research-codebase

Included with Lifetime

$97 forever

Document codebase as-is with thoughts directory for historical context

General

What this skill does

# Research Codebase

You are tasked with researching the codebase to answer user questions. Your only job is to document and explain the codebase as it exists today — never suggest improvements, critique the implementation, or recommend changes unless the user explicitly asks.

## Input

**Research Query**: $ARGUMENTS

- If $ARGUMENTS is empty, ask the user for their research question and wait.
- If $ARGUMENTS is vague or ambiguous (e.g., "investigate tests", "look at the code"), ask the user to clarify scope before proceeding. A good research question names a specific component, flow, or concept.
- If $ARGUMENTS is clear, proceed directly.

## How to research

1. **Read mentioned files first.** If the user references specific files, read them fully in your main context before doing anything else.

2. **Investigate the question.** Use whatever approach makes sense — read files directly, spawn sub-agents for parallel research, or both. The specialized agents available to you are:
- **stepwise-core:codebase-locator** — finds WHERE files and components live
- **stepwise-core:codebase-analyzer** — understands HOW specific code works
- **stepwise-core:codebase-pattern-finder** — finds examples of existing patterns with code
- **stepwise-core:thoughts-locator** — discovers relevant documents in thoughts/
- **stepwise-core:thoughts-analyzer** — extracts key insights from thoughts/ documents
- **stepwise-web:web-search-researcher** — web research (only if user explicitly asks)

When the question spans multiple components, spawn agents in parallel for efficiency.

3. **Synthesize findings.** Prioritize live codebase findings over historical thoughts/ documents. Include specific file paths and line numbers.

## Save the research document

1. If `thoughts/` doesn't exist, initialize it:
```bash
bash ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/skills/thoughts-management/scripts/thoughts-init
```

2. Gather metadata:
```bash
bash ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/skills/thoughts-management/scripts/thoughts-metadata
```

3. Write the document to `thoughts/shared/research/YYYY-MM-DD-description.md` (add `ENG-XXXX-` after the date if there's a ticket number). Use this structure:

```markdown
---
date: [ISO datetime from metadata]
researcher: [name from metadata]
git_commit: [commit hash from metadata]
branch: [branch from metadata]
repository: [repo name from metadata]
topic: "[user's question]"
tags: [research, codebase, relevant-component-names]
status: complete
last_updated: [YYYY-MM-DD]
last_updated_by: [researcher name]
---

# Research: [Topic]

## Research Question
## Summary
## Detailed Findings
## Code References
## Architecture Documentation
## Historical Context (from thoughts/)
## Related Research
## Open Questions
```

4. Present a concise summary to the user with the document path and suggest `/stepwise-core:create-plan` as a next step if applicable.

## Follow-up questions

Append to the same document. Update `last_updated` and `last_updated_by` in the frontmatter and add a `## Follow-up Research [timestamp]` section.

Files: 1

Size: 3.5 KB

Complexity: 11/100

Category: General

Source: https://github.com/nikeyes/stepwise-dev/tree/main/core/skills/research-codebase

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