development-workflow.md

Development Workflow

The full pipeline from idea to production. Every step exists because skipping it caused a bug.

The Pipeline

Research → Plan → Test → Code → Review → Push

Not Code → Maybe Test → Push → Fix in Prod.

Step 0: Research & Reuse

Before writing ANY code:

1. Search for existing solutions — GitHub, npm, PyPI, crates.io
2. Read the docs — don't guess at API behavior
3. Check for prior art — someone probably solved this already
4. Prefer battle-tested libraries over hand-rolled solutions
5. If you find an 80% match, fork/wrap it — don't rewrite from scratch

Step 1: Plan

For any task that takes more than 30 minutes:

• Write down what you're building (1-3 sentences)
• List the files you'll change
• Identify dependencies and risks
• Break into phases if complex

Step 2: TDD

See testing.md for the full TDD workflow.

Step 3: Code

• Follow coding-style.md
• Follow security.md
• Small commits, each one compiles and passes tests

Step 4: Review

After writing code, review it yourself:

• Read every line of the diff
• Check for security issues
• Check for performance issues
• Check for edge cases
• Would a new team member understand this code?

Step 5: Push

See git-workflow.md for commit/PR conventions. The security hooks in this repo automate the pre-push checks.