schlenks/brainstorming

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
• Focus on understanding: purpose, constraints, success criteria

Exploring approaches:

• Propose 2-3 different approaches with trade-offs
• Lead with your recommended option and explain why

Presenting the design:

• Present once you believe you understand what you're building
• Break into sections of 200-300 words, validate each
• 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-bd:using-git-worktrees to create isolated workspace
• Use superpowers-bd:writing-plans to create detailed implementation plan

Key Principles

• One question at a time; prefer multiple choice
• YAGNI ruthlessly -- remove unnecessary features
• Always propose 2-3 approaches before settling
• Present design in sections, validate each incrementally

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