writing-plans

To create a comprehensive implementation plan, you start from an existing spec and outline all files touched, tests to write, docs to check, and commits to make. The plan enforces a fixed structure to ensure complex engineering projects are fully accounted for before coding begins.

The best way to structure task breakdown documentation is by enforcing a consistent plan structure that covers files, tests, docs, and commits. This ensures traceability and reproducibility across complex engineering workflows before implementation starts.

You ensure traceability for implementation plans by saving them to a standard location like docs/plans/YYYY-MM-DD-<feature-name>.md. This standardized naming convention allows you to track feature documentation chronologically within your repository.

Yes, this planning workflow requires an existing feature spec to start. It specifically targets engineering projects where a spec already exists, guiding the touchpoints across files, tests, docs, and commits based on that specification.

Yes, you can use this implementation planning approach in a dedicated worktree. The workflow is designed to follow a reproducible, task-by-task flow within a worktree, ensuring isolated and structured development for complex features.

The limitation of using a fixed plan structure for software documentation is that it strictly enforces a standardized format. Projects lacking a clear spec or requiring highly flexible, unstructured workflows may find the rigid plan structure restrictive for their implementation needs.