autodev

Autonomous Dev Kit

Autonomous Dev Kit is a complete software development workflow for your coding agents, built on top of a set of composable "skills" and some initial instructions that make sure your agent uses them.

How it works

It starts from the moment you fire up your coding agent. As soon as it sees that you're building something, it doesn't just jump into trying to write code. Instead, it steps back and asks you what you're really trying to do.

Once it's teased a spec out of the conversation, it shows it to you in chunks short enough to actually read and digest.

After you've signed off on the design, your agent puts together an implementation plan that's clear enough for an enthusiastic junior engineer with poor taste, no judgement, no project context, and an aversion to testing to follow. It emphasizes true red/green TDD, YAGNI (You Aren't Gonna Need It), and DRY.

Next up, once you say "go", it launches a subagent-driven-development process, having agents work through each engineering task, inspecting and reviewing their work, and continuing forward. In capable hosts, agents can work autonomously for long stretches without deviating from the plan you put together.

There's a bunch more to it, but that's the core of the system. And because the skills trigger automatically, you don't need to do anything special. Your coding agent just has Autonomous Dev Kit.

Autonomous Dev Kit originated as a fork of Jesse Vincent's Superpowers repo.

Installation

Note: Installation differs by platform. Claude Code or Cursor have built-in plugin marketplaces. Codex can use the open skills CLI (npx skills add) or manual setup. OpenCode, Hermes Agent, and Zed currently use manual setup.

Zed Agent

Zed's June 2026 Skills docs require each skill to be a direct child of ~/.agents/skills/ (global) or <worktree>/.agents/skills/ (project-local). Use ADK's Zed installer rather than the namespace symlink used by some other hosts.

macOS/Linux:

# Clone the autodev repository
git clone https://github.com/GoCodeAlone/autonomous-dev-kit.git ~/.agents/autodev

# Link each ADK skill into Zed's flat skills root
~/.agents/autodev/scripts/install-zed.sh

WSL2 with Windows-native Zed: run the same Bash installer from WSL. It detects WSL and, when /mnt/c/Users/<linux-user> exists, copies the skills into the Windows profile path Zed scans: /mnt/c/Users/<linux-user>/.agents/skills (C:\Users\<user>\.agents\skills). If your Windows username differs from your WSL username, pass it explicitly:

~/.agents/autodev/scripts/install-zed.sh --skills-root /mnt/c/Users/<WindowsUser>/.agents/skills --copy --force

Windows (PowerShell):

git clone https://github.com/GoCodeAlone/autonomous-dev-kit.git "$env:USERPROFILE\.agents\autodev"
& "$env:USERPROFILE\.agents\autodev\scripts\install-zed.ps1"

Add this once to Zed personal instructions (~/.config/zed/AGENTS.md, or %APPDATA%\Zed\AGENTS.md on Windows):

# Autonomous Dev Kit host declaration
Host: zed-agent
When reading ADK skills, follow host-neutral instructions and `<host: zed-agent>` blocks. Ignore host blocks for claude-code, codex, opencode, cursor, and hermes-agent unless explicitly running that External Agent instead of Zed Agent.

For project-local install instead of global install, run from a trusted project worktree:

git clone https://github.com/GoCodeAlone/autonomous-dev-kit.git .autodev-kit
.autodev-kit/scripts/install-zed.sh --scope project --project-root .

Windows PowerShell:

git clone https://github.com/GoCodeAlone/autonomous-dev-kit.git .autodev-kit
& ".\.autodev-kit\scripts\install-zed.ps1" -Scope Project -ProjectRoot .

Project-local Zed skills are written under <worktree>/.agents/skills/ and load only after Zed trusts the worktree.

Then open Zed's AI > Skills page or start a new Zed Agent thread and ask help me plan this feature. Skills live-reload; start a fresh thread if the catalog was already cached.

If Zed says no global skills are installed after the installer reports success:

1. In Zed, open AI > Skills, choose the User tab, and click Create Skill.

2. Note the directory Zed says it will write the skill to. That is the global skills root Zed is actually scanning.

3. Rerun the installer with that exact path:

   ~/.agents/autodev/scripts/install-zed.sh --skills-root /exact/path/from/zed --copy --force
   

   & "$env:USERPROFILE\.agents\autodev\scripts\install-zed.ps1" -SkillsRoot "C:\exact\path\from\zed" -Copy -Force
   

This usually means the installer ran under a different home directory than Zed uses, such as MSYS/Git Bash, a remote shell, or another sandboxed environment. For WSL2 with Windows-native Zed, use the WSL-aware Bash installer or the explicit /mnt/c/Users/<WindowsUser>/.agents/skills command above.