Engineering

Skills I use daily for code work.

User-invoked

Reachable only when you type them (Claude Code: disable-model-invocation: true; Codex: policy.allow_implicit_invocation: false in agents/openai.yaml).

• ask-matt: Ask which skill or flow fits your situation. A router over the user-invoked skills in this repo.
• grill-with-docs: Grilling session that also builds your project's domain model, sharpening terminology and updating GLOSSARY.md and ADRs inline.
• triage: Move issues through a state machine of triage roles.
• improve-codebase-architecture: Scan a codebase for deepening opportunities, present them as a visual HTML report, then grill through whichever one you pick.
• setup-matt-pocock-skills: Configure this repo for the engineering skills (issue tracker, triage labels, domain doc layout). Run once per repo.
• to-spec: Turn the current conversation into a spec and publish it to the issue tracker.
• to-tickets: Break any plan, spec, or conversation into a set of tracer-bullet tickets, each declaring its blocking edges, whether as text in a local file or as native blocking links on a real tracker.
• implement: Build the work described by a spec or set of tickets, driving /tdd at pre-agreed seams and closing out with /code-review before committing.
• implement-spec: Implement a whole spec on one integration branch. Works the tickets as a task graph, running implementer subagents across the ready frontier for maximum concurrency, then closes out with /code-review.
• wayfinder: Plan a huge chunk of work (more than one agent session can hold) as a shared map of decision tickets on the issue tracker, resolved one at a time until the way to the destination is clear.
• retro: Suggest improvements to the coding agent's environment (navigation, automated checks, coding standards, steering files, tooling) after a session, most severe first.

Model-invoked

Model- or user-reachable (rich trigger phrasing so the model can reach for them).

• prototype: Build a throwaway prototype to answer a design question: a single shareable HTML file for state/logic, or several toggleable UI variations.
• diagnosing-bugs: Disciplined diagnosis loop for hard bugs and performance regressions: build a feedback loop that goes red on this bug → minimise → hypothesise → instrument → fix → regression-test.
• research: Investigate a question against high-trust primary sources and capture the findings as a cited Markdown file in the repo, run as a background agent.
• tdd: Test-driven development with a red-green-refactor loop. Builds features or fixes bugs one vertical slice at a time.
• domain-modeling: Actively build and sharpen a project's domain model by challenging terms, stress-testing with scenarios, and updating GLOSSARY.md and ADRs inline.
• codebase-design: Shared discipline and vocabulary for designing deep modules: small interfaces, clean seams, testable through the interface.
• code-review: Two-axis review of the diff since a fixed point: Standards (does it follow the repo's coding standards, plus a Fowler smell baseline?) and Spec (does it faithfully implement the originating issue/spec?), run as parallel sub-agents.
• pr: The shape a pull request body should take: a summary as the smallest visual that makes the change clear, before/after evidence that it works, and a merge-danger call (one-way or two-way door, plus blast radius).
• wizard: Generate an interactive bash wizard that walks a human through steps only they can perform: provisioning infrastructure, setting up credentials or CI secrets, walking an unfamiliar third-party dashboard, or running a one-off migration or cutover.