# To Spec > Explicitly turn one settled source into a verified durable parent specification when several slices, multi-session coordination, or a lasting decision boundary justify it. Return one bounded item to Implement when a spec would add no value. - Skill: `stevennitesh/to-spec` (Agent Skill, multi-file: 2 files) - Install (CLI): `npx skillmds@latest add stevennitesh/to-spec` - Raw SKILL.md: https://api.skillmd.com/api/skills/stevennitesh/to-spec/raw - Safety review: pending - Works with: Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex - Category: Coding & Dev Tools - Author: stevennitesh (https://skillmd.com/u/stevennitesh) - Updated: 2026-09-17 - Page: https://skillmd.com/skills/stevennitesh/to-spec --- # To Spec Publish one durable parent decision contract from settled source. Record what was decided without reopening the decision, planning implementation, or starting downstream work. ## Admit Accept one identity-bearing settled source: a direct packet, a confirmed Grill With Docs result with its current domain result, a read-back closed Wayfinder map whose delivered closing evidence satisfies its closing condition, or a verified Audit candidate with settled direction and boundaries. Use To Spec only when a parent contract is useful across several delivery slices or sessions, for durable coordination, or as a lasting decision boundary. If the source already defines one bounded implementation with enough accepted behavior and evidence to implement and verify it, return `not needed` with the exact source and recommend unstarted `$implement`. Create nothing. The source and its owners retain purpose, outcome, scope, exclusions, commitments, acceptance, public and data contracts, security and privacy posture, compatibility, migration, and tradeoffs. If a material decision, authority, acceptance fact, or source identity is missing, contradictory, or inaccessible, return the exact gap, its owner, inspected evidence, and re-entry condition. Do not choose a resolver or make the missing decision. ## Read Read the repository instructions, complete source, every decision-bearing pointer it names, and only the routed domain records, ADRs, and current-state material needed to preserve the source faithfully. Use the project's own language. Treat cited code and configuration as evidence, not as permission for a new repository survey or architecture choice. If direct evidence corrects an incidental current-state statement without changing a commitment, record the correction and pointer in the Source Trace. If it changes a commitment, return the contradiction to its owner. When the settled source names an existing command, installer, public API, migration mechanism, or external target as accepted capability, inspect enough implementation to verify that it owns the named target. Otherwise record the capability gap or leave the mechanism downstream instead of freezing it as a commitment. ## Write Freeze one title, body, and intended parent state that a fresh agent can use without inventing a decision. Include, when material: - source identity and owners; - problem, outcome, scope, and exclusions; - settled behavior, decisions, constraints, and materially different scenarios; - caller-visible interfaces, authoritative data shapes and invariants, and state or failure behavior; - trust-boundary, security, privacy, compatibility, migration, cutover, rollback, or removal obligations; - observable acceptance, the cheapest credible evidence authority, and honest residual uncertainty; - deferrals, risks, and the downstream boundary. Omit empty sections. Trace every material commitment to source authority. Use a detailed crosswalk only for conflicting or multi-owner inputs. Cover states only where behavior materially differs. At an external or trust boundary, state the authoritative representation and observable invalid-input behavior; do not prescribe redundant internal validation. When accepted inputs or rules can disagree, define which governs and what the caller observes. Keep each companion field bound to the result it describes. For independently requested items, state whether missing, unsupported, or invalid state is item-local or rejects the whole request. Carry any source-named semantic input and observable result that make a material distinction visible. When accepted behavior spans several stages, include one representative ordinary caller journey from initiating input to terminal caller-visible outcome. For durable state on that journey, state what persists, what produces it, which ordinary caller consumes it, how it affects that caller, and the observable outcome. When one accepted result feeds another, define successful and rejected predecessor outcomes separately and name every source-defined meaning that must survive the public composition, including value or null, evidence, issues, availability, and governing identity when applicable. When accepted meaning depends on a field's scope, identity, time interpretation, placement, or derivation, define that meaning and its governing rule. This includes whether an issue applies to one item or the combined request, whether time is a calendar value or an instant and any governing conversion, and what happens when authoritative content conflicts with a supplied duplicate or derived value. For typed or provenance-bearing results, name the authoritative schema, require materially different states to remain type-compatible, define contribution-level meaning, and state the observable changes that advance any governing version. When behavior retries, escalates, gathers evidence, or has several stopping criteria, define the materially different request profiles and terminal outcomes. Distinguish conditions that authorize success from those that only stop further work, and define the observable result when they disagree. When acceptance claims a public end-to-end, production-shaped, live, or measured property, name the cheapest evidence capable of distinguishing it. Require evidence beyond deterministic fixtures only when safe representative input, a preserved artifact, or an actual measurement is available; otherwise state the remaining unproved claim. Paths may support a source claim, but ticket slices, expected writes, concrete commands, test ownership, dependency order, and implementation technique stay downstream. Include code only when a source-authorized prototype fragment is itself the clearest settled contract. ## Publish Read `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md` only after the durable-parent branch wins. Verify the required inspect, create, and read-back routes. If setup is missing or incompatible, leave state unchanged, recommend `$repo-bootstrap`, and stop. Inspect the intended parent target. Reuse only when exactly one parent matches the frozen title, body, and intended state. Create only from verified absence and only with authority for that parent. Multiple matches, divergent state, or unknown state returns the observed identities and the smallest source or authority change needed. Do not overwrite or reconcile implicitly. Perform at most one parent create. Create no children, labels, source or domain changes, code, Git state, installation state, or downstream work. Read the durable parent back. Require one returned identity and pointer, and verify its title, body, and state against the frozen expectations. If publication fails, is partial, or remains unknown, report the input and observed durable state with the safest recovery. Never retry an indeterminate create blindly. Return `ready spec` with the durable pointer, exact source identity, verified publication or reuse, and material residual gaps. Recommend unstarted `$to-tickets` when several valuable implementation slices or durable tracker coordination remain; otherwise recommend unstarted `$implement`. Invoke neither. ## Completion Complete through either branch: `not needed` returns the exact bounded source, performs no mutation, and leaves `$implement` unstarted; a published or reused parent preserves every material source commitment, acceptance qualifier, and residual uncertainty, lets a fresh agent recover the same scope and caller-visible contract without inventing a decision, was read back from durable state, and starts no downstream work.