Enhance Workflow

Workscript Workflow Enhancer

Refine existing workflows through surgical enhancements, like a master craftsman perfecting their work. Every enhancement removes what doesn't belong and reveals the workflow's true potential.

Core Philosophy

Surgical precision over wholesale rewriting. Enhancing a workflow means understanding its purpose and making focused changes that improve without disrupting. Changes should be:

• Targeted: Address specific issues without side effects
• Preserving: Maintain what already works well
• Additive when needed: Add guards, error handling, or new branches
• Subtractive when possible: Remove unnecessary nesting, redundancy, or complexity

Enhancement Workflow

Workflow enhancement follows these steps:

1. Identify the target workflow
2. Analyze the workflow thoroughly
3. Understand the enhancement request
4. Plan targeted changes
5. Implement enhancements
6. Validate improvements

Step 1: Identify the Target Workflow

The user must specify which workflow to enhance. Accept:

• Direct path: /apps/sandbox/resources/shared/prompts/my-workflow.json
• Workflow name: my-workflow (resolve to standard locations)
• Contextual reference: "the email processing workflow", "data-pipeline.json"

Default locations to search:

/apps/sandbox/resources/shared/prompts/
/apps/api/prompts/

If the target is ambiguous, ask for clarification before proceeding.

Step 2: Analyze the Workflow Thoroughly

Before making any changes, perform comprehensive analysis using scripts/analyze-workflow.ts:

bun /Users/narcisbrindusescu/teste/workscript/.claude/skills/enhance-workflow/scripts/analyze-workflow.ts <workflow.json>

The analysis examines:

• Structure: Flat vs nested ratio, nesting depth, node count
• Guards: Input validation, AI response validation, array guards
• Error Handling: Presence of error? edges on nodes that can fail
• State Management: State keys read and written, potential conflicts
• Pattern Usage: Identified patterns (loops, conditionals, pipelines)
• Opportunities: Specific improvement suggestions

Read the full workflow contents and understand:

1. What the workflow does (purpose)
2. How data flows through nodes
3. Where branching occurs and why
4. What guards are present or missing
5. What works well vs. what could improve

Step 3: Understand the Enhancement Request

User feedback comes in several forms. See references/enhancement-patterns.md for detailed patterns.

Direct requests: "Add error handling to all nodes", "Flatten the nested structure" Observations: "The workflow fails when AI returns invalid JSON", "It crashes on empty arrays" Advice: "It should validate input first", "The loop needs a guard" Critique: "Too deeply nested", "Missing defensive guards", "Hard to read"

For each piece of feedback, identify:

1. What specifically needs to change
2. Why the change improves the workflow
3. Where in the workflow the change applies
4. How to implement without breaking existing functionality

Step 4: Plan Targeted Changes

Map feedback to specific workflow components:

Create a change plan before implementing:

## Enhancement Plan

### Target: workflow-id.json

### Changes:
1. [Location] - [Change description] - [Rationale]
2. [Location] - [Change description] - [Rationale]

### Preserved:
- [What stays unchanged and why]

### Risk Assessment:
- [Potential issues and mitigations]

Step 5: Implement Enhancements

Apply changes following these principles:

For structure changes:

• Preserve working sections verbatim unless they need changes
• Use surgical edits, not full rewrites
• Convert success? chains to flat workflow arrays when sequential
• Keep actual branching (true?/false?, valid?/invalid?) as edges

For adding guards:

• Add input validation at workflow entry
• Add JSON validation after ask-ai calls
• Add array length checks before loops
• Add error? edges to all nodes that can fail

For flattening:

• Move sequential operations to workflow array
• Keep only true conditional branches as nested edges
• Preserve edge handlers for errors and alternative paths

For state management:

• Track what each node writes to state
• Ensure no state key conflicts
• Add intermediate state keys when needed for clarity

Step 6: Validate Improvements

After implementing changes, validate using the standard workflow validator:

bun /Users/narcisbrindusescu/teste/workscript/.claude/skills/new-workflow/scripts/validate-workflow.ts <workflow.json>

And compare before/after:

bun /Users/narcisbrindusescu/teste/workscript/.claude/skills/enhance-workflow/scripts/diff-workflows.ts <original.json> <enhanced.json>

Validation checks:

1. Structural integrity: Valid JSON, required fields present
2. No regressions: Original capabilities preserved
3. Enhancement applied: Requested changes implemented correctly
4. Node validity: All node types registered
5. State paths valid: All $.path references correct

Enhancement Categories

Category 1: Add Defensive Guards

The most common enhancement - making workflows robust against runtime errors.

Pattern: Input Validation Guard

Add at workflow entry:

{
  "validateData": {
    "validationType": "required_fields",
    "data": "$.input",
    "requiredFields": ["userId", "action"],
    "invalid?": {
      "log": { "message": "Missing required input: {{$.validationErrors}}" }
    }
  }
}

Pattern: AI Response JSON Guard

Add after any ask-ai expecting structured output:

{
  "validateData": {
    "validationType": "json",
    "data": "$.aiResponse",
    "valid?": {
      "validateData": {
        "validationType": "required_fields",
        "data": "$.parsedJson",
        "requiredFields": ["expectedField"],
        "valid?": { ... },
        "invalid?": {
          "log": { "message": "AI response missing fields: {{$.validationErrors}}" }
        }
      }
    },
    "invalid?": {
      "log": { "message": "AI did not return valid JSON" }
    }
  }
}

Pattern: Array Length Guard

Add before loops or array operations:

{
  "logic": {
    "operation": "greater",
    "values": ["$.items.length", 0],
    "true?": { ... loop or array processing ... },
    "false?": {
      "log": { "message": "No items to process" }
    }
  }
}

Category 2: Flatten Structure

Convert unnecessarily nested workflows to flat sequential structure.

Before - Excessive Nesting:

{
  "workflow": [
    {
      "filter": {
        "success?": {
          "sort": {
            "success?": {
              "log": { "message": "Done" }
            }
          }
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

After - Flat Sequential:

{
  "workflow": [
    {
      "filter": {
        "items": "$.data",
        "error?": { "log": { "message": "Filter failed" } }
      }
    },
    {
      "sort": {
        "type": "simple",
        "error?": { "log": { "message": "Sort failed" } }
      }
    },
    {
      "log": { "message": "Done" }
    }
  ]
}

Category 3: Add Error Handling

Ensure all fallible nodes have error? edges.

Nodes that need error? edges:

Enhancement pattern:

{
  "database": {
    "operation": "find",
    "table": "users",
    "query": { "id": "$.userId" },
    "found?": { ... },
    "not_found?": {
      "log": { "message": "User {{$.userId}} not found" }
    },
    "error?": {
      "log": { "message": "Database error: {{$.error}}" }
    }
  }
}

Category 4: Optimize Loops

Make loops safer and more efficient.

Add loop guard:

{
  "logic": {
    "operation": "and",
    "values": [
      { "operation": "greater", "values": ["$.items.length", 0] }
    ],
    "true?": {
      "logic...": {
        "operation": "less",
        "values": ["$.index", "$.items.length"],
        "true?": [ ... loop body ... ],
        "false?": null
      }
    },
    "false?": {
      "log": { "message": "No items to process" }
    }
  }
}

Category 5: Improve State Management

Make state usage clearer and prevent conflicts.

Pattern: Explicit intermediate state:

{
  "workflow": [
    {
      "filter": { "items": "$.rawData" }
    },
    {
      "editFields": {
        "mode": "manual_mapping",
        "fieldsToSet": [
          { "name": "filteredData", "value": "$.filterPassed", "type": "array" }
        ]
      }
    },
    {
      "sort": { "type": "simple" }
    },
    {
      "editFields": {
        "mode": "manual_mapping",
        "fieldsToSet": [
          { "name": "processedData", "value": "$.sortedItems", "type": "array" }
        ]
      }
    }
  ]
}

Enhancement Checklist

Before finalizing any enhancement:

• Validation passes: validate-workflow.ts returns success
• Guards added: Entry validation, AI validation, array guards
• Error edges present: All fallible nodes have error? edges
• Structure optimized: Sequential operations are flat
• State is clear: No ambiguous or conflicting state keys
• Version bumped: Increment version number for changes
• Diff reviewed: Changes match enhancement request

Anti-Patterns to Avoid

See references/anti-patterns.md for detailed examples.

Over-enhancement: Adding more than requested, scope creep Breaking changes: Removing functionality without replacement Over-flattening: Flattening actual conditional branches Guard overload: Adding redundant validations State pollution: Adding unnecessary intermediate state keys

Quick Reference

Command Reference

# Analyze workflow
bun .claude/skills/enhance-workflow/scripts/analyze-workflow.ts <workflow.json>

# Validate enhanced workflow
bun .claude/skills/new-workflow/scripts/validate-workflow.ts <workflow.json>

# Compare before/after
bun .claude/skills/enhance-workflow/scripts/diff-workflows.ts <original> <enhanced>

Common Enhancements

Reference Documentation

• Enhancement Patterns: references/enhancement-patterns.md
• Anti-Patterns: references/anti-patterns.md
• Workflow Syntax: /new-workflow/references/workflow-syntax.md
• Node Reference: /new-workflow/references/node-quick-reference.md
• Flat vs Nested: /new-workflow/references/flat-vs-nested.md