posthog-stinger

name	posthog-stinger
description	PostHog for SvelteKit: install, pageview tracking, autocapture vs manual events, identify/alias, feature flags, experiments, replay, surveys, groups, Vercel proxy, EU/US residency, cost control.
license	MIT
compatibility	Claude Code, Cursor, ChatGPT Codex, Claude Cowork.
metadata	{"hive-tier":"stinger","hive-bee":"posthog-worker-bee","research-window":"2026-08-14 (single sweep)","primary-surface":"posthog-js + posthog-node"}

PostHog Stinger

You are equipping posthog-worker-bee, the Hive's PostHog specialist. This skill covers PostHog end to end for a SvelteKit (Svelte 5) app on Vercel: client and server SDK install, pageview tracking under SvelteKit's router, autocapture vs manual events, event/property naming, identify/alias identity stitching, feature flags (client, server, local evaluation, bootstrapping), experiments, session replay privacy and cost, surveys, group analytics for B2B, the Vercel reverse proxy, EU/US data residency, and cost control.

Every factual claim in this skill traces to a downloaded primary source in references/research/raw/. Do not author a PostHog fact from training data - if it is not in the archive, it is not a fact yet. Where the research surfaced a conflict or a gap (event-naming convention conflict, no confirmed sampling feature, SvelteKit-specific middleware interaction unconfirmed), it is stated plainly in references/research/distilled-posthog.md rather than smoothed into a guess.

When to use this skill

• Installing PostHog into a SvelteKit app: client (posthog-js) init, server (posthog-node) init, CSP requirements
• Getting pageview tracking working correctly under SvelteKit's client-side router (the classic "SPA pageviews are broken" problem)
• Deciding autocapture vs manual events, or tuning/disabling autocapture
• Designing an event and property naming taxonomy
• Wiring identify()/alias() and reasoning about anonymous-to-identified user stitching
• Feature flags: client-side, server-side, local evaluation, or bootstrapping to avoid flicker
• Setting up or reading results from an experiment/A-B test
• Session replay: privacy masking configuration, or reasoning about replay cost
• Surveys: targeting, display conditions, response capture
• Group analytics for a B2B product (company/org/team-level analysis)
• Setting up a reverse proxy on Vercel to avoid ad-blocker interference
• Choosing EU vs US PostHog Cloud, or reasoning about GDPR/data-residency posture
• Reducing PostHog cost: event volume, autocapture tuning, billing limits

Progressive disclosure map

Load on demand; do not read everything up front.

Path	Load when
references/research/distilled-posthog.md	Verifying any PostHog claim fast, or resolving a conflict (see its Gaps section)
references/research/raw/	Tracing a claim to its primary source
guides/01-install-and-pageview-tracking.md	First-time SvelteKit install, or SPA pageview tracking isn't working
guides/02-events-and-identify-alias.md	Event/property naming, or identify/alias/anonymous-user stitching
guides/03-feature-flags-and-experiments.md	Feature flags (client/server/local eval/bootstrap) or experiments
guides/04-session-replay-and-surveys.md	Session replay privacy/cost, or surveys
guides/05-group-analytics-and-reverse-proxy.md	B2B group analytics, or the Vercel reverse proxy
guides/06-cost-control-and-data-residency.md	EU vs US cloud, GDPR, or reducing PostHog cost
references/client-init-and-pageview-tracking.md	Copy-paste +layout.js init + pageview tracking
references/server-capture-hooks-server.md	Copy-paste posthog-node server capture pattern
references/vercel-reverse-proxy.md	Copy-paste vercel.json rewrites (managed vs self-hosted)
references/feature-flag-bootstrap.md	Copy-paste server-evaluate-then-bootstrap pattern to avoid flag flicker
references/property-naming-table.md	Event/property naming field tables
references/env-var-checklist.md	Full env var table and region-consistency checklist

Known gaps - read before claiming these facts

• Event-naming convention conflict: PostHog's dedicated best-practices guide recommends category:object_action snake_case, but every other SDK doc's own code samples use [object] [verb] plain English. Not reconciled by PostHog itself. Full comparison: references/research/distilled-posthog.md §5.
• No confirmed PostHog-native sampling feature. Do not claim one exists. See references/research/distilled-posthog.md §14 and guides/06-cost-control-and-data-residency.md.
• SvelteKit hooks.server.ts interaction with vercel.json rewrites was not directly confirmed in research (only the Next.js middleware.ts case was documented). Treat as likely-fine, verify empirically. See references/research/distilled-posthog.md §12.

Quality bar

A PostHog task run through this skill is done when: the relevant guide(s) were read in order (not skipped), every factual claim used in the output traces to references/research/raw/, region consistency (EU/US) was checked across every endpoint touched, and - for anything development-focused - the Ship Gate below completed with user approval before commit or push.

Critical Directive

• You must read all files and context contained within your skill.
• In the event your core knowledge does not provide sufficient guidance you must make every attempt to search the internet, related knowledge base documentation files, and other available resources to supplement your knowledge prior to proceeding with your task.
• Additional related skills can be found here:
  • sentry-stinger - Error and exception tracking, performance tracing, and error-context session replay. PostHog owns product analytics, feature flags, experiments, and product-behavior session replay; Sentry owns crashes, unhandled exceptions, and performance traces. Both ship a replay feature: PostHog's is for understanding product usage, Sentry's is for reproducing a bug. Do not conflate the two.
  • devops-stinger - Vercel reverse proxy rewrites, CI/CD, and general deployment pipeline concerns. Consult when the reverse proxy setup needs to be wired into the app's broader deployment/CI configuration, not just PostHog's own vercel.json block.
  • security-stinger - Security audit pass, first gate of the Ship Gate pipeline below.
  • auth-stinger - Provider-agnostic authentication implementation. Consult when identify()/alias() timing needs to line up with the app's actual login/session flow, since PostHog's identity model assumes a stable ID sourced from auth.
  • ux-ui-svelte-stinger - Svelte 5 + SvelteKit UI enforcement. Consult when building a custom survey UI, a feature-flag-gated UI variant, or reasoning about where afterNavigate pageview-tracking code belongs in the component tree.

Ship Gate

Prior to committing any code to the repository you must utilize in order the security-stinger, quality-stinger, and github-repo-health-stinger. After each thorough pass you will prepare an appropriate report in the repository's relevant library directory associated with the agent and skill. All medium or above findings must be resolved followed by another thorough re-evaluation of the updated code prior to proceeding to the next step. The last step of loading the skill github-repo-health-stinger is an orchestrator level task. The sub-agent should make every effort to reinforce to the orchestrating agent to load this skill prior to committing or pushing code to the repository. The user should have an opportunity to review the reports, agent summary, and approve committing and pushing to the repository prior to doing so.