+
+### 4. Build the smallest TUI that exposes the state
+
+Build it as a **lightweight TUI** — on every tick, clear the screen (`console.clear()` / `print("\033[2J\033[H")` / equivalent) and re-render the whole frame. The user should always see one stable view, not an ever-growing scrollback.
+
+Each frame has two parts, in this order:
+
+1. **Current state**, pretty-printed and diff-friendly (one field per line, or formatted JSON). Use **bold** for field names or section headers and **dim** for less important context (timestamps, IDs, derived values). Native ANSI escape codes are fine — `\x1b[1m` bold, `\x1b[2m` dim, `\x1b[0m` reset. No need to pull in a styling library unless one is already in the project.
+2. **Keyboard shortcuts**, listed at the bottom: `[a] add user  [d] delete user  [t] tick clock  [q] quit`. Bold the key, dim the description, or vice-versa — whatever reads cleanly.
+
+Behaviour:
+
+1. **Initialise state** — a single in-memory object/struct. Render the first frame on start.
+2. **Read one keystroke (or one line)** at a time, dispatch to a handler that mutates state.
+3. **Re-render** the full frame after every action — don't append, replace.
+4. **Loop until quit.**
+
+The whole frame should fit on one screen.
+
+### 5. Make it runnable in one command
+
+Add a script to the project's existing task runner (`package.json` scripts, `Makefile`, `justfile`, `pyproject.toml`). The user should run `pnpm run <prototype-name>` or equivalent — never need to remember a path.
+
+If the host project has no task runner, just put the command at the top of the prototype's README.
+
+### 6. Hand it over
+
+Give the user the run command. They'll drive it themselves; the interesting moments are when they say "wait, that shouldn't be possible" or "huh, I assumed X would be different" — those are the bugs in the _idea_, which is the whole point. If they want new actions added, add them. Prototypes evolve.
+
+### 7. Capture the answer
+
+When the prototype has done its job, the answer to the question is the only thing worth keeping. If the user is around, ask what it taught them. If not, leave a `NOTES.md` next to the prototype so the answer can be filled in (or filled in by you, if you've watched the session) before the prototype gets deleted.
+
+## Anti-patterns
+
+- **Don't add tests.** A prototype that needs tests is no longer a prototype.
+- **Don't wire it to the real database.** Use an in-memory store unless the question is specifically about persistence.
+- **Don't generalise.** No "what if we wanted to support X later." The prototype answers one question.
+- **Don't blur the logic and the TUI together.** If the reducer / state machine references `console.log`, prompts, or terminal escape codes, it's no longer portable. Keep the TUI as a thin shell over a pure module.
+- **Don't ship the TUI shell into production.** The shell is optimised for being driven by hand from a terminal. The logic module behind it is the bit worth keeping.
@@ -0,0 +1,30 @@
+---
+name: prototype
+description: Build a throwaway prototype to flesh out a design before committing to it. Routes between two branches — a runnable terminal app for state/business-logic questions, or several radically different UI variations toggleable from one route. Use when the user wants to prototype, sanity-check a data model or state machine, mock up a UI, explore design options, or says "prototype this", "let me play with it", "try a few designs".
+---
+
+# Prototype
+
+A prototype is **throwaway code that answers a question**. The question decides the shape.
+
+## Pick a branch
+
+Identify which question is being answered — from the user's prompt, the surrounding code, or by asking if the user is around:
+
+- **"Does this logic / state model feel right?"** → [LOGIC.md](LOGIC.md). Build a tiny interactive terminal app that pushes the state machine through cases that are hard to reason about on paper.
+- **"What should this look like?"** → [UI.md](UI.md). Generate several radically different UI variations on a single route, switchable via a URL search param and a floating bottom bar.
+
+The two branches produce very different artifacts — getting this wrong wastes the whole prototype. If the question is genuinely ambiguous and the user isn't reachable, default to whichever branch better matches the surrounding code (a backend module → logic; a page or component → UI) and state the assumption at the top of the prototype.
+
+## Rules that apply to both
+
+1. **Throwaway from day one, and clearly marked as such.** Locate the prototype code close to where it will actually be used (next to the module or page it's prototyping for) so context is obvious — but name it so a casual reader can see it's a prototype, not production. For throwaway UI routes, obey whatever routing convention the project already uses; don't invent a new top-level structure.
+2. **One command to run.** Whatever the project's existing task runner supports — `pnpm <name>`, `python <path>`, `bun <path>`, etc. The user must be able to start it without thinking.
+3. **No persistence by default.** State lives in memory. Persistence is the thing the prototype is _checking_, not something it should depend on. If the question explicitly involves a database, hit a scratch DB or a local file with a clear "PROTOTYPE — wipe me" name.
+4. **Skip the polish.** No tests, no error handling beyond what makes the prototype _runnable_, no abstractions. The point is to learn something fast and then delete it.
+5. **Surface the state.** After every action (logic) or on every variant switch (UI), print or render the full relevant state so the user can see what changed.
+6. **Delete or absorb when done.** When the prototype has answered its question, either delete it or fold the validated decision into the real code — don't leave it rotting in the repo.
+
+## When done
+
+The _answer_ is the only thing worth keeping from a prototype. Capture it somewhere durable (commit message, ADR, issue, or a `NOTES.md` next to the prototype) along with the question it was answering. If the user is around, that capture is a quick conversation; if not, leave the placeholder so they (or you, on the next pass) can fill in the verdict before deleting the prototype.
@@ -0,0 +1,112 @@
+# UI Prototype
+
+Generate **several radically different UI variations** on a single route, switchable from a floating bottom bar. The user flips between variants in the browser, picks one (or steals bits from each), then throws the rest away.
+
+If the question is about logic/state rather than what something looks like — wrong branch. Use [LOGIC.md](LOGIC.md).
+
+## When this is the right shape
+
+- "What should this page look like?"
+- "I want to see a few options for this dashboard before committing."
+- "Try a different layout for the settings screen."
+- Any time the user would otherwise spend a day picking between three vague mockups in their head.
+
+## Two sub-shapes — strongly prefer sub-shape A
+
+A UI prototype is much easier to judge when it's **butting up against the rest of the app** — real header, real sidebar, real data, real density. A throwaway route on its own is a vacuum: every variant looks fine in isolation. Default to sub-shape A whenever there's a plausible existing page to host the variants. Only reach for sub-shape B if the prototype genuinely has no nearby home.
+
+### Sub-shape A — adjustment to an existing page (preferred)
+
+The route already exists. Variants are rendered **on the same route**, gated by a `?variant=` URL search param. The existing data fetching, params, and auth all stay — only the rendering swaps. This is the default; pick it unless there's a specific reason not to.
+
+If the prototype is for something that doesn't yet have a page but *would naturally live inside one* (a new section of the dashboard, a new card on the settings screen, a new step in an existing flow) — that's still sub-shape A. Mount the variants inside the host page.
+
+### Sub-shape B — a new page (last resort)
+
+Only use this when the thing being prototyped genuinely has no existing page to live inside — e.g. an entirely new top-level surface, or a flow that can't be embedded anywhere sensible.
+
+Create a **throwaway route** following whatever routing convention the project already uses — don't invent a new top-level structure. Name it so it's obviously a prototype (e.g. include the word `prototype` in the path or filename). Same `?variant=` pattern.
+
+Before committing to sub-shape B, sanity-check: is there really no existing page this could be embedded in? An empty route hides design problems that a populated one would expose.
+
+In both sub-shapes the floating bottom bar is identical.
+
+## Process
+
+### 1. State the question and pick N
+
+Default to **3 variants**. More than 5 stops being radically different and starts being noise — cap there.
+
+Write down the plan in one line, in the prototype's location or a top-of-file comment:
+
+> "Three variants of the settings page, switchable via `?variant=`, on the existing `/settings` route."
+
+This works whether the user is here to push back or not.
+
+### 2. Generate radically different variants
+
+Draft each variant. Hold each one to:
+
+- The page's purpose and the data it has access to.
+- The project's component library / styling system (TailwindCSS, shadcn, MUI, plain CSS, whatever).
+- A clear exported component name, e.g. `VariantA`, `VariantB`, `VariantC`.
+
+Variants must be **structurally different** — different layout, different information hierarchy, different primary affordance, not just different colours. Three slightly-tweaked card grids isn't a UI prototype, it's wallpaper. If two drafts come out too similar, redo one with explicit "do not use a card grid" guidance.
+
+### 3. Wire them together
+
+Create a single switcher component on the route:
+
+```tsx
+// pseudo-code — adapt to the project's framework
+const variant = searchParams.get('variant') ?? 'A';
+return (
+  <>
+    {variant === 'A' && <VariantA {...data} />}
+    {variant === 'B' && <VariantB {...data} />}
+    {variant === 'C' && <VariantC {...data} />}
+    <PrototypeSwitcher variants={['A','B','C']} current={variant} />
+  </>
+);
+```
+
+For sub-shape A (existing page): keep all the existing data fetching above the switcher; only the rendered subtree changes per variant.
+
+For sub-shape B (new page): the throwaway route under `/prototype/<name>` mounts the same switcher.
+
+### 4. Build the floating switcher
+
+A small fixed-position bar at the bottom-centre of the screen with three pieces:
+
+- **Left arrow** — cycles to the previous variant (wraps around).
+- **Variant label** — shows the current variant key and, if the variant exports a name, that name too. e.g. `B — Sidebar layout`.
+- **Right arrow** — cycles forward (wraps around).
+
+Behaviour:
+
+- Clicking an arrow updates the URL search param (use the framework's router — `router.replace` on Next, `navigate` on React Router, etc) so the variant is shareable and reload-stable.
+- Keyboard: `←` and `→` arrow keys also cycle. Don't intercept arrow keys when an `<input>`, `<textarea>`, or `[contenteditable]` is focused.
+- Visually distinct from the page (e.g. high-contrast pill, subtle shadow) so it's obviously not part of the design being evaluated.
+- Hidden in production builds — gate on `process.env.NODE_ENV !== 'production'` or an equivalent check, so a stray prototype merge can't ship the bar to users.
+
+Put the switcher in a single shared component so both sub-shapes can reuse it. Locate it wherever shared UI lives in the project.
+
+### 5. Hand it over
+
+Surface the URL (and the `?variant=` keys). The user will flip through whenever they get to it. The interesting feedback is usually **"I want the header from B with the sidebar from C"** — that's the actual design they want.
+
+### 6. Capture the answer and clean up
+
+Once a variant has won, write down which one and why (commit message, ADR, issue, or a `NOTES.md` next to the prototype if running AFK and the user hasn't responded yet). Then:
+
+- **Sub-shape A** — delete the losing variants and the switcher; fold the winner into the existing page.
+- **Sub-shape B** — promote the winning variant to a real route, delete the throwaway route and the switcher.
+
+Don't leave variant components or the switcher lying around. They rot fast and confuse the next reader.
+
+## Anti-patterns
+
+- **Variants that differ only in colour or copy.** That's a tweak, not a prototype. Real variants disagree about structure.
+- **Sharing too much code between variants.** A shared `<Header>` is fine; a shared `<Layout>` defeats the point. Each variant should be free to throw out the layout.
+- **Wiring variants to real mutations.** Read-only prototypes are fine. If a variant needs to mutate, point it at a stub — the question is "what should this look like", not "does the backend work".
+- **Promoting the prototype directly to production.** The variant code was written under prototype constraints (no tests, minimal error handling). Rewrite it properly when you fold it in.
@@ -0,0 +1,121 @@
+---
+name: setup-matt-pocock-skills
+description: Sets up an `## Agent skills` block in AGENTS.md/CLAUDE.md and `docs/agents/` so the engineering skills know this repo's issue tracker (GitHub or local markdown), triage label vocabulary, and domain doc layout. Run before first use of `to-issues`, `to-prd`, `triage`, `diagnose`, `tdd`, `improve-codebase-architecture`, or `zoom-out` — or if those skills appear to be missing context about the issue tracker, triage labels, or domain docs.
+disable-model-invocation: true
+---
+
+# Setup Matt Pocock's Skills
+
+Scaffold the per-repo configuration that the engineering skills assume:
+
+- **Issue tracker** — where issues live (GitHub by default; local markdown is also supported out of the box)
+- **Triage labels** — the strings used for the five canonical triage roles
+- **Domain docs** — where `CONTEXT.md` and ADRs live, and the consumer rules for reading them
+
+This is a prompt-driven skill, not a deterministic script. Explore, present what you found, confirm with the user, then write.
+
+## Process
+
+### 1. Explore
+
+Look at the current repo to understand its starting state. Read whatever exists; don't assume:
+
+- `git remote -v` and `.git/config` — is this a GitHub repo? Which one?
+- `AGENTS.md` and `CLAUDE.md` at the repo root — does either exist? Is there already an `## Agent skills` section in either?
+- `CONTEXT.md` and `CONTEXT-MAP.md` at the repo root
+- `docs/adr/` and any `src/*/docs/adr/` directories
+- `docs/agents/` — does this skill's prior output already exist?
+- `.scratch/` — sign that a local-markdown issue tracker convention is already in use
+
+### 2. Present findings and ask
+
+Summarise what's present and what's missing. Then walk the user through the three decisions **one at a time** — present a section, get the user's answer, then move to the next. Don't dump all three at once.
+
+Assume the user does not know what these terms mean. Each section starts with a short explainer (what it is, why these skills need it, what changes if they pick differently). Then show the choices and the default.
+
+**Section A — Issue tracker.**
+
+> Explainer: The "issue tracker" is where issues live for this repo. Skills like `to-issues`, `triage`, `to-prd`, and `qa` read from and write to it — they need to know whether to call `gh issue create`, write a markdown file under `.scratch/`, or follow some other workflow you describe. Pick the place you actually track work for this repo.
+
+Default posture: these skills were designed for GitHub. If a `git remote` points at GitHub, propose that. If a `git remote` points at GitLab (`gitlab.com` or a self-hosted host), propose GitLab. Otherwise (or if the user prefers), offer:
+
+- **GitHub** — issues live in the repo's GitHub Issues (uses the `gh` CLI)
+- **GitLab** — issues live in the repo's GitLab Issues (uses the [`glab`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/cli) CLI)
+- **Local markdown** — issues live as files under `.scratch/<feature>/` in this repo (good for solo projects or repos without a remote)
+- **Other** (Jira, Linear, etc.) — ask the user to describe the workflow in one paragraph; the skill will record it as freeform prose
+
+**Section B — Triage label vocabulary.**
+
+> Explainer: When the `triage` skill processes an incoming issue, it moves it through a state machine — needs evaluation, waiting on reporter, ready for an AFK agent to pick up, ready for a human, or won't fix. To do that, it needs to apply labels (or the equivalent in your issue tracker) that match strings *you've actually configured*. If your repo already uses different label names (e.g. `bug:triage` instead of `needs-triage`), map them here so the skill applies the right ones instead of creating duplicates.
+
+The five canonical roles:
+
+- `needs-triage` — maintainer needs to evaluate
+- `needs-info` — waiting on reporter
+- `ready-for-agent` — fully specified, AFK-ready (an agent can pick it up with no human context)
+- `ready-for-human` — needs human implementation
+- `wontfix` — will not be actioned
+
+Default: each role's string equals its name. Ask the user if they want to override any. If their issue tracker has no existing labels, the defaults are fine.
+
+**Section C — Domain docs.**
+
+> Explainer: Some skills (`improve-codebase-architecture`, `diagnose`, `tdd`) read a `CONTEXT.md` file to learn the project's domain language, and `docs/adr/` for past architectural decisions. They need to know whether the repo has one global context or multiple (e.g. a monorepo with separate frontend/backend contexts) so they look in the right place.
+
+Confirm the layout:
+
+- **Single-context** — one `CONTEXT.md` + `docs/adr/` at the repo root. Most repos are this.
+- **Multi-context** — `CONTEXT-MAP.md` at the root pointing to per-context `CONTEXT.md` files (typically a monorepo).
+
+### 3. Confirm and edit
+
+Show the user a draft of:
+
+- The `## Agent skills` block to add to whichever of `CLAUDE.md` / `AGENTS.md` is being edited (see step 4 for selection rules)
+- The contents of `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md`, `docs/agents/triage-labels.md`, `docs/agents/domain.md`
+
+Let them edit before writing.
+
+### 4. Write
+
+**Pick the file to edit:**
+
+- If `CLAUDE.md` exists, edit it.
+- Else if `AGENTS.md` exists, edit it.
+- If neither exists, ask the user which one to create — don't pick for them.
+
+Never create `AGENTS.md` when `CLAUDE.md` already exists (or vice versa) — always edit the one that's already there.
+
+If an `## Agent skills` block already exists in the chosen file, update its contents in-place rather than appending a duplicate. Don't overwrite user edits to the surrounding sections.
+
+The block:
+
+```markdown
+## Agent skills
+
+### Issue tracker
+
+[one-line summary of where issues are tracked]. See `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md`.
+
+### Triage labels
+
+[one-line summary of the label vocabulary]. See `docs/agents/triage-labels.md`.
+
+### Domain docs
+
+[one-line summary of layout — "single-context" or "multi-context"]. See `docs/agents/domain.md`.
+```
+
+Then write the three docs files using the seed templates in this skill folder as a starting point:
+
+- [issue-tracker-github.md](./issue-tracker-github.md) — GitHub issue tracker
+- [issue-tracker-gitlab.md](./issue-tracker-gitlab.md) — GitLab issue tracker
+- [issue-tracker-local.md](./issue-tracker-local.md) — local-markdown issue tracker
+- [triage-labels.md](./triage-labels.md) — label mapping
+- [domain.md](./domain.md) — domain doc consumer rules + layout
+
+For "other" issue trackers, write `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md` from scratch using the user's description.
+
+### 5. Done
+
+Tell the user the setup is complete and which engineering skills will now read from these files. Mention they can edit `docs/agents/*.md` directly later — re-running this skill is only necessary if they want to switch issue trackers or restart from scratch.
@@ -1,6 +1,6 @@
-# Domain Awareness
+# Domain Docs

-Consumer rules for any skill that explores a codebase. Producer rules (writing `CONTEXT.md`, offering ADRs) live in [SKILL.md](./SKILL.md).
+How the engineering skills should consume this repo's domain documentation when exploring the codebase.

 ## Before exploring, read these

@@ -0,0 +1,22 @@
+# Issue tracker: GitHub
+
+Issues and PRDs for this repo live as GitHub issues. Use the `gh` CLI for all operations.
+
+## Conventions
+
+- **Create an issue**: `gh issue create --title "..." --body "..."`. Use a heredoc for multi-line bodies.
+- **Read an issue**: `gh issue view <number> --comments`, filtering comments by `jq` and also fetching labels.
+- **List issues**: `gh issue list --state open --json number,title,body,labels,comments --jq '[.[] | {number, title, body, labels: [.labels[].name], comments: [.comments[].body]}]'` with appropriate `--label` and `--state` filters.
+- **Comment on an issue**: `gh issue comment <number> --body "..."`
+- **Apply / remove labels**: `gh issue edit <number> --add-label "..."` / `--remove-label "..."`
+- **Close**: `gh issue close <number> --comment "..."`
+
+Infer the repo from `git remote -v` — `gh` does this automatically when run inside a clone.
+
+## When a skill says "publish to the issue tracker"
+
+Create a GitHub issue.
+
+## When a skill says "fetch the relevant ticket"
+
+Run `gh issue view <number> --comments`.
@@ -0,0 +1,23 @@
+# Issue tracker: GitLab
+
+Issues and PRDs for this repo live as GitLab issues. Use the [`glab`](https://gitlab.com/gitlab-org/cli) CLI for all operations.
+
+## Conventions
+
+- **Create an issue**: `glab issue create --title "..." --description "..."`. Use a heredoc for multi-line descriptions. Pass `--description -` to open an editor.
+- **Read an issue**: `glab issue view <number> --comments`. Use `-F json` for machine-readable output.
+- **List issues**: `glab issue list -F json` with appropriate `--label` filters.
+- **Comment on an issue**: `glab issue note <number> --message "..."`. GitLab calls comments "notes".
+- **Apply / remove labels**: `glab issue update <number> --label "..."` / `--unlabel "..."`. Multiple labels can be comma-separated or by repeating the flag.
+- **Close**: `glab issue close <number>`. `glab issue close` does not accept a closing comment, so post the explanation first with `glab issue note <number> --message "..."`, then close.
+- **Merge requests**: GitLab calls PRs "merge requests". Use `glab mr create`, `glab mr view`, `glab mr note`, etc. — the same shape as `gh pr ...` with `mr` in place of `pr` and `note`/`--message` in place of `comment`/`--body`.
+
+Infer the repo from `git remote -v` — `glab` does this automatically when run inside a clone.
+
+## When a skill says "publish to the issue tracker"
+
+Create a GitLab issue.
+
+## When a skill says "fetch the relevant ticket"
+
+Run `glab issue view <number> --comments`.
@@ -0,0 +1,19 @@
+# Issue tracker: Local Markdown
+
+Issues and PRDs for this repo live as markdown files in `.scratch/`.
+
+## Conventions
+
+- One feature per directory: `.scratch/<feature-slug>/`
+- The PRD is `.scratch/<feature-slug>/PRD.md`
+- Implementation issues are `.scratch/<feature-slug>/issues/<NN>-<slug>.md`, numbered from `01`
+- Triage state is recorded as a `Status:` line near the top of each issue file (see `triage-labels.md` for the role strings)
+- Comments and conversation history append to the bottom of the file under a `## Comments` heading
+
+## When a skill says "publish to the issue tracker"
+
+Create a new file under `.scratch/<feature-slug>/` (creating the directory if needed).
+
+## When a skill says "fetch the relevant ticket"
+
+Read the file at the referenced path. The user will normally pass the path or the issue number directly.
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+# Triage Labels
+
+The skills speak in terms of five canonical triage roles. This file maps those roles to the actual label strings used in this repo's issue tracker.
+
+| Label in mattpocock/skills | Label in our tracker | Meaning                                  |
+| -------------------------- | -------------------- | ---------------------------------------- |
+| `needs-triage`             | `needs-triage`       | Maintainer needs to evaluate this issue  |
+| `needs-info`               | `needs-info`         | Waiting on reporter for more information |
+| `ready-for-agent`          | `ready-for-agent`    | Fully specified, ready for an AFK agent  |
+| `ready-for-human`          | `ready-for-human`    | Requires human implementation            |
+| `wontfix`                  | `wontfix`            | Will not be actioned                     |
+
+When a skill mentions a role (e.g. "apply the AFK-ready triage label"), use the corresponding label string from this table.
+
+Edit the right-hand column to match whatever vocabulary you actually use.
@@ -44,7 +44,7 @@ RIGHT (vertical):

 ### 1. Planning

-Before exploring the codebase, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md). Test names and interface vocabulary should match the project's `CONTEXT.md`.
+When exploring the codebase, use the project's domain glossary so that test names and interface vocabulary match the project's language, and respect ADRs in the area you're touching.

 Before writing any code:

@@ -1,21 +1,23 @@
 ---
 name: to-issues
-description: Break a plan, spec, or PRD into independently-grabbable GitHub issues using tracer-bullet vertical slices. Use when user wants to convert a plan into issues, create implementation tickets, or break down work into issues.
+description: Break a plan, spec, or PRD into independently-grabbable issues on the project issue tracker using tracer-bullet vertical slices. Use when user wants to convert a plan into issues, create implementation tickets, or break down work into issues.
 ---

 # To Issues

-Break a plan into independently-grabbable GitHub issues using vertical slices (tracer bullets).
+Break a plan into independently-grabbable issues using vertical slices (tracer bullets).
+
+The issue tracker and triage label vocabulary should have been provided to you — run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` if not.

 ## Process

 ### 1. Gather context

-Work from whatever is already in the conversation context. If the user passes a GitHub issue number or URL as an argument, fetch it with `gh issue view <number>` (with comments).
+Work from whatever is already in the conversation context. If the user passes an issue reference (issue number, URL, or path) as an argument, fetch it from the issue tracker and read its full body and comments.

 ### 2. Explore the codebase (optional)

-If you have not already explored the codebase, do so to understand the current state of the code. Before exploring, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md). Issue titles and descriptions should use the project's `CONTEXT.md` vocabulary.
+If you have not already explored the codebase, do so to understand the current state of the code. Issue titles and descriptions should use the project's domain glossary vocabulary, and respect ADRs in the area you're touching.

 ### 3. Draft vertical slices

@@ -47,21 +49,23 @@ Ask the user:

 Iterate until the user approves the breakdown.

-### 5. Create the GitHub issues
+### 5. Publish the issues to the issue tracker

-For each approved slice, create a GitHub issue using `gh issue create`. Use the issue body template below.
+For each approved slice, publish a new issue to the issue tracker. Use the issue body template below. These issues are considered ready for AFK agents, so publish them with the correct triage label unless instructed otherwise.

-Create issues in dependency order (blockers first) so you can reference real issue numbers in the "Blocked by" field.
+Publish issues in dependency order (blockers first) so you can reference real issue identifiers in the "Blocked by" field.

 <issue-template>
 ## Parent

-#<parent-issue-number> (if the source was a GitHub issue, otherwise omit this section)
+A reference to the parent issue on the issue tracker (if the source was an existing issue, otherwise omit this section).

 ## What to build

 A concise description of this vertical slice. Describe the end-to-end behavior, not layer-by-layer implementation.

+Avoid specific file paths or code snippets — they go stale fast. Exception: if a prototype produced a snippet that encodes a decision more precisely than prose can (state machine, reducer, schema, type shape), inline it here and note briefly that it came from a prototype. Trim to the decision-rich parts — not a working demo, just the important bits.
+
 ## Acceptance criteria

 - [ ] Criterion 1
@@ -70,7 +74,7 @@ A concise description of this vertical slice. Describe the end-to-end behavior,

 ## Blocked by

- Blocked by #<issue-number> (if any)
+- A reference to the blocking ticket (if any)

 Or "None - can start immediately" if no blockers.

@@ -1,21 +1,21 @@
 ---
 name: to-prd
-description: Turn the current conversation context into a PRD and submit it as a GitHub issue. Use when user wants to create a PRD from the current context.
+description: Turn the current conversation context into a PRD and publish it to the project issue tracker. Use when user wants to create a PRD from the current context.
 ---

 This skill takes the current conversation context and codebase understanding and produces a PRD. Do NOT interview the user — just synthesize what you already know.

+The issue tracker and triage label vocabulary should have been provided to you — run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` if not.
+
 ## Process

-1. Explore the repo to understand the current state of the codebase, if you haven't already. Before exploring, follow [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md). Use the project's `CONTEXT.md` vocabulary throughout the PRD.
+1. Explore the repo to understand the current state of the codebase, if you haven't already. Use the project's domain glossary vocabulary throughout the PRD, and respect any ADRs in the area you're touching.

-2. Sketch out the major modules you will need to build or modify to complete the implementation. Actively look for opportunities to extract deep modules that can be tested in isolation.
+2. Sketch out the seams at which you're going to test the feature. Existing seams should be preferred to new ones. Use the highest seam possible. If new seams are needed, propose them at the highest point you can.

-A deep module (as opposed to a shallow module) is one which encapsulates a lot of functionality in a simple, testable interface which rarely changes.
+Check with the user that these seams match their expectations.

-Check with the user that these modules match their expectations. Check with the user which modules they want tests written for.
-
-3. Write the PRD using the template below and submit it as a GitHub issue.
+3. Write the PRD using the template below, then publish it to the project issue tracker. Apply the `ready-for-agent` triage label - no need for additional triage.

 <prd-template>

@@ -53,6 +53,8 @@ A list of implementation decisions that were made. This can include:

 Do NOT include specific file paths or code snippets. They may end up being outdated very quickly.

+Exception: if a prototype produced a snippet that encodes a decision more precisely than prose can (state machine, reducer, schema, type shape), inline it within the relevant decision and note briefly that it came from a prototype. Trim to the decision-rich parts — not a working demo, just the important bits.
+
 ## Testing Decisions

 A list of testing decisions that were made. Include:
@@ -0,0 +1,103 @@
+---
+name: triage
+description: Triage issues through a state machine driven by triage roles. Use when user wants to create an issue, triage issues, review incoming bugs or feature requests, prepare issues for an AFK agent, or manage issue workflow.
+---
+
+# Triage
+
+Move issues on the project issue tracker through a small state machine of triage roles.
+
+Every comment or issue posted to the issue tracker during triage **must** start with this disclaimer:
+
+```
+> *This was generated by AI during triage.*
+```
+
+## Reference docs
+
+- [AGENT-BRIEF.md](AGENT-BRIEF.md) — how to write durable agent briefs
+- [OUT-OF-SCOPE.md](OUT-OF-SCOPE.md) — how the `.out-of-scope/` knowledge base works
+
+## Roles
+
+Two **category** roles:
+
+- `bug` — something is broken
+- `enhancement` — new feature or improvement
+
+Five **state** roles:
+
+- `needs-triage` — maintainer needs to evaluate
+- `needs-info` — waiting on reporter for more information
+- `ready-for-agent` — fully specified, ready for an AFK agent
+- `ready-for-human` — needs human implementation
+- `wontfix` — will not be actioned
+
+Every triaged issue should carry exactly one category role and one state role. If state roles conflict, flag it and ask the maintainer before doing anything else.
+
+These are canonical role names — the actual label strings used in the issue tracker may differ. The mapping should have been provided to you - run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` if not.
+
+State transitions: an unlabeled issue normally goes to `needs-triage` first; from there it moves to `needs-info`, `ready-for-agent`, `ready-for-human`, or `wontfix`. `needs-info` returns to `needs-triage` once the reporter replies. The maintainer can override at any time — flag transitions that look unusual and ask before proceeding.
+
+## Invocation
+
+The maintainer invokes `/triage` and describes what they want in natural language. Interpret the request and act. Examples:
+
+- "Show me anything that needs my attention"
+- "Let's look at #42"
+- "Move #42 to ready-for-agent"
+- "What's ready for agents to pick up?"
+
+## Show what needs attention
+
+Query the issue tracker and present three buckets, oldest first:
+
+1. **Unlabeled** — never triaged.
+2. **`needs-triage`** — evaluation in progress.
+3. **`needs-info` with reporter activity since the last triage notes** — needs re-evaluation.
+
+Show counts and a one-line summary per issue. Let the maintainer pick.
+
+## Triage a specific issue
+
+1. **Gather context.** Read the full issue (body, comments, labels, reporter, dates). Parse any prior triage notes so you don't re-ask resolved questions. Explore the codebase using the project's domain glossary, respecting ADRs in the area. Read `.out-of-scope/*.md` and surface any prior rejection that resembles this issue.
+
+2. **Recommend.** Tell the maintainer your category and state recommendation with reasoning, plus a brief codebase summary relevant to the issue. Wait for direction.
+
+3. **Reproduce (bugs only).** Before any grilling, attempt reproduction: read the reporter's steps, trace the relevant code, run tests or commands. Report what happened — successful repro with code path, failed repro, or insufficient detail (a strong `needs-info` signal). A confirmed repro makes a much stronger agent brief.
+
+4. **Grill (if needed).** If the issue needs fleshing out, run a `/grill-with-docs` session.
+
+5. **Apply the outcome:**
+   - `ready-for-agent` — post an agent brief comment ([AGENT-BRIEF.md](AGENT-BRIEF.md)).
+   - `ready-for-human` — same structure as an agent brief, but note why it can't be delegated (judgment calls, external access, design decisions, manual testing).
+   - `needs-info` — post triage notes (template below).
+   - `wontfix` (bug) — polite explanation, then close.
+   - `wontfix` (enhancement) — write to `.out-of-scope/`, link to it from a comment, then close ([OUT-OF-SCOPE.md](OUT-OF-SCOPE.md)).
+   - `needs-triage` — apply the role. Optional comment if there's partial progress.
+
+## Quick state override
+
+If the maintainer says "move #42 to ready-for-agent", trust them and apply the role directly. Confirm what you're about to do (role changes, comment, close), then act. Skip grilling. If moving to `ready-for-agent` without a grilling session, ask whether they want to write an agent brief.
+
+## Needs-info template
+
+```markdown
+## Triage Notes
+
+**What we've established so far:**
+
+- point 1
+- point 2
+
+**What we still need from you (@reporter):**
+
+- question 1
+- question 2
+```
+
+Capture everything resolved during grilling under "established so far" so the work isn't lost. Questions must be specific and actionable, not "please provide more info".
+
+## Resuming a previous session
+
+If prior triage notes exist on the issue, read them, check whether the reporter has answered any outstanding questions, and present an updated picture before continuing. Don't re-ask resolved questions.
@@ -4,6 +4,4 @@ description: Tell the agent to zoom out and give broader context or a higher-lev
 disable-model-invocation: true
 ---

-I don't know this area of code well. Go up a layer of abstraction. Give me a map of all the relevant modules and callers, using the language in `CONTEXT.md`.
-
-Use [../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md](../grill-with-docs/DOMAIN-AWARENESS.md) as a reference for how to use `CONTEXT.md`.
+I don't know this area of code well. Go up a layer of abstraction. Give me a map of all the relevant modules and callers, using the project's domain glossary vocabulary.
@@ -0,0 +1,8 @@
+# In Progress
+
+Skills that are still being developed. They're not ready to ship — expect rough edges, breaking changes, and abandoned experiments. They're excluded from the plugin and the top-level README until they graduate to a stable bucket.
+
+- **[review](./review/SKILL.md)** — Review changes since a fixed point along two parallel axes: **Standards** (does the diff follow the repo's coding standards?) and **Spec** (does the diff faithfully implement the originating issue/PRD?).
+- **[writing-beats](./writing-beats/SKILL.md)** — Shape an article as a journey of beats, choose-your-own-adventure style. Pick a starting beat, write only that beat, then pivot to the next, until the article reaches a natural end.
+- **[writing-fragments](./writing-fragments/SKILL.md)** — Grilling session that mines you for fragments — heterogeneous nuggets of writing — and appends them to a single document as raw material for a future article.
+- **[writing-shape](./writing-shape/SKILL.md)** — Take a markdown file of raw material and shape it into an article paragraph by paragraph, arguing format choices at each step.
@@ -0,0 +1,78 @@
+---
+name: review
+description: Review the changes since a fixed point (commit, branch, tag, or merge-base) along two axes — Standards (does the code follow this repo's documented coding standards?) and Spec (does the code match what the originating issue/PRD asked for?). Runs both reviews in parallel sub-agents and reports them side by side. Use when the user wants to review a branch, a PR, work-in-progress changes, or asks to "review since X".
+---
+
+# Review
+
+Two-axis review of the diff between `HEAD` and a fixed point the user supplies:
+
+- **Standards** — does the code conform to this repo's documented coding standards?
+- **Spec** — does the code faithfully implement the originating issue / PRD / spec?
+
+Both axes run as **parallel sub-agents** so they don't pollute each other's context, then this skill aggregates their findings.
+
+The issue tracker should have been provided to you — run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` if `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md` is missing.
+
+## Process
+
+### 1. Pin the fixed point
+
+Whatever the user said is the fixed point — a commit SHA, branch name, tag, `main`, `HEAD~5`, etc. Don't be opinionated; pass it through. If they didn't specify one, ask: "Review against what — a branch, a commit, or `main`?" Don't proceed until you have it.
+
+Capture the diff command once: `git diff <fixed-point>...HEAD` (three-dot, so the comparison is against the merge-base). Also note the list of commits via `git log <fixed-point>..HEAD --oneline`.
+
+### 2. Identify the spec source
+
+Look for the originating spec, in this order:
+
+1. Issue references in the commit messages (`#123`, `Closes #45`, GitLab `!67`, etc.) — fetch via the workflow in `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md`.
+2. A path the user passed as an argument.
+3. A PRD/spec file under `docs/`, `specs/`, or `.scratch/` matching the branch name or feature.
+4. If nothing is found, ask the user where the spec is. If they say there isn't one, the **Spec** sub-agent will skip and report "no spec available".
+
+### 3. Identify the standards sources
+
+Anything in the repo that documents how code should be written. Common locations:
+
+- `CLAUDE.md`, `AGENTS.md`
+- `CONTRIBUTING.md`
+- `CONTEXT.md`, `CONTEXT-MAP.md`, per-context `CONTEXT.md` files
+- `docs/adr/` (architectural decisions are standards)
+- `.editorconfig`, `eslint.config.*`, `biome.json`, `prettier.config.*`, `tsconfig.json` (machine-enforced standards — note them but don't re-check what tooling already checks)
+- Any `STYLE.md`, `STANDARDS.md`, `STYLEGUIDE.md`, or similar at the repo root or under `docs/`
+
+Collect the list of files. The **Standards** sub-agent will read them.
+
+### 4. Spawn both sub-agents in parallel
+
+Send a single message with two `Agent` tool calls. Use the `general-purpose` subagent for both.
+
+**Standards sub-agent prompt** — include:
+
+- The full diff command and commit list.
+- The list of standards-source files you found in step 3.
+- The brief: "Read the standards docs. Then read the diff. Report — per file/hunk where relevant — every place the diff violates a documented standard. Cite the standard (file + the rule). Distinguish hard violations from judgement calls. Skip anything tooling enforces. Under 400 words."
+
+**Spec sub-agent prompt** — include:
+
+- The diff command and commit list.
+- The path or fetched contents of the spec.
+- The brief: "Read the spec. Then read the diff. Report: (a) requirements the spec asked for that are missing or partial; (b) behaviour in the diff that wasn't asked for (scope creep); (c) requirements that look implemented but where the implementation looks wrong. Quote the spec line for each finding. Under 400 words."
+
+If the spec is missing, skip the Spec sub-agent and note this in the final report.
+
+### 5. Aggregate
+
+Present the two reports under `## Standards` and `## Spec` headings, verbatim or lightly cleaned. Do **not** merge or rerank findings — the two axes are deliberately separate so the user can see them independently.
+
+End with a one-line summary: total findings per axis, and the worst single issue (if any) flagged.
+
+## Why two axes
+
+A change can pass one axis and fail the other:
+
+- Code that follows every standard but implements the wrong thing → **Standards pass, Spec fail.**
+- Code that does exactly what the issue asked but breaks the project's conventions → **Spec pass, Standards fail.**
+
+Reporting them separately stops one axis from masking the other.
@@ -0,0 +1,35 @@
+# GLOSSARY.md Format
+
+`GLOSSARY.md` is the canonical language for this teaching workspace. All explainers, exercises, and learning records should adhere to its terminology. Building it is itself part of learning: compressing a concept into a tight definition is evidence the user understands it.
+
+## Structure
+
+```md
+# {Topic} Glossary
+
+{One or two sentence description of the topic this glossary covers.}
+
+## Terms
+
+**Hypertrophy**:
+Muscle growth driven by mechanical tension and metabolic stress over repeated training sessions.
+_Avoid_: Bulking, getting big
+
+**Progressive overload**:
+Systematically increasing the demand on a muscle over time — via load, volume, or intensity.
+_Avoid_: Pushing harder, levelling up
+
+**RPE (Rate of Perceived Exertion)**:
+A 1–10 self-rating of how hard a set felt, where 10 is failure and 8 means two reps left in the tank.
+_Avoid_: Effort score, intensity rating
+```
+
+## Rules
+
+- **Add a term only when the user understands it.** The glossary is a record of compressed knowledge, not a dictionary the user reads to learn. If the user has just been introduced to a concept, wait until they can use it correctly before promoting it here.
+- **Be opinionated.** When several words exist for the same concept, pick the best one and list the rest as aliases to avoid. This is how language compresses.
+- **Keep definitions tight.** One or two sentences. Define what the term IS, not what it does or how to do it.
+- **Use the glossary's own terms inside definitions.** Once a term is in the glossary, prefer it everywhere — including inside other definitions. This is what makes complex terms easier to grasp later.
+- **Group under subheadings** when natural clusters emerge (e.g. `## Anatomy`, `## Programming`). A flat list is fine when terms cohere.
+- **Flag ambiguities explicitly.** If a term is used loosely in the wider field, note the resolution: "In this workspace, 'set' always means a working set — warm-ups are tracked separately."
+- **Revise as understanding deepens.** A definition the user wrote in week one may be wrong by week six. Update in place; do not leave stale entries.
@@ -0,0 +1,46 @@
+# Learning Record Format
+
+Learning records live in `./learning-records/` and use sequential numbering: `0001-slug.md`, `0002-slug.md`, etc. Create the directory lazily — only when the first record is written.
+
+They are the teaching equivalent of ADRs: they capture non-obvious lessons, key insights, and stated prior knowledge that will steer future sessions. They are used to calculate the zone of proximal development.
+
+## Template
+
+```md
+# {Short title of what was learned or established}
+
+{1-3 sentences: what was learned (or what prior knowledge was established), and why it matters for future sessions.}
+```
+
+That is the whole format. A learning record can be a single paragraph. The value is recording _that_ this is now known and _why_ it changes what to teach next — not in filling out sections.
+
+## Optional sections
+
+Only include these when they add genuine value. Most records won't need them.
+
+- **Status** frontmatter (`active | superseded by LR-NNNN`) — useful when an earlier understanding turns out to be wrong and is replaced.
+- **Evidence** — how the user demonstrated the understanding (a question answered, an exercise completed, prior experience cited). Useful when the claim might be revisited.
+- **Implications** — what this unlocks or rules out for future sessions. Worth recording when non-obvious.
+
+## Numbering
+
+Scan `./learning-records/` for the highest existing number and increment by one.
+
+## When to write a learning record
+
+Write one when any of these is true:
+
+1. **The user demonstrated genuine understanding of something non-trivial** — not just exposure, but evidence they can use the concept correctly. This sets a new floor for what to teach next.
+2. **The user disclosed prior knowledge** — "I already know X." Record it so future sessions don't re-teach it. Also record the _depth_ claimed.
+3. **A misconception was corrected** — the user previously believed something wrong and now sees why. These are high-value: they predict future stumbling blocks for related topics.
+4. **The mission shifted in response to learning** — the user discovered they cared about something different than they thought. Cross-link to [[MISSION.md]] and update it.
+
+### What does _not_ qualify
+
+- Material that was merely covered. Coverage is not learning. Wait for evidence.
+- Anything already captured tersely in [[GLOSSARY.md]] as a term definition. Don't duplicate.
+- Session-by-session activity logs. Learning records are not a journal — they are decision-grade insights.
+
+## Supersession
+
+When a later record contradicts an earlier one (the user's understanding deepened or corrected), mark the old record `Status: superseded by LR-NNNN` rather than deleting it. The history of how understanding evolved is itself useful signal.
@@ -0,0 +1,31 @@
+# MISSION.md Format
+
+`MISSION.md` lives at the workspace root. It captures the _reason_ the user is learning this topic. Every teaching decision — what to teach next, which resources to surface, which exercises to design — should trace back to this document.
+
+## Template
+
+```md
+# Mission: {Topic}
+
+## Why
+{1-3 sentences. The concrete real-world goal the user is chasing. What changes in their life or work when they have this skill? Avoid abstract framings like "to understand X" — push for the underlying outcome.}
+
+## Success looks like
+- {A specific, observable thing the user will be able to do}
+- {Another specific thing}
+- {…}
+
+## Constraints
+- {Time, budget, prior commitments, learning preferences, anything that bounds the approach}
+
+## Out of scope
+- {Adjacent topics the user explicitly does not want to chase right now — protects the zone of proximal development}
+```
+
+## Rules
+
+- **One mission per workspace.** If the user wants to learn two unrelated things, that is two workspaces.
+- **Concrete over abstract.** "Run a half marathon by October" beats "get fitter." "Ship a Rust CLI to my team" beats "learn Rust."
+- **Push back on vagueness.** If the user cannot articulate why, interview them before writing anything. A bad mission is worse than no mission.
+- **Revise when reality shifts.** Missions change. When the user's goal moves, update this file — don't leave a stale mission steering future sessions.
+- **Keep it short.** If `MISSION.md` runs past a screen, it has stopped being a compass and started being a plan.
@@ -0,0 +1,32 @@
+# RESOURCES.md Format
+
+`RESOURCES.md` is the curated set of trusted sources for this topic. Knowledge for explainers should be drawn from here, not from parametric guesses. Wisdom comes from the communities listed here.
+
+## Structure
+
+```md
+# {Topic} Resources
+
+## Knowledge
+
+- [Book: _The Science and Practice of Strength Training_ — Zatsiorsky & Kraemer](https://example.com)
+  Foundational text on programming and adaptation. Use for: anything to do with periodisation, recovery, intensity zones.
+- [Article: "How Much Should I Train?" — Greg Nuckols (Stronger By Science)](https://example.com)
+  Evidence-based review of volume landmarks. Use for: weekly set targets per muscle group.
+
+## Wisdom (Communities)
+
+- [r/weightroom](https://reddit.com/r/weightroom)
+  High-signal subreddit, moderated against bro-science. Use for: programme critique, plateau troubleshooting.
+- Local: Tuesday strength class at {gym name}
+  Use for: real-time coaching feedback on lifts.
+```
+
+## Rules
+
+- **High-trust only.** Prefer primary sources, recognised experts, peer-reviewed work, and communities with strong moderation. If a resource is marketing dressed as education, leave it out.
+- **Annotate every entry.** A bare link is useless in three months. Add one line: what it covers and when to reach for it.
+- **Group by Knowledge / Wisdom.** Mirrors the philosophy in [SKILL.md](./SKILL.md). It is fine for a resource to appear in only one group.
+- **Surface gaps explicitly.** If no good resource exists for an area the mission needs, write a `## Gaps` section listing what is missing. This drives future search.
+- **Prune ruthlessly.** A resource that turned out to be wrong, shallow, or off-mission should be removed, not buried. Better five sharp sources than thirty mediocre ones.
+- **Record community preferences.** If the user has opted out of joining communities, note it here so future sessions don't keep proposing them.
@@ -0,0 +1,109 @@
+---
+name: teach
+description: Teach the user a new skill or concept, within this workspace.
+disable-model-invocation: true
+argument-hint: "What would you like to learn about?"
+---
+
+The user has asked you to teach them something. This is a stateful request - they intend to learn the topic over multiple sessions.
+
+## Teaching Workspace
+
+Treat the current directory as a teaching workspace. The state of their learning is captured in this directory in several files:
+
+- `MISSION.md`: A document capturing the _reason_ the user is interested in the topic. This should be used to ground all teaching. Use the format in [MISSION-FORMAT.md](./MISSION-FORMAT.md).
+- `./reference/*.html`: A directory of reference materials. These are the compressed learnings from the lessons - cheat sheets, reference algorithms, syntax, yoga poses, glossaries. They are the raw units of learning. They should be beautiful documents which print out well, and are designed for quick reference.
+- `RESOURCES.md`: A list of resources which can be explored to ground your teaching in contextual knowledge, or to acquire knowledge and wisdom. Use the format in [RESOURCES-FORMAT.md](./RESOURCES-FORMAT.md).
+- `./learning-records/*.md`: A directory of learning records, which capture what the user has learned. These are loosely equivalent to architectural decision records in software development - they capture non-obvious lessons and key insights that may need to be revised later, or drive future sessions. These should be used to calculate the zone of proximal development. They are titled `0001-<dash-case-name>.md`, where the number increments each time. Use the format in [LEARNING-RECORD-FORMAT.md](./LEARNING-RECORD-FORMAT.md).
+- `./lessons/*.html`: A directory of lessons. A **lesson** is a single, self-contained HTML output that teaches one tightly-scoped thing tied to the mission. This is the primary unit of teaching in this workspace.
+- `NOTES.md`: A scratchpad for you to jot down user preferences, or working notes.
+
+## Philosophy
+
+To learn at a deep level, the user needs three things:
+
+- **Knowledge**, captured from high-quality, high-trust resources
+- **Skills**, acquired through highly-relevant interactive lessons devised by you, based on the knowledge
+- **Wisdom**, which comes from interacting with other learners and practitioners
+
+Before the `RESOURCES.md` is well-populated, your focus should be to find high-quality resources which will help the user acquire knowledge. Never trust your parametric knowledge.
+
+Some topics may require more skills than knowledge. Learning more about theoretical physics might be more knowledge-based. For yoga, more skills-based.
+
+## Lessons
+
+A lesson is the main thing you produce — the unit in which knowledge and skills reach the user. Each lesson is one self-contained HTML file, saved to `./lessons/` and titled `0001-<dash-case-name>.html` where the number increments each time.
+
+A lesson should be **beautiful** — clean, readable typography and layout — since the user will return to these later to review.
+
+The lesson should teach ONE THING only. It should be completable very quickly - but give the user a tangible win that they can build on. It should be directly tied to the mission, and should be in the user's zone of proximal development.
+
+Make opening a lesson as easy as possible — ideally a single CLI command the user can run to open the HTML file in their browser.
+
+## The Mission
+
+Every lesson should be tied into the mission - the reason that the user is interested in learning about the topic.
+
+If the user is unclear about the mission, or the `MISSION.md` is not populated, your first job should be to question the user on why they want to learn this.
+
+Failing to understand the mission will mean knowledge acquisition is not grounded in real-world goals. Lessons will feel too abstract. You will have no way of judging what the user should do next.
+
+## Zone Of Proximal Development
+
+Each lesson, the learner should always feel as if they are being challenged 'just enough'.
+
+The user may specify an exact thing they want to learn. If they don't, figure out their zone of proximal development by:
+
+- Reading their `learning-records`
+- Figuring out the right thing to teach them based on their mission
+- Teach the most relevant thing that fits in their zone of proximal development
+
+A user may tell you that they already know about that topic. If so, record it in their `learning-records`.
+
+## Acquiring Knowledge & Skills
+
+Lessons should be designed around a skill the user is going to learn. The knowledge in the lesson should be only what's required to acquire that skill. You teach the knowledge first, then get the user to practice the skills via an interactive feedback loop.
+
+Knowledge should first be gathered from trusted resources. Use `RESOURCES.md` to keep track of them. Lessons should be littered with citations - links to external resources to back up any claim made. This increases the trustworthiness of the lesson, and gives the user a path to acquire more knowledge if they want to go deeper.
+
+Each lesson should contain a reminder to ask followup questions to the agent. The agent is their teacher, and can assist with anything that's unclear.
+
+### Skills
+
+Skills should be taught through interactive lessons. There are several tools at your disposal:
+
+- Interactive lessons, using quizzes and light in-browser tasks
+- Lessons which guide the user through a list of real-world steps to take (for instance, yoga poses)
+- In-agent quizzes, where you ask the user scenario-based questions about what they've learned
+
+Each of these should be based on a **feedback loop**, where the user receives feedback on their performance. This feedback loop should be as tight as possible, giving feedback immediately - and ideally automatically.
+
+## Acquiring Wisdom
+
+Wisdom comes from true real-world interaction - testing your skills outside the learning environment.
+
+When the user asks a question that appears to require wisdom, your default posture should be to attempt to answer - but to ultimately delegate to a **community**.
+
+A community is a place (online or offline) where the user can test their skills in the real world. This might be a forum, a subreddit, a real-world class (budget permitting) or a local interest group.
+
+You should attempt to find high-reputation communities the user can join. If the user expresses a preference that they don't want to join a community, respect it.
+
+## Reference Documents
+
+While creating lessons, you should also create reference documents. Lessons can reference these documents - they are useful for tracking raw units of knowledge useful across lessons.
+
+Lessons will rarely be revisited later - reference documents will be. They should be the compressed essence of the lesson, in a format designed for quick reference.
+
+Some learning topics lend themselves to reference:
+
+- Syntax and code snippets for programming
+- Algorithms and flowcharts for processes
+- Yoga poses and sequences for yoga
+- Exercises and routines for fitness
+- Glossaries for any topic with its own nomenclature
+
+Glossaries, in particular, are an essential reference. Once one is created, it should be adhered to in every lesson.
+
+## `NOTES.md`
+
+The user will sometimes express preferences of how they want to be taught, or things you should keep in mind. This is the place to record those preferences, so you can refer back to them when designing lessons or working with the user.
@@ -0,0 +1,52 @@
+---
+name: writing-beats
+description: Shape an article as a journey of beats, choose-your-own-adventure style. The user picks a starting beat from the raw material, you write only that beat, then offer options for where to pivot next, beat by beat, until the article reaches a natural end. Use when the user has raw material and wants to assemble it as a narrative rather than an argument.
+---
+
+<what-to-do>
+
+The user has passed (or will pass) a markdown file of raw material.
+
+If the user did not say where to save the article, ask once and remember the path.
+
+Then run a beat-by-beat journey:
+
+1. Write 2–3 candidate **starting beats**, drawn from the raw material. Each is a different entry point into the article. Show the user the beats before writing it to the article file. The user picks one. Preview what beats that might lead to once written - as if the user is seeing a little way down the path.
+2. Once the user picks a starting beat, write **only that beat** to the article file. A beat may be one sentence or several paragraphs — whatever that beat naturally is. Stop there.
+3. Re-read the article file from disk. Then offer 2–3 candidate **next beats** — different directions the journey could pivot to from where the article now stands.
+4. Loop steps 2–4 until the article reaches a natural end.
+
+</what-to-do>
+
+<supporting-info>
+
+## What is a beat
+
+A beat is one move in the journey. It does one thing — sets a scene, lands a point, asks a question, drops an aside, twists the angle. Then it stops, leaving the reader at a place where the next beat can pivot.
+
+A beat is sized by what it needs:
+
+- A single sentence if that's all the move is ("And then nothing happened for three weeks.").
+- A short paragraph if the move needs setup.
+- Multiple paragraphs if the beat is a self-contained vignette, argument, or example.
+
+If a "beat" needs five paragraphs and three subheadings, it's not a beat — it's two beats glued together. Split it.
+
+## Writing one beat
+
+Once a beat is picked, write _that beat only_ to the article file. Do not write the next beat.
+
+Pull material from the raw pile to populate the beat. You can paraphrase, split, recombine, or quote. The pile is a quarry.
+
+## Ending the journey
+
+The article ends when the journey is complete — not when the pile is empty. Most piles will have leftover fragments that don't make it in. That is fine; that is the point of having more raw material than you need.
+
+## Writing rhythm
+
+- Append one beat at a time. Never write ahead.
+- Re-read the article file from disk before every write. Preserve user edits absolutely.
+- If the user edits a previous beat substantially, let it change what comes next.
+- If the user says "rewrite that beat" or "go back and try a different beat 3", do it — edit in place, leave the rest alone.
+
+</supporting-info>
@@ -0,0 +1,75 @@
+---
+name: writing-fragments
+description: Grilling session that mines the user for fragments — heterogeneous nuggets of writing (claims, vignettes, sharp sentences, half-thoughts) — and appends them to a single document as raw material for a future article. Use when the user wants to develop ideas before imposing structure, or mentions "fragments", "ideate", or "raw material" for writing.
+---
+
+<what-to-do>
+
+Run a grilling session that produces fragments. Interview the user relentlessly about whatever they want to write about. Do not impose phases, outlines, or structure — that is explicitly out of scope.
+
+As fragments emerge from either side of the conversation, append them to a single markdown file. The user will be editing this file during the session; always re-read it before writing so their edits are preserved.
+
+If the user did not pass a path, ask once where to save the document, then remember it for the rest of the session.
+
+Capture fragments from the very first thing the user says, including the initial prompt.
+
+On first write, put a single H1 at the top with a working title (it can change later) and nothing else — no metadata, no TOC, no date.
+
+</what-to-do>
+
+<supporting-info>
+
+## What is a fragment
+
+A fragment is any piece of text that might survive into the final article. It must be _readable by the author_ — the author can tell what it means — but it does not need to define its terms or be comprehensible to a cold reader. The bar is "is this a piece of good writing?", not "is this a self-contained argument?"
+
+Fragments are deliberately heterogeneous. Examples of what could be a fragment:
+
+- A sharp sentence you'd want to deploy somewhere but don't yet know where.
+- A claim with a one-line justification.
+- A vignette: a thing that happened, a code snippet, a scenario, an analogy.
+- A half-thought: "something about how X feels like Y, work this out later."
+- A quote, a piece of dialogue, an overheard line.
+- A list of related observations that hang together by feel.
+- A complaint, a confession, a punchline.
+
+The novelist's diary is the model: years of unstructured noticings that later get mined for raw material. Fragments are noticings.
+
+## File format
+
+```markdown
+# Working title
+
+A first fragment lives here.
+
+It can be multiple paragraphs. It can include lists, code, quotes — whatever
+shape the fragment naturally takes.
+
+---
+
+A second fragment.
+
+---
+
+> A quoted line that the user wants to keep around.
+
+A reaction to it.
+
+---
+
+- A cluster of related observations
+- That hang together by feel
+- And want to be near each other
+```
+
+Fragments are separated by a horizontal rule (`\n---\n`). No headings inside the body. No tags. No order beyond the order they were added.
+
+## Writing rhythm
+
+Append silently. Don't ask permission for each fragment. Mention what you added in passing ("adding that"), but don't interrupt the conversation with save dialogs.
+
+Before every write: re-read the file from disk. The user may have edited, reordered, or deleted fragments between turns — preserve their changes. Never overwrite the file; only append (or, if the user asks, edit a specific fragment in place).
+
+The user can say "cut the last one", "rewrite that one sharper", "merge those two" at any time. Treat those as first-class instructions.
+
+</supporting-info>
@@ -0,0 +1,64 @@
+---
+name: writing-shape
+description: Take a markdown file of raw material and shape it into an article through a conversational session — drafting candidate openings, growing the piece paragraph by paragraph, arguing about format (lists, tables, callouts, quotes) at each step. Use when the user has a pile of notes, fragments, or a rough draft and wants help turning it into something publishable.
+---
+
+<what-to-do>
+
+The user has passed (or will pass) a markdown file of raw material. Treat it as the input pile — anything from a tidy list of fragments to a wall of unstructured prose to a transcript. The format does not matter. Read it end-to-end before doing anything else.
+
+Then run a shaping session that produces a separate article document. Do not edit the raw material file — it is read-only to this skill.
+
+If the user did not say where to save the article, ask once and remember the path. The user will be editing the article file during the session; always re-read it before writing so their edits are preserved.
+
+</what-to-do>
+
+<supporting-info>
+
+## The loop
+
+1. **Read the pile.** Read the input file in full. Form a sense of what's in it.
+2. **Draft 2–3 candidate openings.** Each opening should imply a different thesis or angle for the article. Show all of them. Force the user to pick or compose a hybrid. The chosen opening defines what the rest of the article must do.
+3. **Grow paragraph by paragraph.** After the opening lands, ask "given this opening, what does the reader need to hear next?" Pull material from the pile to answer. Argue about whether the next beat is a paragraph, a list, a table, a callout, a quote, a code block. Each format choice should be deliberate and defensible.
+4. **Append to the article file as you go.** Don't batch. Write each agreed paragraph or block immediately so the user can see the article taking shape.
+5. **Loop step 3 until the article is done.** The user decides when it's done.
+
+## Conversational feel
+
+This is a grilling session inverted. In ideation, the question was "what are you actually noticing?" Here it's "what is this article actually arguing, and in what order does the reader need to hear it?" Push back. Refuse to let weak transitions slide. If a paragraph doesn't earn its place, cut it.
+
+Specific moves to keep using:
+
+- "What does this paragraph do for the reader that the previous one didn't?"
+- "If I cut this, what breaks?"
+- "Is this prose, or should it be a list? Why prose?"
+- "This sentence is doing two jobs — split it or pick one."
+- "The opening promised X. We've drifted to Y. Either re-thread it or change the opening."
+
+## Pulling from the pile
+
+Treat the raw material as a quarry, not a script. Pull a fragment, rework it to fit the surrounding paragraph, and place it. A fragment may be split across multiple paragraphs, merged with another, or paraphrased. The pile's job is to be mined; the article's job is to read as one voice.
+
+If the pile lacks something the article needs, name the gap explicitly: "We need an example here and the pile doesn't have one — give me one now or we cut this section."
+
+## Format arguments to actually have
+
+When choosing how to render a beat, weigh these tradeoffs out loud with the user, not silently:
+
+- **Prose vs. list.** Prose carries argument; lists carry parallel items. If items aren't truly parallel, prose is better. If they are, a list is faster to scan.
+- **Inline vs. callout.** Tips, warnings, and asides go in callouts (`> [!TIP]`, `> [!NOTE]`) — but only if they'd genuinely derail the main argument inline. Otherwise leave them inline.
+- **Table vs. repeated structure.** If the same shape repeats 3+ times with the same fields, a table. Otherwise prose with bold leads.
+- **Quote vs. paraphrase.** Quote when the original wording is the point. Paraphrase when only the idea matters.
+- **Code block vs. inline code.** Multi-line, runnable, or illustrative → block. Single token or identifier → inline.
+
+## Writing rhythm
+
+Append to the article file as each block is agreed. Re-read the file from disk before every write — the user may have edited between turns. Never overwrite blindly. If the user wants a paragraph rewritten, edit that specific paragraph in place; leave the rest alone.
+
+## Out of scope
+
+- Mining for new fragments that aren't in the pile (the pile is the input — if it's incomplete, name the gap and either get the user to fill it or cut the section).
+- Editing the raw material file.
+- Publishing, formatting for a specific platform, or adding frontmatter the user didn't ask for.
+
+</supporting-info>
@@ -4,4 +4,5 @@ General workflow tools, not code-specific.

 - **[caveman](./caveman/SKILL.md)** — Ultra-compressed communication mode. Cuts token usage ~75% by dropping filler while keeping full technical accuracy.
 - **[grill-me](./grill-me/SKILL.md)** — Get relentlessly interviewed about a plan or design until every branch of the decision tree is resolved.
+- **[handoff](./handoff/SKILL.md)** — Compact the current conversation into a handoff document so another agent can continue the work.
 - **[write-a-skill](./write-a-skill/SKILL.md)** — Create new skills with proper structure, progressive disclosure, and bundled resources.
@@ -0,0 +1,15 @@
+---
+name: handoff
+description: Compact the current conversation into a handoff document for another agent to pick up.
+argument-hint: "What will the next session be used for?"
+---
+
+Write a handoff document summarising the current conversation so a fresh agent can continue the work. Save to the temporary directory of the user's OS - not the current workspace.
+
+Include a "suggested skills" section in the document, which suggests skills that the agent should invoke.
+
+Do not duplicate content already captured in other artifacts (PRDs, plans, ADRs, issues, commits, diffs). Reference them by path or URL instead.
+
+Redact any sensitive information, such as API keys, passwords, or personally identifiable information.
+
+If the user passed arguments, treat them as a description of what the next session will focus on and tailor the doc accordingly.
Author	SHA1	Message	Date
Matt Pocock	be55a79703	Add NOTES.md for recording user preferences and teaching notes	2026-06-06 10:12:27 +01:00
Matt Pocock	dbcb1bda03	Enhance lesson guidelines by emphasizing the importance of citations and interactive elements for improved user engagement	2026-06-06 10:10:38 +01:00
Matt Pocock	cef541c888	Merge branch 'main' of github.com:mattpocock/skills # Conflicts: # skills/in-progress/teach/SKILL.md	2026-06-06 10:09:36 +01:00
Matt Pocock	88eb3f8d04	Refactor teaching documentation to enhance clarity and structure; added lessons section and improved terminology consistency.	2026-06-06 10:06:03 +01:00
Matt Pocock	aaf2453fbd	Refine teaching skill documentation to enhance clarity and interactivity of explainers	2026-05-31 10:08:36 +01:00
Matt Pocock	e3b90b5238	Refine rules in CONTEXT-FORMAT.md for clarity and consistency	2026-05-28 16:48:30 +01:00
Matt Pocock	0288510dd6	Merge branch 'main' of github.com:mattpocock/skills	2026-05-27 13:36:22 +01:00
Matt Pocock	bd96a9f0c6	Moved /teach to in-progress	2026-05-27 13:36:16 +01:00
Matt Pocock	fadf11d45f	Added /teach	2026-05-27 13:35:56 +01:00
Matt Pocock	b8be62ffac	Merge branch 'main' of https://github.com/mattpocock/skills	2026-05-20 09:46:53 +01:00
Matt Pocock	a36584e09e	Updated ICA	2026-05-20 09:46:51 +01:00
Matt Pocock	d54c497aa9	Improved wording of /handoff	2026-05-19 17:07:02 +01:00
Matt Pocock	e7df78bb81	Removed relationships, example dialogue, and flagged ambiguities from CONTEXT.md template	2026-05-19 14:40:27 +01:00
Matt Pocock	bc32841b2e	Update handoff skill documentation to clarify saving location for handoff documents	2026-05-19 14:34:59 +01:00
Matt Pocock	feaaf4204d	Added redaction info to handoff skill	2026-05-19 14:29:31 +01:00
Matt PocockandGitHub	67bce91c80	Fix typo in README.md regarding ticket labels	2026-05-18 13:21:28 +01:00
Matt Pocock	e74f0061bb	Clarify purpose of CONTEXT.md to emphasize it as a glossary, removing implementation details	2026-05-13 14:05:18 +01:00
Matt Pocock	f304057d61	Fix typo in prototype skill description for clarity	2026-05-12 08:36:19 +01:00
Matt Pocock	9f2e0bd0ea	Enhance writing-fragments skill to capture initial user prompts as fragments	2026-05-11 10:19:41 +01:00
Matt Pocock	b6250ed602	Add 'handoff' skill to improve workflow documentation and agent transitions	2026-05-11 09:13:01 +01:00
Matt Pocock	9fecab929a	Add review skill to facilitate two-axis code reviews	2026-05-10 20:59:48 +01:00
Matt Pocock	733d312884	Add skills.sh badge to README for visibility	2026-05-07 07:34:11 +01:00
Matt Pocock	3bb0b1b917	Update issue listing command in GitLab documentation for clarity	2026-05-07 07:20:57 +01:00
Matt Pocock	70141119e9	Update triage label in PRD writing instructions to 'ready-for-agent'	2026-05-06 16:07:58 +01:00
Matt Pocock	494e4b2699	Exclude deprecated skills from linking in the link-skills script	2026-05-06 14:22:15 +01:00
Matt Pocock	918f3fe30f	Add instruction to read the handoff file before writing to it	2026-05-06 13:40:13 +01:00
Matt Pocock	c8364b0d1f	Add suggestion for skills to be used in next session in handoff documentation	2026-05-06 12:56:32 +01:00
Matt Pocock	c63fd971a7	Remove disable-model-invocation flag from handoff skill documentation	2026-05-06 12:53:07 +01:00
Matt Pocock	b27a1a46f8	Add handoff skill documentation for agent transition	2026-05-06 09:33:40 +01:00
Matt Pocock	ff3ee1dda5	Add prototype skill and related documentation for interactive design exploration	2026-05-06 09:26:48 +01:00
Matt Pocock	e736396b35	Clarify issue publication instructions for AFK agents in SKILL.md	2026-05-06 07:40:30 +01:00
Matt PocockandCopilot	b843cb5ea7	Add structured sections for 'what-to-do' and 'supporting-info' in SKILL.md Co-authored-by: Copilot <copilot@github.com>	2026-04-30 12:38:11 +01:00
Matt Pocock	839025ae17	Remove disable-model-invocation flag from grill-with-docs	2026-04-30 11:46:00 +01:00
Matt Pocock	3dae2b1945	Add verify/check mode documentation and list-skills script	2026-04-30 10:12:35 +01:00
Matt PocockandClaude Opus 4.7	f71bb975bf	Add out-of-scope note: issue trackers must be mainstream Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>	2026-04-29 10:56:28 +01:00
Matt PocockandClaude Opus 4.7	4369256220	Add GitLab as a first-class issue-tracker option Closes #98 Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>	2026-04-29 08:21:19 +01:00
Matt PocockandClaude Opus 4.7	b56795bed1	Add out-of-scope note for grilling question limits Records the rejection of #44 (request for a hard cap on grilling questions) so the reasoning isn't lost when the issue is closed and so future similar requests can be deduplicated against it. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>	2026-04-28 19:25:12 +01:00
Matt PocockandCopilot	179a14e721	Swapped 'backlog' for 'issue tracker Co-authored-by: Copilot <copilot@github.com>	2026-04-28 19:06:32 +01:00
Matt Pocock	5fed805a92	Enhance quickstart instructions in README; clarify setup steps for `/setup-matt-pocock-skills` and triage labels	2026-04-28 16:51:49 +01:00
Matt PocockandGitHub	0e51243253	Merge pull request #90 from mattpocock/setup-skill-and-vague-prose Add setup-matt-pocock-skills; rename github-triage; migrate skills to vague prose	2026-04-28 16:46:49 +01:00
Matt Pocock	70653e105c	Enhance user guidance in setup-matt-pocock-skills; add explanations for backlog backend, triage labels, and domain docs decisions	2026-04-28 16:41:14 +01:00
Matt Pocock	a32ebfb550	Remove deprecated triage-issue skill and update README to reflect changes	2026-04-28 16:35:22 +01:00
Matt PocockandClaude Opus 4.7	7afa86d3a5	Add setup-matt-pocock-skills; rename github-triage to triage; migrate engineering skills to vague prose Engineering skills no longer hard-code GitHub or specific label strings. A new setup skill scaffolds an `## Agent skills` block in AGENTS.md/CLAUDE.md plus `docs/agents/` so each repo can declare its own backlog backend, triage label vocabulary, and domain doc layout. Skills that need the mapping (to-issues, to-prd, triage) point at the setup skill; skills that only soften with it (diagnose, tdd, improve-codebase-architecture, zoom-out) stay vague. ADR-0001 records the split. Closes #88, #89. Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 4.7 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>	2026-04-28 16:33:37 +01:00
Matt PocockandGitHub	49cec7be01	Update title in README.md	2026-04-28 14:42:04 +01:00
Matt PocockandGitHub	d7c8dcfd02	Enhance README with skills newsletter images Added images for skills newsletter in README.	2026-04-28 14:40:16 +01:00
Matt Pocock	073a37e75d	Enhance link-skills.sh to check for symlink conflicts and provide user guidance	2026-04-28 12:38:36 +01:00