planning-and-task-breakdowncommit 8300e1bSKILL.md · Task Breakdown
Planning and Task Breakdown
Breaks work into small, ordered tasks with acceptance criteria and verification steps, saved as a plan document and task list.
npx skills add addyosmani/agent-skills --skill planning-and-task-breakdownCommand selected. Copy it manually.
- Permissions
- read-repo
- write-files
- shell
- network
- Compatible with
- Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Copilot, Gemini CLI
- GitHub
- 112.3k
- Source
- Community · Addy Osmani
- Status
- Scan passed
- License
- MIT
- Category
- Task Breakdown
Core rule
Every task must be small enough to implement, test and verify in one focused session, with explicit acceptance criteria.
Execution Phases
Phase 01Enter plan mode
In read-only mode, read the spec and relevant code, note patterns, dependencies, risks and unknowns; write no code.
Phase 02Map and slice
Draw the dependency graph, order bottom-up, and slice vertically by complete feature path rather than by database, API and UI layers.
Phase 03Write tasks
Give each task a description, acceptance criteria, verification, dependencies, likely files and size; split anything L or larger.
Phase 04Order and checkpoint
Satisfy dependencies, put high-risk tasks early, and add a verification checkpoint every 2–3 tasks.
Phase 05Save and confirm
Save to tasks/plan.md and tasks/todo.md (or the designated tracker), never overwriting an incomplete plan, and get human approval.
Permissions (summarised from SKILL.md)
| Capability | Needed | Details |
|---|---|---|
| File writes | Limited | Writes only tasks/plan.md and the task list (default tasks/todo.md); no code during planning. |
| Command execution | Not required | Test and build commands are written into each task's verification, not run during planning. |
| Network outbound | Limited | Only when the project or user designates an external tracker (e.g. GitHub Issues, Jira, Linear), to create task items there. |
SKILL.md frontmatter (YAML)
---
name: planning-and-task-breakdown
description: Breaks work into ordered tasks. Use when you have a spec or clear requirements and need to break work into implementable tasks. Use when a task feels too large to start, when you need to estimate scope, or when parallel work is possible.
---