Document Spreadsheet Tooling Readiness
Acknowledgement: Shared by Peter Bamuhigire, techguypeter.com, +256 784 464178.
Required Inputs
| Input |
Required |
Use |
| Decision, audience, and deliverable |
yes |
Bound the business outcome |
| Source evidence, constraints, and owner |
yes |
Ground recommendations and accountability |
| Approved budget, customer data, or production artefacts |
conditional |
Support high-impact execution |
Capability and permission contract
Default to read-only analysis and drafting. Do not publish, send, price, promise, alter customer records, commit budget, or modify production artefacts without explicit authority and a named approver. Minimise confidential data, preserve provenance, and keep reversible copies.
Degraded mode
If evidence, stakeholder decisions, specialist tooling, or authoritative commercial data are unavailable, deliver a labelled draft, checklist, or decision memo. State what was not verified and do not claim approval, publication, financial accuracy, or customer acceptance.
Decision rules
| Condition |
Action |
Stop condition |
| Output creates a commercial, customer, or delivery commitment |
Obtain named approval before release |
Authority or terms are unclear |
| Evidence supports a reversible draft |
Produce it with assumptions and owner |
Required evidence conflicts |
| Tooling or data is incomplete |
Specify validation |
A final executable artefact is expected |
Domain Anti-Patterns
- Inventing customer evidence, prices, benchmarks, or approvals. Fix: cite the source or mark the gap.
- Publishing or sending a draft without authority. Fix: retain draft status and name the approver.
- Hiding assumptions inside polished prose. Fix: expose them beside each affected decision.
- Polishing presentation while the decision remains unclear. Fix: resolve audience, owner, and acceptance criteria.
- Treating unavailable tooling as passed validation. Fix: record the unassessed check.
Use When
- Before promising or creating
.docx, .pdf, .xlsx, application registers, scoring matrices, budgets, dashboards, price schedules, CV packs, reports, or annexes.
- When moving an engine to a new machine and confirming whether document/spreadsheet tooling is installed.
Do Not Use When
- The user only asks for plain Markdown or a conceptual outline and no generated file is claimed.
Required Inputs
- Desired output formats, local tooling access, plugin/connector availability, and any required templates.
Workflow
- Check plugins/connectors first, then Python packages, then binaries.
- Run a one-file smoke test before production export.
- Choose a route and state fallback honestly.
- Never claim a file exists until it was generated and opened or validated.
Quality Standards
- File-output claims are factual claims.
- Fallbacks are explicit, not silent.
- PDF conversion route must be known before promising PDF.
- Background LibreOffice work uses one isolated profile per job through the shared cross-platform launcher.
Anti-Patterns
- Saying a Word, PDF, or Excel file was generated when only Markdown exists.
- Assuming LibreOffice, Pandoc, or a plugin exists without checking.
- Shipping a workbook without reopening or formula/control checks.
Outputs
- Toolchain check, smoke-test result, route decision, fallback plan, and validation note.
References
references/toolchain-checks.md: Commands and package/binary checklist.
references/fallback-routes.md: Output routes and fallback decision tree.
references/libreoffice-headless.md: Required cross-platform headless conversion, diagnosis, and validation contract.
Core Workflow
- Confirm requested formats and whether a generated file is actually required.
- Prefer built-in document/spreadsheet plugins where available.
- Check Python packages: openpyxl, XlsxWriter, pandas, python-docx, docxtpl, docxcompose, pypandoc, markdown, beautifulsoup4, lxml, pillow, PyMuPDF, pypdf, pdfplumber, reportlab.
- Check binaries: pandoc, soffice/LibreOffice, wkhtmltopdf where needed, and tesseract for OCR tasks.
- For a LibreOffice conversion or render, read
references/libreoffice-headless.md, run the shared launcher --check, and use its isolated-profile conversion path rather than a hand-built soffice command.
- Run a minimal DOCX and XLSX smoke test before production output on a new machine.
- Pick the generation route and record it in the deliverable notes.
- Open, parse, or otherwise validate the generated file before telling the user it was created.
1---2name: document-spreadsheet-tooling-readiness3description: Use when checking whether this machine can generate and validate requested DOCX, PDF, XLSX, workbook, register, budget, or dashboard outputs.4metadata:5 portable: true6 compatible_with:7 - claude-code8 - codex9---1011# Document Spreadsheet Tooling Readiness12Acknowledgement: Shared by Peter Bamuhigire, techguypeter.com, +256 784 464178.131415## Required Inputs1617| Input | Required | Use |18|---|---|---|19| Decision, audience, and deliverable | yes | Bound the business outcome |20| Source evidence, constraints, and owner | yes | Ground recommendations and accountability |21| Approved budget, customer data, or production artefacts | conditional | Support high-impact execution |2223## Capability and permission contract2425Default to read-only analysis and drafting. Do not publish, send, price, promise, alter customer records, commit budget, or modify production artefacts without explicit authority and a named approver. Minimise confidential data, preserve provenance, and keep reversible copies.2627## Degraded mode2829If evidence, stakeholder decisions, specialist tooling, or authoritative commercial data are unavailable, deliver a labelled draft, checklist, or decision memo. State what was not verified and do not claim approval, publication, financial accuracy, or customer acceptance.3031## Decision rules3233| Condition | Action | Stop condition |34|---|---|---|35| Output creates a commercial, customer, or delivery commitment | Obtain named approval before release | Authority or terms are unclear |36| Evidence supports a reversible draft | Produce it with assumptions and owner | Required evidence conflicts |37| Tooling or data is incomplete | Specify validation | A final executable artefact is expected |3839## Domain Anti-Patterns4041- Inventing customer evidence, prices, benchmarks, or approvals. Fix: cite the source or mark the gap.42- Publishing or sending a draft without authority. Fix: retain draft status and name the approver.43- Hiding assumptions inside polished prose. Fix: expose them beside each affected decision.44- Polishing presentation while the decision remains unclear. Fix: resolve audience, owner, and acceptance criteria.45- Treating unavailable tooling as passed validation. Fix: record the unassessed check.464748<!-- dual-compat-start -->49## Use When5051- Before promising or creating `.docx`, `.pdf`, `.xlsx`, application registers, scoring matrices, budgets, dashboards, price schedules, CV packs, reports, or annexes.52- When moving an engine to a new machine and confirming whether document/spreadsheet tooling is installed.5354## Do Not Use When5556- The user only asks for plain Markdown or a conceptual outline and no generated file is claimed.5758## Required Inputs5960- Desired output formats, local tooling access, plugin/connector availability, and any required templates.6162## Workflow6364- Check plugins/connectors first, then Python packages, then binaries.65- Run a one-file smoke test before production export.66- Choose a route and state fallback honestly.67- Never claim a file exists until it was generated and opened or validated.6869## Quality Standards7071- File-output claims are factual claims.72- Fallbacks are explicit, not silent.73- PDF conversion route must be known before promising PDF.74- Background LibreOffice work uses one isolated profile per job through the shared cross-platform launcher.7576## Anti-Patterns7778- Saying a Word, PDF, or Excel file was generated when only Markdown exists.79- Assuming LibreOffice, Pandoc, or a plugin exists without checking.80- Shipping a workbook without reopening or formula/control checks.8182## Outputs8384- Toolchain check, smoke-test result, route decision, fallback plan, and validation note.8586## References8788- `references/toolchain-checks.md`: Commands and package/binary checklist.89- `references/fallback-routes.md`: Output routes and fallback decision tree.90- `references/libreoffice-headless.md`: Required cross-platform headless conversion, diagnosis, and validation contract.91<!-- dual-compat-end -->9293## Core Workflow94951. Confirm requested formats and whether a generated file is actually required.962. Prefer built-in document/spreadsheet plugins where available.973. Check Python packages: openpyxl, XlsxWriter, pandas, python-docx, docxtpl, docxcompose, pypandoc, markdown, beautifulsoup4, lxml, pillow, PyMuPDF, pypdf, pdfplumber, reportlab.984. Check binaries: pandoc, soffice/LibreOffice, wkhtmltopdf where needed, and tesseract for OCR tasks.995. For a LibreOffice conversion or render, read `references/libreoffice-headless.md`, run the shared launcher `--check`, and use its isolated-profile conversion path rather than a hand-built `soffice` command.1006. Run a minimal DOCX and XLSX smoke test before production output on a new machine.1017. Pick the generation route and record it in the deliverable notes.1028. Open, parse, or otherwise validate the generated file before telling the user it was created.