speckit-plan
dceoy/speckit-agent-skills
Execute implementation planning workflows to generate design artifacts from feature specifications.
What is speckit-plan?
Speckit-plan is a workflow skill that guides you through structured implementation planning using templates. It reads your feature specification, executes a multi-phase design process (research, data modeling, contract definition), and generates design artifacts in your spec-kit project. Use this when you need to plan a feature before coding.
- Validates spec-kit project structure and loads feature specifications
- Executes pre-execution extension hooks if configured in .specify/extensions.yml
- Generates research.md by resolving unknowns and documenting technology decisions
- Creates data-model.md with entities, fields, relationships, and validation rules
- Defines interface contracts for external-facing APIs, CLIs, or services
- Produces quickstart.md with runnable validation scenarios
How to install speckit-plan
npx skills add https://github.com/dceoy/speckit-agent-skills --skill speckit-plan- Spec-kit project with .specify/ directory structure
- Feature specification file (FEATURE_SPEC) already created
- Optional: .specify/extensions.yml for custom pre/post-execution hooks
How to use speckit-plan
- 1.Run the skill with optional guidance for the planning phase as an argument
- 2.The skill will check for and execute any pre-plan hooks from .specify/extensions.yml
- 3.Review the generated research.md with resolved unknowns and technology decisions
- 4.Examine the data-model.md for entities and validation rules
- 5.Check the contracts/ directory for interface definitions (if applicable)
- 6.Review quickstart.md for end-to-end validation scenarios
- 7.Post-execution hooks will run automatically before completion
Use cases
- Planning a new feature by researching unknowns and documenting design decisions before implementation
- Generating data models and API contracts for a feature to align team understanding
- Creating validation guides that prove a feature works end-to-end
- Organizing design artifacts in a spec-kit project structure for downstream implementation tasks
- Developers using spec-kit project structure
- Teams planning features with formal design documentation
- Projects requiring pre-implementation research and contract definition
speckit-plan FAQ
Speckit-plan enforces a structured workflow with specific phases (research, design, contracts) and integrates with your spec-kit project's constitution and extension hooks, ensuring consistency and traceability across your feature planning.
No. The skill identifies unknowns as 'NEEDS CLARIFICATION' in the Technical Context phase, then Phase 0 researches and resolves them before proceeding to design.
The contracts/ generation step is skipped for purely internal projects (build scripts, one-off tools). The skill will still generate data-model.md and quickstart.md.
Yes. You can register pre-plan and after-plan hooks in .specify/extensions.yml to inject custom steps or validations before and after the workflow.
The skill will report the parser error and tell you that no hooks were checked, then continue with the normal planning workflow.
Full instructions (SKILL.md)
Source of truth, from dceoy/speckit-agent-skills.
name: "speckit-plan" description: "Execute the implementation planning workflow using the plan template to generate design artifacts." argument-hint: "Optional guidance for the planning phase" compatibility: "Requires spec-kit project structure with .specify/ directory" metadata: author: "github-spec-kit" source: "templates/commands/plan.md" user-invocable: true disable-model-invocation: false
User Input
$ARGUMENTS
You MUST consider the user input before proceeding (if not empty).
Pre-Execution Checks
Check for extension hooks (before planning):
- Check if
.specify/extensions.ymlexists in the project root. - If it exists, read it and look for entries under the
hooks.before_plankey - If the YAML cannot be parsed or is invalid, do not skip silently: tell the user that
.specify/extensions.ymlcould not be read (include the parser error) and that no hooks were checked, including any mandatory (optional: false) hooks registered there, then continue normally - Filter out hooks where
enabledis explicitlyfalse. Treat hooks without anenabledfield as enabled by default. - For each remaining hook, do not attempt to interpret or evaluate hook
conditionexpressions:- If the hook has no
conditionfield, or it is null/empty, treat the hook as executable - If the hook defines a non-empty
condition, skip the hook and leave condition evaluation to the HookExecutor implementation
- If the hook has no
- When constructing command invocations from hook command names, replace dots (
.) with hyphens (-). For example,speckit.git.commit→/speckit-git-commit. - For each executable hook, output the following based on its
optionalflag:-
Optional hook (
optional: true):## Extension Hooks **Optional Pre-Hook**: {extension} Command: `/{command}` Description: {description} Prompt: {prompt} To execute: `/{command}` -
Mandatory hook (
optional: false):## Extension Hooks **Automatic Pre-Hook**: {extension} Executing: `/{command}` EXECUTE_COMMAND: {command} Wait for the result of the hook command before proceeding to the Outline.After emitting the block above you MUST actually invoke the hook and wait for it to finish before continuing. Run it the same way you would run the command yourself in this agent/session (the invocation may differ from the literal
{command}id shown above, e.g. a skills-mode agent runs it as/skill:speckit-...or$speckit-...). Emitting the block alone does not run the hook.
-
- If no hooks are registered or
.specify/extensions.ymldoes not exist, skip silently
Outline
-
Setup: Run
.specify/scripts/bash/setup-plan.sh --jsonfrom repo root and parse JSON for FEATURE_SPEC, IMPL_PLAN, FEATURE_DIR, BRANCH. For single quotes in args like "I'm Groot", use escape syntax: e.g 'I'''m Groot' (or double-quote if possible: "I'm Groot"). -
Load context: Read FEATURE_SPEC and
.specify/memory/constitution.md. Load IMPL_PLAN template (already copied). -
Execute plan workflow: Follow the structure in IMPL_PLAN template to:
- Fill Technical Context (mark unknowns as "NEEDS CLARIFICATION")
- Fill Constitution Check section from constitution
- Evaluate gates (ERROR if violations unjustified)
- Phase 0: Generate research.md (resolve all NEEDS CLARIFICATION)
- Phase 1: Generate data-model.md, contracts/, quickstart.md
- Re-evaluate Constitution Check post-design
Mandatory Post-Execution Hooks
You MUST complete this section before reporting completion to the user.
Check if .specify/extensions.yml exists in the project root.
- If it does not exist, or no hooks are registered under
hooks.after_plan, skip to the Completion Report. - If it exists, read it and look for entries under the
hooks.after_plankey. - If the YAML cannot be parsed or is invalid, do not skip silently: tell the user that
.specify/extensions.ymlcould not be read (include the parser error) and that no hooks were checked, including any mandatory (optional: false) hooks registered there, then continue to the Completion Report. - Filter out hooks where
enabledis explicitlyfalse. Treat hooks without anenabledfield as enabled by default. - For each remaining hook, do not attempt to interpret or evaluate hook
conditionexpressions:- If the hook has no
conditionfield, or it is null/empty, treat the hook as executable - If the hook defines a non-empty
condition, skip the hook and leave condition evaluation to the HookExecutor implementation
- If the hook has no
- When constructing command invocations from hook command names, replace dots (
.) with hyphens (-). For example,speckit.git.commit→/speckit-git-commit. - For each executable hook, output the following based on its
optionalflag:-
Mandatory hook (
optional: false) — You MUST emitEXECUTE_COMMAND:for each mandatory hook:## Extension Hooks **Automatic Hook**: {extension} Executing: `/{command}` EXECUTE_COMMAND: {command}After emitting the block above you MUST actually invoke the hook and wait for it to finish before continuing. Run it the same way you would run the command yourself in this agent/session (the invocation may differ from the literal
{command}id shown above, e.g. a skills-mode agent runs it as/skill:speckit-...or$speckit-...). Emitting the block alone does not run the hook. -
Optional hook (
optional: true):## Extension Hooks **Optional Hook**: {extension} Command: `/{command}` Description: {description} Prompt: {prompt} To execute: `/{command}`
-
Completion Report
Command ends after Phase 1 design. Report branch, IMPL_PLAN path, and generated artifacts.
Phases
Phase 0: Outline & Research
-
Extract unknowns from Technical Context above:
- For each NEEDS CLARIFICATION → research task
- For each dependency → best practices task
- For each integration → patterns task
-
Generate and dispatch research agents:
For each unknown in Technical Context: Task: "Research {unknown} for {feature context}" For each technology choice: Task: "Find best practices for {tech} in {domain}" -
Consolidate findings in
research.mdusing format:- Decision: [what was chosen]
- Rationale: [why chosen]
- Alternatives considered: [what else evaluated]
Output: research.md with all NEEDS CLARIFICATION resolved
Phase 1: Design & Contracts
Prerequisites: research.md complete
-
Extract entities from feature spec →
data-model.md:- Entity name, fields, relationships
- Validation rules from requirements
- State transitions if applicable
-
Define interface contracts (if project has external interfaces) →
/contracts/:- Identify what interfaces the project exposes to users or other systems
- Document the contract format appropriate for the project type
- Examples: public APIs for libraries, command schemas for CLI tools, endpoints for web services, grammars for parsers, UI contracts for applications
- Skip if project is purely internal (build scripts, one-off tools, etc.)
-
Create quickstart validation guide →
quickstart.md:- Document runnable validation scenarios that prove the feature works end-to-end
- Include prerequisites, setup commands, test/run commands, and expected outcomes
- Use links or references to contracts and data model details instead of duplicating them
- Do not include full implementation code, model/service/controller bodies, migrations, or complete test suites
- Keep this artifact as a validation/run guide; implementation details belong in
tasks.mdand the implementation phase
Output: data-model.md, /contracts/*, quickstart.md
Key rules
- Use absolute paths for filesystem operations; use project-relative paths for references in documentation
- ERROR on gate failures or unresolved clarifications
Done When
- Plan workflow executed and design artifacts generated
- Extension hooks dispatched or skipped according to the rules in Mandatory Post-Execution Hooks above
- Completion reported to user with branch, plan path, and generated artifacts
Related skills
More from dceoy/speckit-agent-skills and the wider catalog.

speckit-specify
Generate feature specifications from natural language descriptions using Spec Kit project structure.

speckit-tasks
Generate dependency-ordered, actionable tasks.md from design artifacts in spec-kit projects.

speckit-taskstoissues
Convert tasks into dependency-ordered GitHub issues from design artifacts.

claude-command-converter
Convert Claude Code commands to portable Agent Skills format for multi-runtime compatibility.
dex
Manage tasks via dex CLI. Use when breaking down complex work, tracking implementation items, or persisting context across sessions.
dex-plan
Create dex task from markdown planning documents (plans, specs, design docs, roadmaps)