Planning software

Planning Software

Produces an orchestration plan from an approved enriched roadmap. The plan is the orchestrator's execution contract — it records the workflow tier, tracks chunk progress, and holds everything project-specific a fresh session needs to resume; the execution protocol itself lives in orchestrating-software-dev, which any resuming session loads.

The plan describes process (agent sequence, review perspectives, gates); the roadmap describes content (what to build in each chunk). Separate documents, separate owners — never duplicate roadmap content into the plan.

Inputs (request anything missing before proceeding): approved enriched ROADMAP.md; workflow tier (decided upstream by orchestrating-software-dev); project name; confirmation that PRD.md and ARCHITECTURE.md exist (referenced, not duplicated).

Outputs: ORCHESTRATION-PLAN.md (the workflow contract) and an empty append-only ORCHESTRATION-LOG.md, both in the project root.

Not covered: roadmap creation/enrichment, tier selection, the per-chunk execution protocol and log entry format (both defined in orchestrating-software-dev).

Workflow

Step 1: Read the enriched roadmap

Read ROADMAP.md completely. Note: total chunk count and IDs; phased (Thorough) or flat; parallel dispatch annotations; any chunk already in-progress.

Step 2: Determine plan depth from workflow tier

Tier	Plan depth
Quick	Short — no phases section, flat chunk list, no whole-project review step
Standard	Full — sequential chunks, whole-project review at end
Thorough	Full with phases — phase groupings, parallel dispatch annotations, whole-project review at end

Step 3: Write the orchestration plan

Populate the Template below:

• Header — project name, tier, date, pointers to upstream artefacts
• Upstream steps — mark all complete (they are done by the time this skill runs). Quick lists PRD + architecture only; Standard/Thorough add interface design, decomposition, enrichment.
• Build Progress — one todo per chunk, chunk-level only (no sub-steps); whole-project review entry for Standard/Thorough. Markers: [ ] not started, [~] in-progress, [x] complete.
• Execution — pointer to the per-chunk protocol plus the review perspectives resolved for this tier.
• Completion — Quick omits; Standard/Thorough point to Stage 9 (whole-project review and user emulation).
• Resumption Note — tells a fresh session how to find the current position.

Step 4: Initialise ORCHESTRATION-LOG.md

Create it with a header comment only — the entry format lives in orchestrating-software-dev:

# Orchestration Log

<!-- Append-only. Do not edit previous entries. -->

Template

Adapt to the workflow tier per the annotations.

# Orchestration Plan — [Project Name]

**Tier:** [Quick / Standard / Thorough]
**Created:** [YYYY-MM-DD]
**Roadmap:** ROADMAP.md
**PRD:** PRD.md
**Architecture:** ARCHITECTURE.md

---

## Upstream Steps

- [x] PRD — PRD.md
- [x] Architecture — ARCHITECTURE.md
[Standard/Thorough add:]
- [x] Interface Design — .interface-design/system.md (if project has UI)
- [x] Decomposition — ROADMAP.md (structure)
- [x] Enrichment — ROADMAP.md (executable)

---

## Build Progress

<!-- Update status markers as work proceeds: [ ] not started, [~] in-progress, [x] complete -->

- [ ] chunk-001: [name]
- [ ] chunk-002: [name]
[... repeat for all chunks ...]
[Standard/Thorough add:]
- [ ] Whole-project review

---

## Execution

For each chunk, in dependency order, run the Per-Chunk Execution Protocol from the orchestrating-software-dev skill.

**Review perspectives (resolved for this tier):**

[Quick:]
- spec-compliance

[Standard:]
- spec-compliance → code-quality → design-compliance (if system.md exists and chunk touches UI)

[Thorough:]
- spec-compliance → code-quality → design-compliance (if system.md exists and chunk touches UI) → security (if chunk handles user input or sensitive data)

---

## Completion

[Quick: omit this section]

[Standard/Thorough:]

After all chunks are marked complete, run Stage 9 (Completion Review — whole-project review, then user emulation) from the orchestrating-software-dev skill.

---

## Resumption Note

New session? Read this file. Find the first `[~]` or `[ ]` chunk in Build Progress. Resume from there using the Per-Chunk Execution Protocol from orchestrating-software-dev.

Edge Cases

Resuming mid-chunk: for a [~] chunk, check ORCHESTRATION-LOG.md for the last completed step, re-read the chunk from ROADMAP.md, and resume where the developer-agent left off.

Tier change after plan creation: do not modify an existing plan's tier mid-project. If scope expands significantly, note it in ORCHESTRATION-LOG.md and create a revised plan.

Parallel chunks (Thorough only): note parallelisable chunks in Build Progress (e.g., - [ ] chunk-003: [name] [parallel with chunk-004]); dispatch concurrently when file sets do not conflict.

Quick tier with security concern: override the spec-compliance-only default — load the security perspective for any chunk handling authentication, user input, or sensitive data.