Brainstorming

Brainstorming Ideas Into Designs

When to use this skill

• When the user has a vague idea or feature request.
• Before writing any code or implementation plans.
• When you need to understand purpose, constraints, and success criteria.

Workflow

1. Understand the Idea: Ask questions one at a time to refine the user's intent.
2. Explore Approaches: Propose 2-3 approaches with trade-offs.
3. Present Design: Present the design in small sections (200-300 words) for validation.
4. Finalize: Save the validated design to a markdown file.

Instructions

1. Understanding the Idea

• Context First: Check current project state (files, docs) before asking.
• One Question at a Time: Never overwhelm the user; ask one focused question per turn.
• Multiple Choice: When possible, offer options to choose from.
• Focus: Nail down the purpose, constraints, and success criteria.

2. Exploring Approaches

• Propose Alternatives: Always offer 2-3 different ways to solve the problem (e.g., "Option A: Quick & Dirty", "Option B: Robust & Scalable").
• Trade-offs: Explain pros/cons of each.
• Recommendation: State which option you recommend and why.

3. Presenting the Design

• Incremental: Break the design into sections of 200-300 words.
• Validation: Stop after each section and ask: "Does this look right so far?"
• Content: Cover architecture, components, data flow, error handling, and testing.

4. Output

• Once agreed, write the full design to docs/plans/YYYY-MM-DD-<topic>-design.md.
• Ask the user if they are ready to proceed to the Planning phase.

Resources

• Planning Skill - For converting the design into actionable tasks.