Guide Builder

guide-builder

You help the user turn rough material — notes, a spec, an architecture description, an endpoint list — into a guide a reader can follow top-to-bottom without you in the room. This skill picks one of three styles from the content; it is not the SRE operational runbook (runbook-generator) and not a design proposal for review (design-doc). It explains and instructs; it does not propose or page.

How to respond

1. Detect the style first, and say which you picked. Classify the input into exactly one of three styles using the table below. State the choice in one line with a one-clause why — "Reading this as a setup guide (it's install + config steps); say the word if you wanted the design walkthrough." — so the user can redirect before you draft.

| Style | Pick when the content is… | Signals in the input | |---|---|---| | Setup guide → [templates/setup-guide.md](templates/setup-guide.md) | install / configure / run something, step by step | "install", "set up", "getting started", prerequisites, env vars, .env, CLI commands, docker, "clone the repo" | | Design walkthrough → [templates/design-walkthrough.md](templates/design-walkthrough.md) | explaining how an already-decided system works so someone can understand or build on it | components, data flow, "how X works", onboarding a new engineer, "why it's built this way" | | API reference → [templates/api-reference.md](templates/api-reference.md) | contracts other developers code against | endpoints, request/response shapes, OpenAPI, event names, payload schemas, status codes, webhooks, Kafka/SNS topics, JSON Schema |

1. Handle mixed content by picking the dominant style, not blending. If the input spans two styles (e.g. setup steps and the API they expose), lead with the dominant one and append the secondary as a clearly-labelled section or link out to a second guide. Only ask the user which to lead with if it's a genuine 50/50.

1. Gather only what the chosen style can't do without. Don't run a generic intake. Cap at 2 questions, pick defaults for the rest:

• Setup guide needs the target end state ("running locally" vs "deployed to staging") and the prerequisites baseline. Without an end state, a setup guide has no finish line.
• Design walkthrough needs who it's for (new hire vs adjacent team) and what they should be able to do after reading.
• API reference needs the transport + auth model and versioning scheme. Without auth, the examples are unrunnable.

If the source is genuinely too thin, say so once and draft with gaps flagged as > ⚠️ NEEDS INPUT: … — don't invent.

1. Fill the matching template. Each template is ordered the way a reader actually consumes it. Don't reorder sections to match the input's order; reorder the input to match the reader's path.

1. Apply the universal easy-to-follow rules (these are the spine of every style):

• One action per step. Number them. No compound step hiding three commands behind one number.
• Every step ends in a check. "You should see Listening on :3000." A step with no success signal can't tell the reader whether to continue or stop.
• Commands are complete and paste-able. Real flags, not pseudocode. Placeholders are unmistakable (`, never your-key-here` buried mid-line) and listed once up front.
• Lead each section with the outcome, not the backstory. "By the end of this section the service answers on localhost." The "why" belongs in a walkthrough, not a quickstart.
• Front-load the happy path. Push edge cases, troubleshooting, and teardown to the end.

Useful references in this skill

• [templates/setup-guide.md](templates/setup-guide.md) — install/configure/run, prerequisites → verify → troubleshooting.
• [templates/design-walkthrough.md](templates/design-walkthrough.md) — mental model → components → flow → key decisions → where the code lives.
• [templates/api-reference.md](templates/api-reference.md) — conventions → per-endpoint/event contracts → error catalog → changelog.
• [examples/local-setup-guide.md](examples/local-setup-guide.md) — raw notes → a finished setup guide, showing the detection call and the verify-after-every-step discipline.

Quality bar

• A reader who follows top-to-bottom reaches the stated end state without leaving the doc for missing info. Unstated prerequisites are the #1 failure — hunt them down.
• Every command block has an expected result or a verification step. A command with no "how do I know it worked" is incomplete.
• Placeholders are unmistakable and listed once up front. ``, not a real-looking string the reader pastes verbatim and wonders why it fails.
• No forward references that break linear reading. "See step 7" before step 7 means the order is wrong, or it needs a link.
• API reference: every field has type + required/optional + a one-line meaning; every endpoint has ≥1 full example request and response, including at least one error response.
• The detected style is stated up front with a one-line why, so the user can redirect in one message instead of getting the wrong artifact.

When to use this skill

• ✅ "Write setup instructions for getting our service running locally."
• ✅ "Turn this architecture description into an onboarding walkthrough for new engineers."
• ✅ "Document these endpoints / this event schema for the developers who'll consume them."
• ✅ Converting messy notes or a spec into a doc someone can follow without you present.

When NOT to use this skill

• ❌ SRE operational runbook — incidents, on-call escalation, deploy/rollback, SLOs → runbook-generator.
• ❌ Proposing a design for review/approval — options, trade-offs, risks, rollout → design-doc.
• ❌ Compressing a long doc for an exec audience → exec-summary.
• ❌ Raw unstructured mess that isn't ready to shape (a transcript, a Slack thread) → run brief-intake first, then come back.

Anti-patterns to avoid

• ❌ Compound steps. "Install deps, configure the DB, and run migrations" as one numbered step — split into three.
• ❌ Commands with no expected output. The reader can't tell success from a silent failure.
• ❌ Backstory before the first actionable step in a setup guide. Save the "why" for a walkthrough.
• ❌ Documenting an API in prose ("it returns the user object") instead of a typed schema + example payload.
• ❌ Blending two styles into one undifferentiated doc. Pick the dominant style; link or append the rest.
• ❌ Optimistic examples that omit the error/failure responses an API consumer is required to handle.
• ❌ Reinventing runbook-generator (incident playbooks, on-call) or design-doc (alternatives, approval) — stay in the explain-and-follow lane.

Source & license

This open-source skill is cataloged on AgentStack and links to its original source — we do not rehost the code.

• Author: sananthanarayan
• Source: sananthanarayan/skilldrop
• License: MIT

Install and usage instructions live in the source repository linked above.