oss-wiki-development-arc

name	oss-wiki-development-arc
description	Three-phase methodology (Substrate → Depth → Quality) for building open-source engineering wikis efficiently. Skip 70%+ of empirical iteration cost by pre-loading the pattern.
version	1.0.0
author	Workspace Hub
category	coordination
tags	["wiki","methodology","oss","content-development","llm-wiki","multi-agent"]
related_skills	["engineering-issue-workflow","artifact-verification"]

OSS-Wiki Development Arc — Three-Phase Methodology

Empirical basis: Traced across 38 iterations of llm-wiki (iter-22 → iter-59, V1 → V17 audit lineage). Phases were observed, not designed; this skill codifies them so future wiki projects can pre-load the pattern.

The 3-Phase Pattern

Phase	Audit-version range	Iters observed	Marginal-cost signature	Exit criterion
1. Substrate	V1 → V11	~27	Cheap breadth wins	substrate-fill marginal-cost > marginal-value
2. Depth	V12 → V15	~7	Compounding per-page value via 4-element recipe	median per-iter line-growth <50% + thin-starter cohort exhausted
3. Quality	V15 → V17	~2	Diagnose-then-execute closure	4-criterion publication-readiness gate met

Each phase has a distinct iter-shape, distinct success metric, and distinct saturation signal. Mixing phases (e.g., depth-expanding while substrate is incomplete) wastes effort because depth-content depends on substrate-resolvers being citable.

When To Use This Skill

• Bootstrapping a new engineering/marine/scientific OSS wiki (greenfield)
• Resuming work on a stalled wiki (which phase are we in?)
• Diagnosing wiki-development thrash ("we keep adding pages but nothing improves")
• Auditing a wiki for publication readiness

When NOT To Use

• Closed/internal documentation projects (audit-trail, governance constraints differ)
• Single-page reference docs (no substrate/depth/quality distinction)
• Wikis whose authoritative content is mirrored from elsewhere (use sync tooling, not this arc)

Phase Invocation

Read the phase-specific reference before kicking off iter-N+1. Each reference is self-contained — a future agent can apply it without reading the others.

• Phase 1 — Substrate: references/phase-1-substrate.md
  • 4-agent fanout (audit + 2-3 content lanes + bridge)
  • Goal: every concept page links to a resolver page; every entity has a stub; substrate-completeness measured per-wiki
• Phase 2 — Depth: references/phase-2-depth.md
  • Top-N inbound-citation candidate selection
  • 4-element recipe per expanded page (worked example + comparison table + ≥30 outbound intra-wiki links + cross-link to entity/source)
  • 3-cohort growth-profile (thin-starter +200-300% / mid-tier +100-130% / already-expanded +35-50%)
• Phase 3 — Quality: references/phase-3-quality.md
  • Diagnose-then-execute 2-iter cycle
  • 4-criterion gate: orphans ≤3 + unidir-bridges=0 + frontmatter consistency + link-integrity ≥99%

Supporting references applicable to all phases:

• references/audit-template.md — audit-doc structure + V1→V17 measurement-discipline progression
• references/iter-shape-recipes.md — 4-agent fanout default; bundled-sequential exception (W231 race-block lesson)
• references/cross-wiki-bridges.md — sister-pair pattern; sibling-template recognition; substantive (not "see also") bridge content

Saturation-Detection Signals

Before kicking off another iter in the current phase, verify the saturation signal hasn't fired:

Phase 1 → 2 transition	Phase 2 → 3 transition	Phase 3 → publish
Substrate-fill audit identifies <3 high-value gaps per wiki	Median per-iter line-growth across top-N pages drops <50%	All 4 closure criteria green simultaneously across 1 audit cycle
Cross-wiki edge-density plateaus	Thin-starter cohort exhausted (no <100-line top-citation pages remain)	Frontmatter mismatch count = 0
Resolver-coverage ≥95% on canonical concept set	Already-expanded cohort dominates the next-target list	unidir-bridges = 0 (every cross-wiki link is reciprocated)

If a saturation signal fires while in-phase, transition rather than spend another substrate-iter or depth-iter; the marginal value has collapsed.

Reference Exemplar

vamseeachanta/llm-wiki — public OSS wiki where this arc was empirically traced. Repository structure, audit-doc lineage (docs/audits/V1.md … V17.md), and iter-shape decisions are all visible.

Critical Cost-Avoidance

A future wiki using this skill should:

1. Start with the audit-doc skeleton (see audit-template.md) on iter-1, not iter-15. Most of llm-wiki's measurement-discipline gain happened V12→V15; loading it pre-baked saves ~10 iters of audit-format churn.
2. Adopt the 4-agent fanout default from iter-1. Solo-author iters were the dominant low-throughput pattern in llm-wiki's V1-V8.
3. Track inbound-citation count per page from iter-1 (substrate-phase metric is just count; depth-phase ranks by it). This avoids retroactive instrumentation.
4. Resist the urge to depth-expand before substrate is saturated. Depth-content references resolvers; if resolvers are stubs, the cross-links don't compound.