pre-push-self-review

name

pre-push-self-review

description

BEFORE every `git push`, run a systematic self-review on the diff against a checklist of the recurring footguns Copilot has flagged in this codebase. The goal is to catch issues that would otherwise consume Copilot review cycles. Trigger BEFORE typing `git push`, after `git commit`, when about to open a PR with `gh pr create`, when running the local test gate, or when the user asks to "review my changes" / "lint diff" / "check diff".

Pre-push self-review checklist — MANDATORY

Why this skill exists

Copilot (the GitHub PR reviewer) is excellent at catching footguns the agent missed. But every Copilot review cycle costs minutes of waiting and a CI run, and signals to the reviewer that the agent's first pass was sloppy. The agent must catch these issues itself before pushing.

This skill codifies the recurring failure patterns Copilot has flagged on Padosoft / lopadova repos. Running through the checklist before every push has two effects:

1. The push goes in clean (Copilot says "0 comments generated") on the first or second round, not the fifth.
2. The agent gets faster over time because the checklist becomes internalised.

When to invoke

Before git push to a PR branch. The flow:

git add → git commit → [INVOKE THIS SKILL → check the diff against the checklist] → git push

If any item fails, fix it, amend or add a commit, and re-run the checklist before pushing.

The checklist

Read the diff with git diff HEAD~1..HEAD (or git diff --staged if not yet committed) and walk through every item below.

A — Type safety on user input

• No bare (int) cast on env-var / config / request input. Use is_numeric() + range check + safe fallback. Example: ```php // ❌ Wrong — REGOLO_TIMEOUT="abc" silently becomes 0 (= no timeout) $timeout = (int) ($_ENV['REGOLO_TIMEOUT'] ?? 60);

  // ✅ Right — validation gate + safe fallback
  $configured = $_ENV['REGOLO_TIMEOUT'] ?? null;
  if ($configured === null || ! is_numeric($configured)) {
      return 60;
  }
  $timeout = (int) $configured;
  return $timeout >= 1 ? $timeout : 60;
  ```
  

• No bare (float), (bool), (array) cast on user input. Same rule.

• Http::timeout(0) = no timeout at all on the underlying Guzzle client. Validate >= 1 before passing.

B — Env-var lookup

• Read from all three superglobals when looking up env vars: getenv(), $_ENV[], $_SERVER[]. PHPUnit <server> blocks and CI runners populate different ones. Treat empty string as unset. php foreach ([getenv($name), $_ENV[$name] ?? null, $_SERVER[$name] ?? null] as $candidate) { if ($candidate === false || $candidate === null || $candidate === '') { continue; } return (string) $candidate; } return null;

C — Defaults and precedence

• No hardcoded default that bypasses config. Defaults must flow through a precedence chain that consumers can override: per-call argument → config entry → safe hard default. Document the chain in the function docblock.
• A docblock claim must match the implementation. If the docblock says "X uses Y" but X actually uses Z, the docblock is a bug. Diff the description against the code.

D — Markdown / GitHub rendering

• Anchor links to emoji-prefixed headings: GitHub's heading slugger strips the emoji and the leading whitespace, so the slug is ai-vibe-coding-pack-included, NOT -ai-vibe-coding-pack-included. Test the link before pushing with grep -n '#-' README.md — any leading-dash anchor on an emoji heading is broken.
• Cross-reference links target the section that actually contains the explanation, not an unrelated section.

E — Test assertions

• Argument order on PHPUnit ordering assertions is dangerous. assertGreaterThanOrEqual($expected, $actual) asserts $actual >= $expected. For ordering invariants, prefer assertTrue($a >= $b, "diagnostic message with both values") with a printf-formatted failure message — readers do not have to remember the argument convention.
• Test name = test body. R16 — failure-path tests must actually fire the failure; ordering tests must use strictly-monotonic fixtures with strict comparisons.
• Public API change ships with a unit test that pins the new behaviour. Without the pin, a regression in the next PR can silently undo the fix.

F — Reflection on final classes

• ReflectionMethod::invoke() on a protected method requires setAccessible(true) before invocation. Skipping it raises ReflectionException at runtime.

G — Quality gates

Before pushing run the full local quality gate the repo ships:

• vendor/bin/phpunit or equivalent — green
• vendor/bin/phpstan analyse — [OK] No errors
• vendor/bin/pint --test — passed (run vendor/bin/pint to autofix if it fails)
• (if applicable) frontend / E2E gates the repo has — green

If any of these is red, do NOT push. Fix locally first.

H — Diff hygiene

• No accidental dd() / dump() / console.log / breakpoint / TODO from debugging in the diff. R-rule: no debug statements in commit.
• No commented-out code unless followed by a clear Why: line explaining the deliberate choice.
• No verbatim quotes from private conversations / named individuals in repo-visible content (commits, PRs, READMEs, docs). Use neutral prose. Verbatim quotes only in private memory / private workspace.

I — Recurring footguns specific to this codebase

• Storage::put / delete / copy return value checked. R4 — no silent failures.
• fnmatch() on path-like inputs uses FNM_PATHNAME. R19.
• LIKE escaping is complete — %, _, \\. R19.
• CSV env-var split uses array_filter(array_map('trim', explode(',', $raw))). R19.
• Tenant-aware Eloquent query scoped via forTenant($id) or explicit where('tenant_id', ...). R30.
• Soft-delete-aware — write paths on already-deleted rows use withTrashed() / onlyTrashed(). R2.

Anti-patterns

• ❌ Pushing first, fixing what Copilot finds. The agent must catch these issues in the first round.
• ❌ Treating "PHPUnit green" as sufficient. PHPUnit will not catch a bare (int) cast on a non-numeric env var until the env var is actually misconfigured in production.
• ❌ "Copilot will tell me if there's a problem." Copilot is the safety net, not the first line of defence. Each Copilot iteration costs CI time, reviewer attention, and confidence.

Application example

The reference moment for this rule is padosoft/laravel-ai-regolo PR #7 (Apr 2026). Five Copilot review rounds were spent on issues that this checklist would have caught at round one:

Round	Issue	Checklist item that catches it
1	47 / 100 assertions outdated count	C — docblock matches code
2	gh pr push not a real CLI	C — docblock matches code
3	Anchor #-ai-vibe-coding-pack-included	D — emoji heading slug
4	Http::timeout(0) from (int) cast	A — type safety on user input
5	embeddingsDimensions() same (int) cast	A — type safety on user input

After this skill ships, the equivalent Round 1 should generate 0–1 Copilot must-fix comments instead of 5–6.

Maintenance

When Copilot flags a new recurring footgun on any Padosoft / lopadova repo, append it to the relevant section of this checklist in a follow- up PR. The checklist grows by experience.