Technical Design Quality Review
Review a technical design before implementation for boundaries, dependencies, failure modes, data consistency, security, performance, observability, compatibility, maintainability, and verification readiness. It produces TD-## findings and validation preparation; it does not review unsupplied code or approve architecture.
When to Use
- Use it for ADRs, component/data-flow designs, technical proposals, and non-functional constraints.
- Use it to identify failure paths, dependency assumptions, compatibility risks, and evidence gaps.
- Use it when an incomplete design still needs a bounded implementation-readiness pass.
Do not use it to run builds, tests, production probes, or choose a final architecture for a Human.
Output Format Options
- Use Markdown by default; when a table, CSV, or JSON is requested, preserve the same evidence, status, impact, owner, and validation fields.
- Do not present a structured format or static inventory as execution, pass, approval, or release evidence.
How to Use
- Read this Skill's primary prompt and provide the objective, scope, material, environment, and available evidence.
- Follow the prompt's input audit and output contract; deliver a bounded first pass when information is incomplete.
- Retain source, evidence status, impact, owner role, close condition, and validation method for every finding.
Workflow
- Read
prompts/technical-design-quality-review.mdand audit objective, version, scope, sources, and success criteria. - Classify input as
known,missing,conflicting,stale,out_of_scope, andassumptions. - Build a design-coverage matrix; bind each material gap to a
TD-##, minimum evidence, impact, priority, and validation method. - Separate facts, evidence-backed inferences, recommendations, and Human decisions; never upgrade a design claim to an implementation result.
- Deliver bounded conclusions and evidence actions when information is missing instead of filling gaps with generic architecture knowledge.
Core Constraints
- Do not review implementation that was not supplied or claim build, compatibility, security, or performance tests passed.
- Do not infer consistency, capacity, latency, SLOs, owners, or recovery behavior from component names.
- Each
TD-##includes topic, source/evidence, impact, priority, gap action, owner role, decision question, and validation method. - Design presence proves only that a document exists; execution evidence requires identity, time, environment, inputs, and raw results.
Reference Files
- Always read
prompts/technical-design-quality-review.mdbefore producing a review. - For regression, read
evals/eval.yamland its cases; a static design review is not system execution. - For trigger checks, use
evals/trigger-prompts.csvandevals/local-rules.json; without a selection trace reportBLOCKED.
Best Practices
- Prioritize high-impact gaps with a verifiable next action, using the smallest useful experiment or evidence request.
- Separate facts, evidence-backed inferences, recommendations, and Human decisions; never upgrade an assumption into a conclusion.
Delivery Checklist
- Complete the six input-audit categories and state design scope.
- Cover boundaries, dependencies/failures, data, security, performance, observability, compatibility, maintainability, and verification readiness.
- Give every
TD-##evidence, impact, owner, action, and validation method. - Separate design claims, evidence-backed inference, recommendations, and Human decisions.
- Do not present document presence or static checks as implementation/runtime results.
Common Pitfalls
- Checking that a diagram exists without checking boundaries, failures, or recovery.
- Treating “supports high concurrency” or “has monitoring” as a verification criterion.
- Turning technical recommendations into an approved architecture or release conclusion.