review-a-design SKILL.md skillA

review-a-design from inkeep/open-knowledge is an agent skill: a SKILL.md folder an AI agent loads when a task calls for it.

Install it, pinned
mdr add inkeep/open-knowledge/review-a-design@git:20261014.adeb8b5

Pins git:20261014.adeb8b5 in mdr.lock. Pin the fingerprint instead.

Audit grade
A, 17 of 17 checks passed
Kind
SKILL.md skill
Repository
inkeep/open-knowledge
Path
packages/server/assets/skills/packs/software-lifecycle/review-a-design/SKILL.md
Versions recorded
5
Latest version
git:20261014.adeb8b5, committed Oct 14, 2026
First version recorded
Jul 31, 2026
Size
14,749 bytes
Repository stars
4,635
License
GPL-3.0

Reviews whether a design is SOUND — solving the right problem, derived from its stated goals and constraints — and emits ranked, evidence-backed findings, not edits. Read when asked to 'review this design', 'is this design sound', 'pressure-test this proposal', 'do a design review', 'does this solve the right problem', 'poke holes in this spec', 'should we build this', or to critique a proposal / spec / ADR / architecture or product decision. Do NOT read when the user wants to AUTHOR one of…

Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.

What the file says

# Review a design — is it sound, not just complete

The platform `/open-knowledge` skill still governs every markdown operation here (reads via `exec`, writes via `write`/`edit`, links as plain relative markdown, MCP owns in-scope `.md`); this skill layers design-review craft on top of it.

**Three reviews are not the same review, and only one is this skill's job.**

- **Completeness review** asks: is every section filled in? (Are Drawbacks and Alternatives non-empty?)
- **Correctness review** asks: are the individual claims true? (Does the benchmark really say 40ms? Is that API deprecated?)
- **Soundness review** asks: *should this be built at all, and is this the design that follows from the stated goals and constraints?*

You are doing the third. A proposal can be complete and factually correct and still be the wrong design — solving a symptom, chosen before its goals, engaging only strawman alternatives. Completeness and correctness are cheap to check and someone else's pass. Say this to the user up front if there's any ambiguity about what kind of review they want, then do soundness.
…

Read the whole file at its exact version.

How to install

The exact contents, by fingerprint
mdr add inkeep/open-knowledge/review-a-design@sha256:df99e49071d8715b

The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20261014.adeb8b5, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.

Badge

mdr badge

[![mdr](https://markdownregistry.com/badge/art_ol6dnafyq53mw62h.svg)](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_ol6dnafyq53mw62h)

4 badge image fetches in 30 days. What the badge shows.

Versions

The registry has recorded 5 versions of this file, between Jul 31, 2026 and Oct 14, 2026, about one every 19 days.

versioncommittedcommitsizeaudit
git:20261014.adeb8b5 latest2026-10-14 adeb8b5 14,749 BA view · diff
git:20260813.12a6ea22026-08-13 12a6ea2 14,728 BA view · diff
git:20260805.f3f8da42026-08-05 f3f8da4 14,761 BA view · diff
git:20260804.8471ed32026-08-04 8471ed3 14,763 BA view · diff
git:20260731.e3d6ce52026-07-31 e3d6ce5 14,795 BA view

Audit of the latest version

A  17 of 17 checks passed. Fixed automatic checks with no AI involved, so the same checks give the same answer every run.
  • pass: Frontmatter block present
  • pass: Frontmatter declares a name
  • pass: Frontmatter declares a description
  • pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (14749 bytes)
  • pass: No zero-width or bidi control characters
  • pass: No instruction hidden inside an HTML comment
  • pass: No link to an exfiltration or paste host
  • pass: No credential-shaped string
  • pass: No instruction to send local credentials anywhere
  • pass: No text hidden with inline styles
  • pass: No prompt-injection phrasing
  • pass: No curl or wget piped into a shell
  • pass: No recursive delete of root, home or parent
  • pass: No instruction to read or print local credentials
  • pass: No base64 blob over 200 characters
  • pass: No link to a raw IP address
  • pass: No script tag

Source

GitHub

inkeep/open-knowledge · 4,635 stars · license GPL-3.0 · pushed 2026-10-19 · branch main

API

GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_ol6dnafyq53mw62h
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=inkeep/open-knowledge/review-a-design
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/df99e49071d8715b246aee96462ce0275f0a95f758ac14a7fcc7e1be510e8480

Your AI assistant does the legwork. You hear about the deals worth your word. Hand yours the standing instructions at modelranch.com and it joins the network that reads files like this one.

Guides: the SKILL.md format and its required fields · what to check before you install a skill · how to pin a skill to an exact version · where to find agent skills · keeping a team on the same skills · which agent file does what.

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Every file in inkeep/open-knowledge

Other files named review-a-design

review-a-design SKILL.md skill
inkeep/open-knowledge-skills · skills/starter-packs/software-lifecycle/review-a-design/SKILL.md · Reviews whether a design is SOUND — solving the right problem, derived from its stated goals and constraints — and…
git:20261014.2bb8524 · audit A · 12 stars

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