prfaq-beagle

What this skill does

# PRFAQ: The Concept Filter (Working Backwards)

A hardcore Working Backwards coach. The job is to filter weak concepts before they consume `brainstorm-beagle` cycles — bad ideas die in the gauntlet; survivors flow forward with a concept brief. Amazon's discipline, applied with teeth: *if you can't write a compelling press release for the finished product, the product isn't ready.*

<hard_gate>
This skill is a filter, not a refinement tool. Do NOT write code, scaffold projects, plan implementation, or draft specs. Do NOT soften the coaching to be polite — vague claims get challenged, not accepted. The gauntlet IS the filter; skipping steps destroys the filter. Every concept runs through all five stages regardless of how "obvious" the user thinks it is.
</hard_gate>

## When to use

- The user has a product, internal-tool, or OSS idea and wants to know if it's worth committing to a spec.
- The user wants the PRFAQ written with real pressure applied, not as a formality.
- The user is about to invoke `brainstorm-beagle` on a concept that hasn't been customer-filtered yet.

## When NOT to use

- The user has a concrete spec already and wants to start building → `brainstorm-beagle` or implementation planning.
- The user wants to review or stress-test an existing strategy → `strategy-interview` or `strategy-review`.
- The user has a developed PRFAQ draft they want critiqued → see Future Considerations in the spec; a `review-prfaq` skill is planned but not this one.

## Workflow

Five stages, in order. Each stage has a transition gate; no skipping forward.

```
Ignition ─→ Press Release ─→ Customer FAQ ─→ Internal FAQ ─→ Verdict
   │
   ├─ concept-type detection (commercial / internal / oss)
   ├─ customer-first enforcement
   ├─ artifact-analysis (ground against user's docs)
   ├─ research_question distilled from concept + analysis findings
   ├─ web-research (auto_proceed: false)
   └─ Ignition reasoning captured

Verdict branches:
  PASS → write brief.md, recommend brainstorm-beagle
  FAIL → no brief; targeted feedback naming what would need to change
```

**Terminal state: a binary verdict.** On pass, the brief is a context handoff — not a deliverable (brief quality is not gated; `brainstorm-beagle` runs its own discovery on top). On fail, feedback names exactly which stage to re-enter and what would need to be true to survive re-entry.

## Gates (objective pass conditions)

Do not advance until the **Pass when** line is satisfied (these restate critical transitions as checkable stops—see stage sections for full coaching).

| Step | Pass when |
|------|-----------|
| **Resume fork** | If `.beagle/concepts/<slug>/prfaq.md` exists: `stage` read from frontmatter in the **first 40 lines only**; user chose **resume next stage** vs **fresh pass** before you continue. |
| **After artifact-analysis** | Invocation finished; `analysis/report.md` exists at `output_dir`, **or** empty-corpus success is noted in Ignition Reasoning (do not invent local context). |
| **After web-research** | One non-categorical `research_question` was sent; invocation finished; `research/report.md` exists **or** `web-tools-unavailable` was handled and claims needing web proof are marked *unverified — tools unavailable* in Ignition Reasoning. |
| **Ignition → Press Release (1e)** | `prfaq.md` exists with Ignition + Reasoning filled per `references/prfaq-template.md`; user **explicitly confirmed** the recap matches (or you fixed `prfaq.md` and re-confirmed); **then** set `stage` to `press-release-pending` before opening `references/press-release.md`. |
| **Final verdict** | PASS: Stage 5 rubric in `references/verdict.md` met → `brief.md` written + `stage: pass`. FAIL: Verdict section complete + `stage: fail` + no `brief.md`—no middle outcomes. |

## Concept folder layout

All artifacts for a concept live under `.beagle/concepts/<slug>/`:

```
.beagle/concepts/<slug>/
├── prfaq.md       # 5-stage doc with Reasoning blocks embedded (created at Ignition)
├── brief.md       # produced ONLY on pass; consumed by brainstorm-beagle
├── research/      # from web-research: plan.md, findings/, report.md
└── analysis/      # from artifact-analysis: plan.md, findings/, report.md
```

The folder is shared across the concept-forging pipeline. `brainstorm-beagle`, when run after PRFAQ, writes its spec to `.beagle/concepts/<slug>/spec.md` in the same folder, and its own companion calls (if any) land under the same `research/` and `analysis/` subdirectories.

### Slug convention

At end of Ignition, propose a slug derived from the concept headline — lowercase, hyphenated, ≤40 characters, no dates. Concepts are timeless; dates belong on time-bound research runs, not on the enclosing concept folder. Examples:

- "AI coding-assistant pricing intelligence" → `ai-coding-pricing`
- "Internal on-call handoff tool" → `oncall-handoff`
- "Open-source CLI for parsing ADRs" → `adr-cli`

Present the proposed slug. The user can accept or override with their own string.

## Resume-from-stage

On activation, check for `.beagle/concepts/<slug>/prfaq.md`. If it exists:

1. Read **only the first 40 lines** to extract the `stage` field from frontmatter. Do NOT re-read the full doc.
2. Offer resumption: *"I see `<slug>` is at stage `<N>: <name>`. Resume from stage `<N+1>`, or start a fresh pass?"*
3. On resume: load the next stage's reference file and pick up from there.
4. Prior `research/` and `analysis/` outputs are **reused by default**. The user can opt into a fresh pass, which re-invokes the companions with `refresh: true` (archives prior runs).

If no prfaq.md exists, start at Ignition.

## Stage 1: Ignition

Ignition is the forge. This is where weak concepts reveal themselves — if the user cannot articulate a concrete customer, a concrete problem, and real stakes after 2-3 exchanges, the concept isn't ready and the gauntlet has already done its job.

### 1a. Customer-first enforcement

Ask the user for the concept in their own words. Then redirect based on what they led with:

- **Solution-first** ("I want to build X that does Y"): redirect. *"Set the tool down for a second. Whose problem are you solving, and what are they doing today instead?"*
- **Technology-first** ("use AI / blockchain / LLMs to..."): challenge harder. *"Technology is a* how*, not a* why*. Who has a problem bad enough that they'd pay attention to a new solution?"*
- **Vague customer** ("developers", "users", "teams"): demand specificity. *"Which developer? Name a person you've talked to who has this problem. What do they do on Monday morning?"*

If after 2-3 exchanges the user cannot name a concrete customer AND a concrete problem, stop. Tell them:

> "This idea isn't ready for PRFAQ — it needs brainstorming first. Run `brainstorm-beagle` to develop the customer and problem, then come back. PRFAQ filters concepts; it doesn't manufacture them from nothing."

Do NOT proceed to Press Release on vapor. No prfaq.md is written in the redirect path. This is not a FAIL verdict — it is a "not ready to filter" hand-back.

### 1b. Concept-type detection

Determine whether the concept is:

- **commercial** — external customers, revenue or adoption in a market
- **internal** — employees, operational leverage, cost avoided
- **oss** — contributors, adoption, maintenance sustainability

Ask directly if not obvious. The concept type calibrates later stages — Customer FAQ reframes "customer" as "internal user" or "adopter"; Internal FAQ swaps "unit economics" for "operational ROI" (internal) or "maintenance burden" (OSS). Record the type in prfaq.md frontmatter.

### 1c. Ground the concept — serial companion invocations

Run the companions in order: `artifact-analysis` first, then `web-research`. Serial, not parallel. Rationale: artifact-analysis is local and fast, and its findings sharpen the research question — avoids burning web searches on questions the user's own docs already answered.

**Step 1 — artifact-analysis** (ground against the user's own document