gsd-spike

A disposable spike is a short, timeboxed experiment that validates the technical viability of a proposed approach by producing temporary artifacts to test a hypothesis, which are then discarded after the spike concludes.

Define a clear spike question, establish explicit success criteria, execute the experiment in a timeboxed environment, measure results, and perform a tidy wrap-up with cleanup to discard any temporary artifacts.

Use a timeboxed spike when you need to validate technical viability or check feasibility before committing to full implementation, allowing you to learn from disposable artifacts without the overhead of production-ready code.

Before starting a feasibility spike, you need a clearly defined spike question, explicit success criteria, an execution environment, and a tidy wrap-up and cleanup plan to ensure the disposable artifacts are properly discarded.

No, a viability spike produces disposable artifacts that are discarded after the experiment concludes, meaning no long-term maintenance is required once the technical viability has been validated and learnings are recorded.

A disposable spike focuses on short, timeboxed validation with explicit cleanup, whereas a standard proof-of-concept may evolve into production code; spikes emphasize learning and immediate discard of artifacts over reuse.