Setup Engineering

Setup Engineering

Scaffold .claude/engineering.local.md, the per-repo config that write-spec, write-plan, and record-adr read to know where — if anywhere — to save their output.

This is a prompt-driven skill, not a deterministic script. Explore, present what you found, confirm with the user, then write.

Process

1. Explore

Look at the repo before asking anything:

• docs/ layout — existing subdirectories for specs, plans, or design docs
• Existing ADR directories — docs/adr/, docs/decisions/, or similar, and whether entries are already numbered
• Existing spec/plan conventions — a SPEC.md, PLAN.md, or a docs folder with dated files
• Monorepo signals — pnpm-workspace.yaml, a workspaces field in package.json, or populated packages/*/docs — these suggest per-package paths might fit better than repo-root ones
• Whether .claude/engineering.local.md already exists — if so, this run is a redo, not a first setup

2. Present findings and confirm

Summarize what's present and missing, then propose one value per key, leading with the recommendation so the user can accept in a word. If .claude/engineering.local.md already exists, present its current values as the default for each key, and fall back to fresh exploration only to fill in whatever is missing.

• specs: — where spec documents go (an existing specs-shaped directory if found, otherwise docs/specs, or none to skip saving)
• plans: — where implementation plans go (same logic, e.g. docs/plans)
• adr: — where ADRs go (an existing ADR directory if found, otherwise docs/adr)

Ask about project notes only if exploration surfaced something worth recording (a non-obvious doc convention, a naming rule); otherwise leave the notes body empty and mention it can be filled in later.

Show the confirmed values and let the user edit before writing.

3. Write

Write .claude/engineering.local.md from references/config-template.md, filling in the three keys and any notes.

Then check .git/info/exclude for a .claude/engineering.local.md line with grep, appending it only if absent. Leave .gitignore, CLAUDE.md, and AGENTS.md untouched — this file is local-only config, not a project convention worth sharing.

4. Done

Tell the user the file can be edited directly going forward — re-running this skill is only needed to start over.