sdd

Spec-Driven Development (SDD)

Structure for AI-assisted development

AI coding assistants are powerful but chaotic. You prompt, you get code, but then what? No documentation of decisions, no way to verify the code matches what you needed, and a codebase that's impossible to explain to teammates.

SDD brings structure to AI-assisted development. Every change starts with a spec, gets broken into a plan, and ends with verified implementation. Specialized agents handle each concern instead of one AI doing everything poorly.

Installation

claude plugin marketplace add https://github.com/LiorCohen/sdd
claude plugin install sdd

Quick Start

/sdd I want to initialize a new project              # Initialize a new project
/sdd I want to create a new feature                   # Create a spec
/sdd I want to approve the spec                       # Review spec, create plan
/sdd I want to approve the plan                       # Approve plan, enable implementation
/sdd I want to start implementing                     # Execute the plan
/sdd I want to verify the implementation              # Verify it matches the spec

Get started with the tutorial →

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How It Works

Specs Are the Source of Truth

Every change lives in a markdown specification before it lives in code:

changes/2026/01/15/user-auth/
├── SPEC.md    # What you're building (acceptance criteria)
└── PLAN.md    # How to build it (phased implementation)

Specs include frontmatter metadata, acceptance criteria in Given/When/Then format, and references to domain concepts.

Four Change Types

Type	Purpose	Structure
feature	New functionality	6 phases
bugfix	Fix existing behavior	4 phases
refactor	Restructure without changing behavior	4 phases
epic	Multiple features grouped under one goal	Child changes in changes/ subdirectory

Specialized Agents

Instead of one general-purpose AI, SDD uses 7 specialized agents:

Agent	Model	Purpose
api-designer	sonnet	Design OpenAPI contracts
backend-dev	sonnet	Node.js backend (CMDO architecture)
frontend-dev	sonnet	React components (MVVM architecture)
db-advisor	opus	Database performance review
devops	sonnet	Kubernetes, Helm, CI/CD, Testkube
tester	sonnet	Integration and E2E test automation
reviewer	opus	Code review and spec compliance

Commands

Command	Purpose
/sdd	Context-aware hub — reads project state and guides you
/sdd I want to create a new feature	Create new change spec
/sdd I want to import an external spec	Import changes from external spec
/sdd I want to approve the spec	Approve spec, create plan
/sdd I want to approve the plan	Approve plan, enable implementation
/sdd I want to start implementing	Execute implementation plan
/sdd I want to verify the implementation	Verify implementation matches spec
/sdd I want to generate config for local	Generate merged config for an environment
/sdd set up the database	Direct system operations via natural language
/sdd-help	Interactive tutor for SDD concepts

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Reducing Permission Prompts

SDD commands create many files. To reduce permission prompts, add this to your .claude/settings.local.json:

{
  "permissions": {
    "allow": [
      "Write(changes/**)",
      "Write(specs/**)",
      "Write(components/**)",
      "Edit(changes/**)",
      "Edit(specs/**)",
      "Edit(components/**)",
      "Bash(git *)",
      "Bash(npm *)"
    ],
    "deny": [
      "Write(.env*)",
      "Edit(.env*)"
    ]
  }
}

See Permissions Setup for full configuration options.

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Documentation

• Getting Started - First project tutorial
• Workflows - Feature, bugfix, and refactor workflows
• Commands - Full command reference
• Agents - What each agent does
• Components - Component types reference
• Configuration Guide - Config system details
• Permissions Setup - Reduce permission prompts

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Project Structure

When you run /sdd I want to initialize a new project, you get: