brainstorming

You MUST use this before any creative work - creating features, building components, adding functionality, or modifying behavior. Explores user intent, requi...

Security Scan

This is an instruction-only brainstorming/design helper that coherently asks the agent to read the current project, interactively refine ideas, write a design doc, and optionally commit it to git — it requests no external credentials or installs and its actions match its stated purpose.

Purpose & Capability

The name/description (brainstorming and design) align with the instructions: understanding project context, proposing approaches, producing a design, writing a doc, and committing. There are no unrelated env vars, binaries, or installs requested.

Instruction Scope

SKILL.md explicitly instructs the agent to read the current project state (files, docs, recent commits), ask targeted questions, produce designs in 200–300 word sections, write to docs/plans/YYYY-MM-DD-<topic>-design.md, and commit the document to git. Those behaviors are coherent with a developer-facing design assistant, but they do involve reading repository contents and making repository changes — actions users should expect and control.

Install Mechanism

No install spec and no code files are present. Instruction-only skills have low install risk because nothing is written to disk by an installer.

Credentials

The skill declares no required environment variables, credentials, or config paths. The SKILL.md references other skills (e.g., elements-of-style, superpowers:using-git-worktrees), which is reasonable as optional integrations but do not create hidden credential requirements.

Persistence & Privilege

always is false and the skill does not request permanent system privileges. However, it instructs the agent to write files and commit to git (modifying the user's repository). Autonomous invocation is allowed by default — if the agent can run git commands autonomously it could perform those writes without interactive confirmation unless policies prevent it.

Assessment

This skill is coherent with its stated goal but it will read your repository and may write and commit design documents. Before installing or enabling it: (1) ensure you are comfortable with an agent reading project files and commits; (2) decide whether the agent should be allowed to run git commit operations autonomously — if not, restrict git access or require explicit confirmation; (3) back up important branches or require that the agent use a worktree/branch for changes; (4) be aware it may call other installed 'superpower' skills (e.g., writing-style or git helpers) — verify those skills' behaviors too; (5) if you want read-only brainstorming, instruct the agent not to perform commits or file writes.

Brainstorming Ideas Into Designs

Overview

Help turn ideas into fully formed designs and specs through natural collaborative dialogue.

Start by understanding the current project context, then ask questions one at a time to refine the idea. Once you understand what you're building, present the design in small sections (200-300 words), checking after each section whether it looks right so far.

The Process

Understanding the idea:

• Check out the current project state first (files, docs, recent commits)
• Ask questions one at a time to refine the idea
• Prefer multiple choice questions when possible, but open-ended is fine too
• Only one question per message - if a topic needs more exploration, break it into multiple questions
• Focus on understanding: purpose, constraints, success criteria

Exploring approaches:

• Propose 2-3 different approaches with trade-offs
• Present options conversationally with your recommendation and reasoning
• Lead with your recommended option and explain why

Presenting the design:

• Once you believe you understand what you're building, present the design
• Break it into sections of 200-300 words
• Ask after each section whether it looks right so far
• Cover: architecture, components, data flow, error handling, testing
• Be ready to go back and clarify if something doesn't make sense

After the Design

Documentation:

• Write the validated design to docs/plans/YYYY-MM-DD-<topic>-design.md
• Use elements-of-style:writing-clearly-and-concisely skill if available
• Commit the design document to git

Implementation (if continuing):

• Ask: "Ready to set up for implementation?"
• Use superpowers:using-git-worktrees to create isolated workspace
• Use superpowers:writing-plans to create detailed implementation plan

Key Principles

• One question at a time - Don't overwhelm with multiple questions
• Multiple choice preferred - Easier to answer than open-ended when possible
• YAGNI ruthlessly - Remove unnecessary features from all designs
• Explore alternatives - Always propose 2-3 approaches before settling
• Incremental validation - Present design in sections, validate each
• Be flexible - Go back and clarify when something doesn't make sense