[IMPORTANT] Use

TaskCreate

to break ALL work into small tasks BEFORE starting — including tasks for each file read. This prevents context loss from long files. For simple tasks, AI MUST ATTENTION ask user whether to skip.

Critical Thinking Mindset — Apply critical thinking, sequential thinking. Every claim needs traced proof, confidence >80% to act. Anti-hallucination: Never present guess as fact — cite sources for every claim, admit uncertainty freely, self-check output for errors, cross-reference independently, stay skeptical of own confidence — certainty without evidence root of all hallucination.

AI Mistake Prevention — Failure modes to avoid on every task:

• Check downstream references before deleting. Deleting components causes documentation and code staleness cascades. Map all referencing files before removal.
• Verify AI-generated content against actual code. AI hallucinates APIs, class names, and method signatures. Always grep to confirm existence before documenting or referencing.
• Trace full dependency chain after edits. Changing a definition misses downstream variables and consumers derived from it. Always trace the full chain.
• Trace ALL code paths when verifying correctness. Confirming code exists is not confirming it executes. Always trace early exits, error branches, and conditional skips — not just happy path.
• When debugging, ask "whose responsibility?" before fixing. Trace whether bug is in caller (wrong data) or callee (wrong handling). Fix at responsible layer — never patch symptom site.
• Assume existing values are intentional — ask WHY before changing. Before changing any constant, limit, flag, or pattern: read comments, check git blame, examine surrounding code.
• Verify ALL affected outputs, not just the first. Changes touching multiple stacks require verifying EVERY output. One green check is not all green checks.
• Holistic-first debugging — resist nearest-attention trap. When investigating any failure, list EVERY precondition first (config, env vars, DB names, endpoints, DI registrations, data preconditions), then verify each against evidence before forming any code-layer hypothesis.
• Surgical changes — apply the diff test. Bug fix: every changed line must trace directly to the bug. Don't restyle or improve adjacent code. Enhancement task: implement improvements AND announce them explicitly.
• Surface ambiguity before coding — don't pick silently. If request has multiple interpretations, present each with effort estimate and ask. Never assume all-records, file-based, or more complex path.

Quick Summary

Goal: Create structured UI/UX design specification documents from requirements or PBIs for developer handoff.

Workflow:

1. Read Source — Extract UI requirements from PBI, story, or Figma URL
2. Determine Complexity — Quick Spec (sections 1-4) vs Full Spec (all 7 sections)
3. Build Component Inventory — List new vs existing components
4. Define States & Tokens — Interactions, design tokens, responsive breakpoints
5. Save Artifact — Output to

   team-artifacts/design-specs/

Key Rules:

• If Figma URL provided → auto-routes to

  /figma-design

  for context extraction
• If wireframe image provided → auto-routes to

  /wireframe-to-spec

  for structured analysis
• If screenshot provided → uses

  ai-multimodal

  for design extraction
• Reference existing design system tokens from

  docs/project-reference/design-system/

• Component patterns:

  docs/project-reference/frontend-patterns-reference.md

  (content auto-injected by hook — check for [Injected: ...] header before reading)
• Include accessibility requirements (keyboard nav, ARIA labels, contrast)

Be skeptical. Apply critical thinking, sequential thinking. Every claim needs traced proof, confidence percentages (Idea should be more than 80%).

Design Specification

Create structured UI/UX design specification documents from requirements or PBIs for developer handoff.

When to Use

• A PBI or user story needs a design spec before implementation
• Translating requirements into concrete UI layout, states, and tokens
• Documenting component inventory and interaction patterns
• Creating responsive breakpoint specifications

When NOT to Use

• This skill auto-routes Figma URLs to

  /figma-design

  and wireframes to

  /wireframe-to-spec

  — no need to call those skills separately
• Building the actual UI -- use

  frontend-design

• Full UX research and design process -- use

  ux-designer

• Reviewing existing UI code -- use

  web-design-guidelines

Prerequisites

Read before executing:

• The source PBI, user story, or requirements document

• docs/project-reference/design-system/

  -- project design tokens (if applicable)
• Existing design specs in

  team-artifacts/design-specs/

  for format consistency

Frontend/UI Context

When this task involves frontend or UI changes,

UI System Context — For ANY task touching

.ts

,

.html

,

.scss

, or

.css

files:

MUST ATTENTION READ before implementing:

1. docs/project-reference/frontend-patterns-reference.md

   — component base classes, stores, forms

2. docs/project-reference/scss-styling-guide.md

   — BEM methodology, SCSS variables, mixins, responsive

3. docs/project-reference/design-system/README.md

   — design tokens, component inventory, icons

Reference

docs/project-config.json

for project-specific paths.

• Frontend patterns:

  docs/project-reference/frontend-patterns-reference.md

• Styling/BEM guide:

  docs/project-reference/scss-styling-guide.md

• Design system tokens:

  docs/project-reference/design-system/README.md

Workflow

1. Read source input & route by type

   Input Detected	Detection	Action
   Figma URL	figma.com/design or figma.com/file in text	Activate /figma-design to extract context, then continue
   Image/screenshot	Image file attached to prompt	Use ai-multimodal to extract design guidelines, then continue
   Hand-drawn wireframe	Image + "wireframe"/"sketch" keyword	Activate /wireframe-to-spec to generate structured spec, then continue
   PBI/story text	Acceptance criteria present	Extract UI requirements from text, continue
   Verbal/text requirements	No image, no URL, no PBI	Clarify with user, then continue

   For ANY visual input: extract design context FIRST, then proceed to spec generation.

2. Determine spec complexity

   IF single form or simple component → Quick Spec (sections 1-4 only)
   IF full page or multi-component view → Full Spec (all 7 sections)
   IF multi-page flow → Full Spec + Flow Diagram
   

3. Build component inventory

   • List all UI components needed
   • Identify reusable vs feature-specific components
   • Note existing components from shared component library or design system

4. Define states and interactions

   • Default, hover, active, disabled, error, loading, empty states
   • User interactions (click, drag, keyboard shortcuts)
   • Transitions and animations

5. Extract design tokens

   • Colors, typography, spacing, shadows, border-radius
   • Reference existing design system tokens where possible

6. Document responsive behavior

   • Mobile (320-767px), Tablet (768-1023px), Desktop (1024px+)
   • What changes at each breakpoint (layout, visibility, sizing)

7. Save artifact

   • Path:

     team-artifacts/design-specs/{YYMMDD}-designspec-{feature-slug}.md

Output Format

# Design Spec: {Feature Name}

**Source:** {PBI/story reference}
**Date:** {YYMMDD}
**Status:** Draft | Review | Approved

## 1. Overview

{1-2 sentence summary of what this UI does}

## 2. Component Inventory

| Component | Type     | Source           | Notes                       |
| --------- | -------- | ---------------- | --------------------------- |
| UserCard  | New      | Feature-specific | Displays user avatar + name |
| DataTable | Existing | shared library   | Reuse with custom columns   |

## 3. Layout

{Description or ASCII wireframe of layout structure}

- Desktop: {layout description}
- Tablet: {layout changes}
- Mobile: {layout changes}

## 4. Design Tokens

| Token      | Value          | Usage                 |
| ---------- | -------------- | --------------------- |
| $primary   | #1976D2        | Action buttons, links |
| $text-body | 14px/1.5 Inter | Body text             |
| $gap-md    | 16px           | Section spacing       |

## 5. States & Interactions

| Element  | Default    | Hover      | Active     | Disabled         | Error |
| -------- | ---------- | ---------- | ---------- | ---------------- | ----- |
| Save btn | Blue/white | Darken 10% | Scale 0.98 | Gray/50% opacity | --    |

## 6. Accessibility

- Keyboard navigation order
- ARIA labels for interactive elements
- Color contrast compliance notes

## 7. Open Questions

- {Any unresolved design decisions}

Examples

Example 1: Simple form spec

Input: "Design spec for employee onboarding form"

Output: Quick Spec with sections 1-4 covering form fields (name, email, department dropdown, start date picker), validation rules, submit/cancel actions, and mobile stacking behavior.

Example 2: Complex dashboard spec

Input: "Design spec for recruitment pipeline dashboard with drag-and-drop columns"

Output: Full Spec covering Kanban board layout, candidate cards (component inventory), drag-and-drop interactions, column states (empty, populated, over-limit), filter bar, responsive collapse to list view on mobile, and accessibility for keyboard drag operations.

Related Skills

ux-designer

figma-design

frontend-design

interface-design

web-design-guidelines

Workflow Recommendation

MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION — NO EXCEPTIONS: If you are NOT already in a workflow, you MUST ATTENTION use

AskUserQuestion

to ask the user. Do NOT judge task complexity or decide this is "simple enough to skip" — the user decides whether to use a workflow, not you:

1. Activate

   design-workflow

   workflow (Recommended) — design-spec → code-review
2. Execute

   /design-spec

   directly — run this skill standalone

Closing Reminders

• MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION break work into small todo tasks using

  TaskCreate

  BEFORE starting
• MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION search codebase for 3+ similar patterns before creating new code
• MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION cite

  file:line

  evidence for every claim (confidence >80% to act)
• MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION add a final review todo task to verify work quality <!-- SYNC:ui-system-context:reminder -->
• MANDATORY IMPORTANT MUST ATTENTION read frontend-patterns-reference, scss-styling-guide, design-system/README before any UI change. <!-- /SYNC:ui-system-context:reminder --> <!-- SYNC:critical-thinking-mindset:reminder -->
• MUST ATTENTION apply critical thinking — every claim needs traced proof, confidence >80% to act. Anti-hallucination: never present guess as fact. <!-- /SYNC:critical-thinking-mindset:reminder --> <!-- SYNC:ai-mistake-prevention:reminder -->
• MUST ATTENTION apply AI mistake prevention — holistic-first debugging, fix at responsible layer, surface ambiguity before coding, re-read files after compaction. <!-- /SYNC:ai-mistake-prevention:reminder -->