Feature Lifecycle Skill for Claude

Feature Lifecycle Skill

Phase-gated feature workflow: DESIGN > PLAN > IMPLEMENT > VALIDATE > RELEASE. Each phase must pass its gate before the next begins.

Phase Routing

Determine which phase to execute based on feature state:

• If .feature/ exists, check current phase:

   python3 ~/.claude/scripts/feature-state.py status

Route to the phase indicated by the state machine.

• If no feature state exists, determine entry point from user intent:
• "design", "think through", "explore approaches" -> DESIGN
• "plan", "break down", "create tasks" -> PLAN (requires completed design)
• "implement", "execute plan", "start building" -> IMPLEMENT (requires completed plan)
• "validate", "quality gates", "check feature" -> VALIDATE (requires completed implementation)
• "release", "merge", "ship it" -> RELEASE (requires passed validation)
• "end to end", "full lifecycle", "from scratch" -> DESIGN (start from beginning)

• Load the phase reference for the current phase:
• DESIGN: Read references/design.md
• PLAN: Read references/plan.md
• IMPLEMENT: Read references/implement.md
• VALIDATE: Read references/validate.md — run quality gate commands, do not reason about whether they would pass. Paste exit codes and output.
• RELEASE: Read references/release.md
• END-TO-END: Read references/pipeline.md

• Follow the loaded reference exactly. Each reference contains the full phase instructions, gates, and checkpoints.

State Conventions

Read references/shared.md for directory structure, state management commands, context loading rules, and naming conventions. All state operations go through python3 ~/.claude/scripts/feature-state.py -- never manipulate state files directly.

Phase Ordering

DESIGN -> PLAN -> IMPLEMENT -> VALIDATE -> RELEASE
  |         |         |           |          |
  v         v         v           v          v
design.md plan.md  impl.md   report.md  PR merged

Each phase produces an artifact consumed by the next. Skipping phases is not supported because downstream phases depend on artifacts from earlier phases.

Reference Loading Table

| Signal | Load These Files | Why |

|---|---|---|

| Phase 1 DESIGN: idea to design document | design.md | Loads detailed guidance from design.md. |

| errors, error handling | error-handling.md | Loads detailed guidance from error-handling.md. |

| Phase 3 IMPLEMENT: dispatching task waves to domain agents | implement.md | Loads detailed guidance from implement.md. |

| running the full design-to-release pipeline | pipeline.md | Loads detailed guidance from pipeline.md. |

| Phase 2 PLAN: decomposing design into wave-ordered tasks | plan.md | Loads detailed guidance from plan.md. |

| Phase 5 RELEASE: PR merge, tagging, worktree cleanup | release.md | Loads detailed guidance from release.md. |

| feature state directory layout, naming, write protection | shared.md | Loads detailed guidance from shared.md. |

| Phase 4 VALIDATE: running quality gates | validate.md | Loads detailed guidance from validate.md. |

Error Handling

| Error | Cause | Solution |

|-------|-------|----------|

| Phase mismatch | User requests phase N but state is at phase M | Report current state, suggest correct next phase |

| Missing artifact | Previous phase did not produce expected output | Route back to previous phase |

| Gate failure | Phase requirements not met | Report what failed, suggest fixes |

References

| Task Signal | Load |

|-------------|------|

| Phase routing (design/plan/implement/validate/release) | Phase reference (design.md, plan.md, implement.md, validate.md, release.md) |

| End-to-end or full pipeline | references/pipeline.md |

| State commands, directory structure, naming | references/shared.md |

| Error, failure, blocked, gate fail, retry, deviation | references/error-handling.md |

• references/design.md -- Design phase: explore requirements, discuss trade-offs
• references/plan.md -- Plan phase: break design into wave-ordered tasks
• references/implement.md -- Implement phase: dispatch tasks to domain agents
• references/validate.md -- Validate phase: run quality gates
• references/release.md -- Release phase: merge, tag, cleanup
• references/pipeline.md -- End-to-end orchestration across all phases
• references/shared.md -- State conventions shared across all phases
• references/error-handling.md -- Recovery patterns for phase errors, gate failures, agent dispatch failures