Grounding Before Coding
by riekelte67b7af9ac74No license5 starsListed Oct 8, 2026Updated Oct 8, 2026Repository updated 3 weeks ago
Use when starting any non-trivial change, investigating a bug, or working in unfamiliar code - before the first line is written. Also use for pure investigation with no change planned yet - "dig into this", "figure out why", "sometimes the export is empty", intermittent errors after a deploy. Encodes the ground-first discipline: map the real code and data, quote evidence, never guess conventions. Use whenever a change or a conclusion is about to be built from belief instead of from the tree, even under time pressure.
Only the file list is public. File contents are available once the skill is installed in a workspace.
| Path | Size | Type |
|---|---|---|
| SKILL.md | 3.3 KB | text/markdown |
Source and attribution
Source:riekelt/principal-engineerinplugins/principal-engineer/skills/grounding-before-codingat commite67b7af
License: No license
Content belongs to its original authors. SourceWeft indexes it from a public repository.
More from riekelt/principal-engineer
Writing Unit Tests
riekelt
Guides writing and refactoring unit tests around behavior-first principles: one behavior per test, deterministic setup, boundary-only mocks.
Verifying Before Done
riekelt
Encodes verification as the definition of done: drive the change at its surface, run the verify command, and report results faithfully.
Testing Changes
riekelt
Guides which tests a behavior change owes, including regression tests, discriminating assertions and red-test handling.
Scoping Changes
riekelt
Guides agents on sizing fixes to their trigger, decomposing oversized work visibly, and driving approved plans to completion.
Principal Engineering
riekelt
Encodes evidence-over-theory engineering discipline, safety rules, and a pre-change checkpoint for non-trivial software work.
Operating Safely
riekelt
Encodes safety guards for destructive operations, secrets hygiene, and concurrent-session work on live systems.
More in Software Development
Playground
anthropics
Builds self-contained interactive HTML playgrounds with controls, live preview, and copyable prompt output.
M5 Onboard
anthropics
Provisions M5Stack ESP32 boards by detecting them on USB, flashing UIFlow 2.0 firmware, and installing a MicroPython app bundle.
Cardputer Buddy
anthropics
Guides iterating on a Cardputer-Adv MicroPython app bundle: adding apps, pushing files over USB-serial, tailing logs, and running REPL commands.
Web Design Guidelines
vercel-labs
Reviews UI code against Web Interface Guidelines fetched from a remote source and reports findings as file:line entries.
Vercel React Native Skills
vercel-labs
React Native and Expo best-practice rules covering list performance, animation, navigation, UI patterns, state, and monorepo setup.
Vercel React Best Practices
vercel-labs
Vercel's React and Next.js performance guidelines, organized as 70 rules for writing, reviewing, and refactoring code.