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Status:🚀 ACTIVE
Date:📅 unknown
Domain:📦 Drift Introspection Skills

SPEC-0001: Drift Introspection Skills

Overview

Drift detection and introspection capabilities for validating alignment between design artifacts (ADRs, specs) and implementation code. Provides a layered approach with a fast /design:check for targeted checks and a deep /design:audit for comprehensive analysis. See 📝 ADR-0001.

Requirements

Requirement: Quick Check Skill

The /design:check skill SHALL provide fast, focused drift detection against a specific file, directory, ADR, or spec target. It MUST operate in single-agent mode only (no --review flag). It MUST complete analysis without requiring the full project to be scanned.

Scenario: Check a specific file against its governing spec

  • WHEN a user runs /design:check src/components/Auth.tsx
  • THEN the skill SHALL identify the governing ADRs and specs for that file and produce a findings table showing any drift between the implementation and the design artifacts

Scenario: Check with no design artifacts present

  • WHEN a user runs /design:check in a project with no ADRs or specs
  • THEN the skill SHALL report that no design artifacts were found and suggest creating some with /design:adr or /design:spec

Scenario: Check an ADR against code

  • WHEN a user runs /design:check <a href="/decisions/ADR-0001-drift-introspection-skills" className="rfc-ref">📝 ADR-0001</a>
  • THEN the skill SHALL scan the codebase for implementations related to that ADR's decisions and report any drift

Requirement: Comprehensive Audit Skill

The /design:audit skill SHALL provide deep, comprehensive analysis covering all forms of drift: code-vs-spec, code-vs-ADR, ADR-vs-spec inconsistencies, coverage gaps, stale artifact detection, and policy violations. It MUST produce a structured report with prioritized findings.

Scenario: Full project audit

  • WHEN a user runs /design:audit
  • THEN the skill SHALL examine the entire project and produce a comprehensive report covering all analysis types with severity levels (critical, warning, info)

Scenario: Audit with team review

  • WHEN a user runs /design:audit --review
  • THEN the skill SHALL spawn a team with an auditor agent and a reviewer agent following the established handoff protocol with a maximum of 2 revision rounds

Scenario: Audit with no code to analyze

  • WHEN a user runs /design:audit in a project with ADRs and specs but no implementation code
  • THEN the skill SHALL report coverage gaps (unimplemented specs) without producing false drift findings

Requirement: Findings Output Format

Both skills MUST produce findings as structured markdown tables. Each finding MUST include a severity level (critical, warning, info), the affected file or artifact, and a concrete description of the mismatch. Findings MUST be specific enough for developers to act on, including file paths and line references where applicable.

Scenario: Findings table format

  • WHEN either skill completes analysis and finds drift
  • THEN the output SHALL include a markdown table with columns for Severity, Location, Finding, and Recommendation

Scenario: No drift found

  • WHEN either skill completes analysis and finds no drift
  • THEN the output SHALL confirm alignment and report the number of artifacts and files checked

Requirement: Analysis Types

The /design:audit skill MUST support the following analysis types. The /design:check skill SHOULD support code-vs-spec drift, code-vs-ADR drift, and ADR-vs-spec inconsistency checks.

Scenario: Coverage gap detection

  • WHEN /design:audit scans the project
  • THEN it SHALL identify areas of the codebase that have no governing ADR or spec

Scenario: Stale artifact detection

  • WHEN /design:audit scans the project
  • THEN it SHALL identify ADRs and specs whose status or content no longer reflects the current state of the codebase

Scenario: Policy violation detection

  • WHEN /design:audit scans the project
  • THEN it SHALL identify code that violates MUST, MUST NOT, or SHALL NOT constraints stated in specs