Use when the user asks for a blindspot pass or to find their unknown unknowns, or signals unfamiliarity with a domain, tool, or codebase area ("never used X", "first time doing Y", "no idea where to start", "don't know what I don't know") before working there. Turns unknown unknowns into known unknowns so the user can prompt well
npx skills add https://github.com/vinta/hal-9000 --skill blindspot
The user is about to work in territory they don't know. They may not know what questions to ask, what good looks like, what prior art exists, or which potholes are waiting. Survey the territory for them, then hand back a map they can prompt with.
This is not a tutorial (teach the minimum needed to prompt well) and not a plan (that comes after, from the sharpened prompt).
If the invocation doesn't already say, ask one AskUserQuestion round covering: what they're trying to do, and their familiarity with the involved domain, tool, or codebase area. Skip this step entirely when their prompt already answers both. Never stretch calibration into a full interview (that's the grilling skill's job).
Ground everything in current sources, not training data:
find-docs for current APIs and config. Add a WebSearch for pitfalls ("X gotchas", "X common mistakes"): pitfalls live in issue threads and post-mortems, not getting-started docs. For terrain dominated by one tool's setup choices, delegate the sweep to the best-practices skill instead. It covers both halves with parallel subagents.WebSearch for how practitioners judge quality in this domain.Report compactly, in this order:
End with:
AskUserQuestion, stress-test with the grilling skill, prototype, or enter plan modeGuide for creating high-quality MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers that enable LLMs to interact with external services through well-designed tools. Use when building MCP servers to integrate external APIs or services, whether in Python (FastMCP) or Node/TypeScript (MCP SDK).
Automatically creates user-facing changelogs from git commits by analyzing commit history, categorizing changes, and transforming technical commits into clear, customer-friendly release notes. Turns hours of manual changelog writing into minutes of automated generation.
Use when implementation is complete, all tests pass, and you need to decide how to integrate the work - guides completion of development work by presenting structured options for merge, PR, or cleanup
Guide for creating high-quality MCP (Model Context Protocol) servers that enable LLMs to interact with external services through well-designed tools. Use when building MCP servers to integrate external APIs or services, whether in Python (FastMCP) or Node/TypeScript (MCP SDK).
React Native and Expo best practices for building performant mobile apps. Use when building React Native components, optimizing list performance, implementing animations, or working with native modules. Triggers on tasks involving React Native, Expo, mobile performance, or native platform APIs.
React and Next.js performance optimization guidelines from Vercel Engineering. This skill should be used when writing, reviewing, or refactoring React/Next.js code to ensure optimal performance patterns. Triggers on tasks involving React components, Next.js pages, data fetching, bundle optimization, or performance improvements.
Next.js best practices - file conventions, RSC boundaries, data patterns, async APIs, metadata, error handling, route handlers, image/font optimization, bundling
Use when starting feature work that needs isolation from current workspace or before executing implementation plans - creates isolated git worktrees with smart directory selection and safety verification
Take vinta/blindspot from the repository into ~/.claude/skills for personal
use, or into .claude/skills inside a project.
The agent identifies a skill by the name field in its header. Two skills with the
same name cannot sit side by side — one of them will be ignored.