Generate Ppt

/generate-ppt

Produces a brand-compliant PowerPoint deck (.pptx) for customer engagements. Uses pptxgenjs under the hood. Pulls templates from ~/.lintel/brand/ppt-templates/ (or falls back to in-repo defaults if brand not pulled). Compliance-gated before distribution.

Prerequisites

This skill renders .pptx via the Node library pptxgenjs. If it is not installed, set it up first: npm i pptxgenjs (project-local) or npm i -g pptxgenjs. Graceful degradation if it cannot be installed (no Node toolchain / offline): fall back to /li:generate-web → /li:make-pdf for a rendered deliverable, or emit the slide content as markdown. Do not silently produce nothing — state which path you took.

When to use

• Customer-engagement deliverable (pitch deck, workshop deck, summary deck)
• Internal presentation that needs the active pack's brand identity
• Reusing engagement-specific content across multiple PPT outputs
• Replacing manual PPT authoring with a workflow that has voice + brand + provenance gates

When NOT to use

• One-slide quick mockup — /design-html is faster
• Non-PPT artifact — use /generate-word or /generate-web
• Pack compliance gate not satisfied AND output is customer-bound — resolve the gate first

Inputs

• Required --brief <path|inline> — content brief describing the deck purpose OR --from-pipeline <dir> (shared pipeline mode)
• Required --template <name> — PPT template name from ~/.lintel/brand/ppt-templates/ (e.g. pitch-deck, workshop)
• Optional --audience <text> — primary audience (affects voice tier output)
• Optional --slide-count <N> — target slide count (default: 20-30 based on duration)
• Optional --duration <minutes> — presentation duration (informs slide pacing)
• Optional --voice <tier> — voice tier for slide content (default: the active pack's voice tier, internal by default)
• Optional --use-defaults — force use of in-repo default templates instead of brand pull
• Optional --ignore-stale-brand <reason> — bypass brand-staleness-warn

From-pipeline mode (v3.5 Phase 2 — generate-pipeline integration)

If invoked with --from-pipeline <run-dir> instead of --brief:

1. Read shared pipeline-output:

   • <run-dir>/content.md — written content (with HTML-comment annotations for voice/type/key_message per section)
   • <run-dir>/speaker-notes.md — speaker notes per slide
   • <run-dir>/design-spec.json — per-format layout-mappings (read per_format.ppt.layouts)

2. Replace brief-parsing logic with direct-read of content.md sections + design-spec layouts. The PPTNarrativeArchitect agent is NOT invoked in this mode (narrative-design already done by shared generate-design).

3. Apply format-specific design-pass via design_pass_hook:

   • Reads per_format.ppt.layouts[N].design_pass_hook (canonical: PPTNarrativeArchitect)
   • Invokes agent for a PPT-specific fidelity-pass (slide-narrative-arc, FastPath-recommendations, animation-cues) on top of the shared baseline
   • Acknowledges plan-eng-review Reviewer Concern #7 — per-format design-agents stay per-format

4. CLI stays backward-compat: existing --brief-flag invocations work unchanged. --from-pipeline is additive.

5. 4-gate pipeline runs as usual after generation (brand + voice + honest-limitations + provenance).

Operator-CLI stays non-breaking. Existing workflow-scripts are unaffected.

Workflow

1. Preflight gates:

   • ~/.lintel/brand/ppt-templates/<template>.pptx exists OR --use-defaults flag present
   • brand-staleness-warn check (90-day rule) — surface warning if stale
   • The active pack's compliance gates if a customer-facing voice tier is set (resolve_pack_field compliance.hooks; none by default — gate failure → output marked unverified)

2. Read brief + extract structure:

   • Goal / key message (one sentence)
   • Audience profile
   • 3-5 substantive sections
   • Opening hook + closing CTA

2b. Design DNA slide pass (ADR-0017 — retrieval before slide design). Query the slide decision engine so the arc is grounded in the corpus, not invented:

dna="${LINTEL_SKILLS_DIR:-skills}/design-dna"
python3 "$dna/scripts/search.py" "<deck goal / pitch type>" --slide strategy -n 1   # narrative arc + sparkline-beats
# then per slide, by the slide's emotion (trust|urgency|confidence…) and goal (hook|proof|cta…):
python3 "$dna/scripts/search.py" "<emotion>" --slide color-logic -n 1   # background/text/accent + full-bleed
python3 "$dna/scripts/search.py" "<goal>"    --slide layout-logic -n 1  # layout pattern + break-pattern
python3 "$dna/scripts/search.py" "<slide-type>" --slide copy -n 1       # headline formula

Feed the strategy's sparkline_beats + emotion_arc to PPTNarrativeArchitect as the arc spine. python3 absent → Read design-dna/data/slides/*.csv directly (controlled vocabulary in design-dna SKILL.md).

3. Invoke PPTNarrativeArchitect agent to design slide arc:

   • Slide-by-slide content goals — seeded by the slide-strategy sparkline_beats
   • Mode tags per slide (Reveal / Inspire / Provoke / Neutral) — aligned to the slide's emotion
   • Layout suggestions per slide — from --slide layout-logic (pattern + break-pattern at 1/3, 2/3)
   • Asset suggestions (from the active pack's asset library, if one is configured)

4. Generate slides via pptxgenjs:

   • Apply template
   • Add slides per architect's arc
   • Populate text with brief-derived content
   • Insert assets from the active pack's asset library where matched
   • Mode-tag in slide notes for voice-check downstream

4b. Critique slide narration via SlideNarrationCritic agent (if the deck carries speaker notes / a talk track):

narration_brief=$(mktemp)
cat > "$narration_brief" <<EOF
task: Critique the generated deck's slide narration / speaker notes
context_pointers:
  - <draft deck path>.pptx (speaker notes per slide)
constraints:
  - voice-tier consistency per active pack
  - pacing (words-per-minute vs each slide's duration)
  - audience alignment + recovery-line presence on risky slides
acceptance:
  - per-slide narration verdict + specific rewrite recommendations
EOF

/li:brief-forge subagent_spawn generate-ppt SlideNarrationCritic brief "$narration_brief"

5. 4-gate quality pipeline (output stays in ~/.lintel/draft/ until ALL 4 PASS):

   Gate 1 — Voice (the active pack's compliance gates):

   • Apply the active pack's voice rubric to slide text (resolve_pack_field compliance.hooks; none by default)
   • Require any pack-defined threshold met, 0 P1 violations
   • PASS → continue; FAIL → surface + regenerate flagged slides (up to 2 retries)

   Gate 2 — Brand-conformance:

   • Template matches latest brand version (or default-fallback marker present)
   • Assets are from the active pack's asset library (or operator-confirmed)
   • No unauthorized branding (third-party logos)
   • Color/typography matches template tokens

   Gate 3 — Honest-limitations:

   • Applies to transparency-note slides ONLY
   • Limitations section ≥ capabilities − 2 (per the active pack's disclosure rule, if defined)
   • Skipped for pitch/workshop decks (no transparency-note section)

   Gate 4 — Provenance:

   • Generate a provenance record with source chain + voice score + brand version
   • Record landed in .claude/runtime/audit/

6. On all 4 PASS: move from ~/.lintel/draft/ → operator-specified --out path (or <brief-stem>.pptx in cwd).

7. On any gate FAIL: keep in draft, surface specific failures, allow operator iteration.

Report format

Generate PPT: customer-A-arc-pitch

Template: pitch-deck.pptx (~/.lintel/brand/ppt-templates/, brand version 2026-Q2)
Brand staleness: ok (32 days)
Voice tier: internal (pack-resolved)
Audience: mid-market public sector IT leadership

## Slide architecture (PPTNarrativeArchitect)
  1. Opening: Reveal/Curtain — "What does Friday 2 AM actually cost?"
  2. Stakes: Provoke/Unflinching — current cost in incidents + hours
  3. Setup: Reveal/Dream — picture the unified-Arc world
  4-8. Substantive: feature surface mapped to operational pain
  9. Close: Inspire/Marvel — what becomes possible

## Generation (pptxgenjs)
  9 slides generated. 6 service icons resolved from the active pack's asset library.
  142 KB output → ~/.lintel/draft/customer-A-arc-pitch.pptx

## 4-Gate pipeline
  Gate 1 (voice):   ✓ PASS — score 87/100, 0 P1 violations
  Gate 2 (brand):   ✓ PASS — template + 6/6 assets from brand-version 2026-Q2
  Gate 3 (honest):  N/A — no transparency-note slides
  Gate 4 (proven):  ✓ PASS — PROV-7f8a2 recorded

## Status
ALL GATES PASS. Moving from draft → ./customer-A-arc-pitch.pptx.

Distribution: operator-driven. Verify the provenance chain (PROV-7f8a2) before sending.

Compliance integration

• 4-gate pipeline is the customer-bound enforcement path; the specific gates are pack-configurable (resolve_pack_field compliance.hooks; none by default)
• The active pack's deploy/release gate (if any) reads provenance + voice-check status before customer-bearing distribution
• Customer-data patterns in brief → BLOCK (always-on)
• Stale brand (>90d) surfaces warn but doesn't block (operator decides)

Voice tier note

voice: mixed. Skill itself is engineering-internal; the SLIDE CONTENT may use a customer-facing voice tier (gated by Gate 1).

Failure modes

• pptxgenjs runtime error (lib bug, malformed template) — surface error, keep work-in-progress in ~/.lintel/draft/.work/, allow operator manual debug
• Brand template missing AND --use-defaults not set — surface options: pull brand, use defaults, abort
• Voice gate fails after 2 regen attempts — keep draft, surface specific slide failures with fix recommendations
• Asset library returns 0 results for slide concept — surface to operator, allow them to provide path manually OR skip the asset for that slide
• Customer-data in brief — BLOCK before generation. Sanitize first.

Examples

Standard pitch deck:

> /generate-ppt --brief docs/engagement/customer-A-pitch-brief.md --template pitch-deck --audience "public-sector CIO"
[Architect designs, pptxgenjs generates, 4 gates pass]
✓ Deck at ./customer-A-arc-pitch.pptx. Provenance PROV-7f8a2.

Workshop deck with defaults:

> /generate-ppt --brief workshop-brief.md --template workshop --use-defaults --voice internal
[Uses in-repo default-ppt-template; voice tier internal so Gate 1 is no-op]
✓ Deck at ./workshop.pptx (default-fallback marker present).

Stale brand override:

> /generate-ppt --brief archive-pitch.md --template pitch-deck --ignore-stale-brand "archival deliverable, brand version pinned"
[Bypasses brand-staleness-warn, logs reason]

See also

• BRAND-INTEGRATION.md — brand architecture + cache
• PPTNarrativeArchitect agent — slide arc design
• SlideNarrationCritic agent — slide narration / talk-track critique (post-generation)
• The active pack's compliance gates — Gate 1
• /generate-word, /generate-web — sibling doc-gen skills
• brand-staleness-warn hook — Phase E