super-brainstorm

A design interview clarifies vague ideas by enforcing a plan-mode workflow that asks one question at a time. It scans your codebase and docs to ground decisions, resolving architectural constraints step-by-step before generating a validated specification document for review.

Yes, you can use plan-mode for system architecture refactoring. The structured interview process applies to feature design, system architecture, refactors, and greenfield projects, traversing the design-tree to resolve decisions before writing a formal spec to your docs/plans directory.

To write a technical spec for a greenfield project, initiate a design interview that performs a deep context scan of existing docs and recent commits. This grounds the architecture decisions and outputs a clearly scoped, validated specification file before any coding starts.

The best way to gather requirements before coding is through an ultrathink-driven interview that surfaces hidden dependencies and constraints. This disciplined design work ensures clarity and testability by generating a formal specification saved for review prior to implementation.

Yes, the design interview process works without external dependencies. It relies entirely on deep context scanning of your existing codebase, documentation, and recent commits to generate validated specifications, requiring no additional components or external libraries.

You should not use a structured design specification workflow for tasks requiring immediate, undiscined implementation rather than validated design work. If your task does not benefit from deep context scanning, design-tree traversal, or formal spec generation, skip the plan-mode interview.