Review the design of an API surface, meaning an HTTP API (OpenAPI spec or route code), an SDK's public classes and functions, or a CLI. Checks naming and consistency, resource modelling, error design (stable codes, RFC 9457 problem details, request ids),…
Build benchmarks that survive scrutiny and catch the classic lies (dead code elimination, lazy results, constant folding, warm caches, coordinated omission, averages hiding GC pauses, unequal work, noisy machines). Defines the question first, controls and…
Find the exact commit (or dependency version, config value, or input) that caused a regression by turning it into an automatic pass/fail check and running git bisect run in a separate worktree, then shrink the bad commit to the hunk that matters and explain…
Understand an unfamiliar codebase fast, the way senior engineers do. Reads the orientation signals (README, manifests, CI, Dockerfiles, routes, migrations), mines git history for hotspots, hidden coupling and ownership, builds the import graph to find layers,…
Audit the developer experience of a developer tool (SDK, API, CLI, framework) by trying it exactly like a brand-new developer, from the official docs only, in a fresh empty environment. Logs every step with timestamps and friction tags, measures time to first…
Find why a test is flaky and fix the root cause, never by adding retries, sleeps or bigger timeouts. Measures the flake rate with a confidence interval, runs the test under stressors (random order, timezone, fake clock at month end or DST, CPU load, fresh…
Threat-model the user's own app from its real code. Draws the data flow (actors, trust boundaries, data stores, external services) as a Mermaid diagram, finds threats per element with STRIDE, ranks them by likelihood times impact, then proves each top risk…
Learn a company's brand design from its live website (colours, fonts with the real font files, logo, button and card shapes, texture, image style) and save it as a reusable kit that vox-explainer and image-gen apply automatically. Use FIRST, before any brand…
