ade-workflow

ADE — Agent-Driven Engineering

A Claude Code plugin implementing Anthropic's recommended 3-agent harness for long-running application development.

Based on: Harness Design for Long-Running Apps

How It Works

/ade:plan "Build a task management app"
    → Planner researches context, asks questions with suggested answers
    → Creates a plan scaled to scope (app, feature, task, bug)
    → You review and approve

/ade:execute
    → Generator implements deliverables one by one
    → Evaluator tests and scores each against rubrics
    → They iterate until all criteria pass

/ade:done
    → Archives the completed plan

Three Agents

Agent	Role	Key Behavior
Planner	Interactive planning	Researches → asks questions → writes plan scaled to scope
Generator	Implementation	Builds deliverable-by-deliverable, commits to git
Evaluator	Adversarial QA	Scores against rubrics with hard thresholds, can't modify code

Planning at Any Scale

The planner adapts to the scope of the work:

Scope	Examples	Questions	Plan Structure
Large	Full app, new product	3-5+	Phased features + user stories
Medium	New feature, integration	1-3	Deliverables + acceptance criteria
Small	Bug fix, task, refactor	0-1	Goal + what to change + done when

The planner always researches before asking questions — exploring the codebase for existing projects or searching for similar products for greenfield work.

Architecture

Skills are the source of truth for methodology. Agents are thin execution shells that reference skills for guidance.

skills/          → methodology, knowledge, the "why" and "how"
agents/          → execution shells that read skills
commands/        → user-facing entry points that invoke agents
rubrics/         → evaluation criteria with scored thresholds
testing-tools/   → testing configurations for the evaluator

Pluggable Rubrics

Default rubrics in rubrics/:

• frontend-design.md — UI quality, originality, craft, functionality
• code-architecture.md — separation of concerns, clarity, error handling, testability
• api-quality.md — API design, responses, validation, security
• ux-flows.md — flow coherence, edge cases, information architecture, feedback

Add custom rubrics by dropping .md files in .ade/rubrics/ in your project. Project rubrics override plugin defaults with the same filename.

Pluggable Testing Tools

Default tools in testing-tools/:

• playwright.md — browser testing via Playwright MCP (auto-configured, falls back to curl)
• api-tester.md — HTTP endpoint testing via curl
• unit-test-runner.md — test suite execution (auto-detects framework)

Add custom tools by dropping .md files in .ade/testing-tools/ in your project.

Configuration

Project settings in .claude/ade.local.md:

---
commits_style: conventional    # conventional | jira
---

Commands

Command	Description
/ade:plan [anything]	Research, ask questions, create plan scaled to scope
/ade:execute	Launch Generator + Evaluator team
/ade:done	Archive completed plan
/ade:status	Show build progress

Install

Inside a Claude Code session, add the marketplace:

/plugin marketplace add alexsds/ade-workflow

Then install the plugin:

/plugin install ade@alexsds-ade-workflow

Or run /plugin to open the interactive plugin manager.

Why This Architecture

Anthropic's research found:

• Planning stays high-level — micro-detail errors cascade through implementation
• Separate evaluator — self-evaluation bias makes agents praise mediocre work
• Adversarial stance — evaluators must hunt for failures, not confirm correctness
• Graded scoring with hard thresholds — pass/fail is not rigorous enough
• No sprint contracts — unnecessary with Opus 4.6
• No context isolation — Opus 4.6 handles compaction without context anxiety

License

MIT