Use this skill whenever you're implementing a non-trivial change -- a feature, a multi-file bug fix, a refactor, a migration, a framework or dependency upgrade, a schema or API change, performance work, an infrastructure or build-system edit, or anything spec-driven. Also triggered by argless resume phrases -- "resume", "continue", "keep going", "pick up where I left off", "let's get going" (bare phrases only; "resume the X project" or "resume the X investigation" routes to desk-research-project-status). It enforces the project's plan -> execute -> self-review -> fix loop with mechanical gates (lint, typecheck, tests) and adversarial review. Default to this skill for any task larger than a one-line edit.
Use when holding a raw signal (market observation, OKR gap, user pain pattern, engineering finding, competitive signal) at initiative or capability level — turning it into a typed finding, a Wardley capability maturity assessment, and an anchor into the PE six-step shaping sequence. Triggers on "frame this situation", "what do we do with this signal", "is this an opportunity or a risk", "where should we start", "map this to the shaping sequence". Do NOT use for a feature-scoped request (use `frame-intent`), testing an assumption (use `de-risk-intent`), or breaking down a shaped intent (use `decompose-intent`).
Use this skill when a session has surfaced a list of future work — follow-ons, review recommendations, audit remediation items, deferred scope — and you want to capture it into workspace.toml so a later session can pick it up cold. Triggers on "capture this", "add these to the queue", "capture these as queue items", "queue these up", "add this to the backlog" + a bulleted or numbered list in context. Do NOT use to turn unstructured external input into a product brief (use author-brief), to decompose a brief into specs (use receive-brief), or to orient at session start (use workspace-status).
Use this skill to orient at session start, check initiative queue state, or see what's ready to work on next. Reads workspace.toml and surfaces ready-to-start items, blocked items with reason, parallel candidates, and active signals. Triggers on "workspace status", "where am I", "orient me", "session start", "what's ready", "show the queue", "what's next", "what should I work on", "check workspace", or any cold-start orientation request. Offers to initialise workspace.toml if absent.
Use this skill when the user receives an externally-authored, multi-feature product brief -- a PRD, a solution handoff, a requirements packet -- and needs to turn it into shippable specs. Triggers on "receive a brief", "decompose this PRD", "we got a product brief", "break this handoff into specs". Elicits the load-bearing fields without mandating a schema, decomposes by shippability, and executes each slice through new-spec then work-loop. Do NOT use to author a single feature from scratch (use new-spec) or to record a decision (use new-adr).
Convert documents and images to Markdown for AI context layers. Documents (PDF, DOCX, XLSX, PPTX, HTML, EPUB, CSV/TSV, OpenDocument, .eml) go through `scripts/convert.py`, which extracts at a no-ML Tier-0 floor (pure-Python / stdlib parsers) and falls through to Docling (Tier 2) only for .xls and images; images go through a two-pass sliding-window vision pipeline whose tiling and reconciliation are deterministic (`scripts/split_image.py` and `scripts/reconcile.py`). Every output carries a versioned frontmatter contract (provenance + a quality/confidence signal). The agent's job is the per-tile vision read; tile dedup and ordering are handled by the script.
Use this skill when the user wants to start a new feature with a spec, or wants to write a spec for something they're about to build. Triggers on "new spec", "write a spec for X", "let's spec this out", "start a feature for...". Spec-driven development; the spec drives implementation. Do NOT use for cross-cutting proposals (use `new-rfc`) or recording decisions (use `new-adr`).
Load when a task's primary output is HTML, CSS, or JS. Provides design pre-flight, codified craft rules, and GATES verification commands for that surface.