photostructure/coding-skills/tpp

Work on TPP

Documented in depth: Claude Code has amnesia. So do PRs, changelogs, and your future self.

A Technical Project Plan (TPP) is a living handoff document: it carries research, design decisions, failed approaches, and next steps across sessions, so the next session (or the next engineer) continues instead of restarting.

Work the referenced TPP to completion: start from its current phase and keep going until every task's acceptance test passes and every box under Current phase is checked.

Required Reading First

Before any work, you MUST read:

• The project's instructions: AGENTS.md, plus CLAUDE.md when present
• The project's TPP guide: docs/TPP-GUIDE.md if it exists; otherwise the

bundled reference TPP-GUIDE.md

Process

1. Read the referenced TPP. It will live in _todo/, in a priority folder

(_active/, _p1/…_p4/), or in a documented feature integration queue matching _feat-<name>/ if this project uses them.

1. Identify the current phase from its Next: line and unchecked boxes.
2. Work through the open tasks and phases without checking in. Put status notes

in the same message as your next action.

1. As each task's acceptance test passes, tick it in the TPP and record

discoveries — gotchas, rejected approaches, and the _why_ behind decisions, not a transcript.

Stop and ask the user only when:

• a decision is open that neither the TPP nor the code settles;
• the TPP contradicts what you find in the code;
• the next action deletes data, force-pushes, or changes anything outside the

repository.

When context runs low before the work is done, invoke the handoff skill rather than letting the session end silently. When the TPP is complete, move it to _done/.

Adapting for your project

• Create a project `docs/TPP-GUIDE.md` (start from the bundled reference)

and tailor the layout, frontmatter fields, and template to your conventions — the project guide always takes precedence over the bundled copy.

• Extend the required reading list with your high-value docs

(DESIGN-PRINCIPLES.md, TDD.md, architecture decisions). Every listed file is read on every invocation, so keep it short.

• Automate durable reminders portably. Put the TPP update requirement in

the repository's AGENTS.md, or use a supported project hook or automation that prompts the coding agent to update the active TPP before a task ends.