straymark-aidec

To document technical decisions and preserve trade-off rationale, you create a structured AIDEC record with YAML frontmatter metadata. It captures the chosen approach, alternatives with pros and cons, and the decision rationale to prevent knowledge loss during project evolution.

An AIDEC record is a structured engineering documentation file that preserves the reasoning behind a technical decision. You need to create one when selecting between libraries, frameworks, algorithms, data structures, or design patterns where trade-offs must be explicitly preserved for audit trails.

You generate a decision record template by providing a decision title, 2–3 alternatives, and the rationale for the chosen option. The Skill fills the template-based structure with id, title, created date, agent, confidence, and risk level metadata automatically.

Yes, the decision record system requires a `.straymark/config.yml` file to select the correct template and support language preferences. It also uses this configuration alongside automatic daily sequencing to compute the correct AIDEC sequence for today's entries.

AIDEC decision records are saved to the StrayMark decisions directory using a sequence-based filename. This ensures organized audit trails and allows teammates to discover past engineering decisions chronologically.

If your engineering documentation lacks an audit trail for architecture choices, you should start recording structured decision documents with context and consequences. Creating AIDEC records ensures the trade-off rationale behind design patterns and data structures is never lost.