capturing-ideas

Capture New Idea

Purpose

This skill captures user ideas exactly as stated, without interpretation, enhancement, or reformulation. Ideas are stored in .wrangler/ideas/ directory for future consideration and refinement.

Core Principle

PRESERVE USER'S EXACT WORDING - Do not:

• Rephrase or enhance the idea
• Add technical details
• Interpret what the user "meant to say"
• Convert to requirements or specifications
• Add implementation suggestions

The idea artifact type exists to capture raw thoughts before they undergo refinement into specifications or issues.

When to Use

Use this skill when the user:

• Suggests a feature or improvement casually
• Mentions "it would be nice if..."
• Says "I've been thinking about..."
• Proposes something without concrete details
• Shares a rough concept or vision
• Wants to "capture this for later"

DO NOT use for:

• Detailed feature requests (use writing-specifications skill)
• Bugs or issues (use creating-issues skill)
• Concrete implementation tasks (use writing-plans skill)
• Ideas that are already refined into specs

Process

1. Extract User's Exact Words

Identify the core idea from the user's message. Use their exact phrasing where possible.

Example:

• User says: "It would be cool if users could export their data as PDF"
• Title: "Export data as PDF"
• Description: "It would be cool if users could export their data as PDF"

2. Create Idea Using MCP Tool

Call the issues_create MCP tool with:

issues_create({
  title: "Short, clear title from user's words",
  description: "User's idea in their own words (verbatim or lightly formatted)",
  type: "idea",
  status: "open",
  priority: "medium",  // Default unless user indicates urgency
  labels: [],  // Add contextual labels if obvious (e.g., ["ui", "export"])
  // Leave assignee, project, wranglerContext empty unless specified
})

3. Field Guidelines

title (required):

• Extract core concept from user's statement
• Keep concise (under 50 characters ideal)
• Use user's terminology, not technical jargon
• Example: "Dark mode option" not "Implement theme switching system"

description (required):

• Use user's exact words when possible
• If user provided multiple sentences, keep them all
• Add minimal formatting (line breaks, bullets) for readability only
• NO interpretation, NO enhancement, NO technical details
• Template: See IDEA_TEMPLATE.md

type: Always "idea"

status: Always "open" (ideas start as open until reviewed)

priority:

• "low" - Nice to have someday
• "medium" - Default for most ideas
• "high" - User explicitly emphasizes importance
• "critical" - Rarely used for ideas (only if user says "we really need this")

labels (optional):

• Add only obvious, non-interpretive labels
• Examples: ["ui"], ["mobile"], ["export"], ["performance"]
• Avoid speculative labels like ["backend"] unless user mentioned it

assignee, project, wranglerContext: Leave empty unless user explicitly specifies

Examples

Example 1: Simple Feature Idea

User says: "I think we should add keyboard shortcuts for common actions"

Create idea:

issues_create({
  title: "Keyboard shortcuts for common actions",
  description: "I think we should add keyboard shortcuts for common actions",
  type: "idea",
  status: "open",
  priority: "medium",
  labels: ["ui", "accessibility"]
})

Example 2: Performance Concern

User says: "The app feels slow when loading large datasets. Maybe we could add pagination or lazy loading?"

Create idea:

issues_create({
  title: "Improve performance with large datasets",
  description: `The app feels slow when loading large datasets. Maybe we could add pagination or lazy loading?`,
  type: "idea",
  status: "open",
  priority: "medium",
  labels: ["performance"]
})

Example 3: High Priority Idea

User says: "We really need offline support - customers keep asking for it and it's affecting sales"

Create idea:

issues_create({
  title: "Offline support",
  description: "We really need offline support - customers keep asking for it and it's affecting sales",
  type: "idea",
  status: "open",
  priority: "high",
  labels: ["feature"]
})

Example 4: Vague Concept

User says: "What if we made the UI more playful?"

Create idea:

issues_create({
  title: "Make UI more playful",
  description: "What if we made the UI more playful?",
  type: "idea",
  status: "open",
  priority: "low",
  labels: ["ui", "design"]
})

What Happens to Ideas

Ideas stored in .wrangler/ideas/ can later be:

1. Refined into specifications - Use writing-specifications skill to develop the idea
2. Converted to issues - Use issues_update to change type: "idea" to type: "issue"
3. Archived - Close or delete ideas that are no longer relevant
4. Grouped - Add project field to group related ideas

Anti-Patterns

DON'T enhance the user's idea:

// ❌ WRONG - Adding details not mentioned by user
issues_create({
  title: "Implement OAuth2 authentication with JWT tokens",
  description: "Add OAuth2 authentication using industry-standard JWT tokens with refresh token rotation...",
  type: "idea"
})

// ✅ CORRECT - User's actual words
issues_create({
  title: "Better login system",
  description: "Users are complaining about having to log in too often",
  type: "idea"
})

DON'T convert to requirements:

// ❌ WRONG - Turning idea into requirements
issues_create({
  title: "Search functionality",
  description: `Requirements:
- Full-text search across all fields
- Real-time results
- Autocomplete suggestions
- Filter by date range`,
  type: "idea"
})

// ✅ CORRECT - Keeping it as an idea
issues_create({
  title: "Better search",
  description: "It's hard to find things - we need better search",
  type: "idea"
})

Template Reference

See IDEA_TEMPLATE.md for the structure of idea descriptions.

Verification

After creating the idea:

1. Confirm the idea was created successfully
2. Note the ID assigned (e.g., "000042")
3. Inform user: "Captured your idea as #000042 in .wrangler/ideas/"
4. DO NOT start implementing or planning - ideas are for capture only

Transition to Implementation

When an idea is ready for implementation:

1. User decides to pursue the idea
2. Use writing-specifications skill to create a detailed spec (new artifact)
3. OR use issues_update to convert idea to issue
4. OR use writing-plans skill to break into implementation tasks

Ideas remain raw capture until deliberately refined.