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    Product Spec to Vertical Slices — MVP Build Plan & Walking Skeleton

    1

    Turns a PRD, product spec, or rough idea into a risk-weighted vertical-slice roadmap: what to build first, what to defer or cut, technical decisions to force early, and a walking skeleton that proves the architecture.

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    Product Spec to Vertical Slices — MVP Build Plan & Walking Skeleton

    Product Spec to Vertical Slices — MVP Build Plan & Walking Skeleton

    Example session with this skill installed

    Product: PalletLink — B2B wholesale order portal for specialty food distributors

    Buyers browse ~800 SKUs, cart, and place orders for weekly delivery.
    Hard lock: Monday 2:00pm local cutoff so warehouse can plan.
    Warehouse needs pick lists grouped by delivery route.
    Account managers need weekly order totals (no card payments in v1).
    QuickBooks invoice export is desired later, not first release.
    Non-goals: native mobile, driver GPS, multi-distributor marketplace.
    Team: 2 full-stack + part-time designer · ~8 week first release.
    Open: catch-weight pricing rule; late orders after cutoff?

    Ask: vertical-slice build plan, walking skeleton, MVP cut-line, spikes, handoff seeds.

    • Read your context and instructions
    • Compiled the product spec to
    • Generated the data export

    Vertical Slice Implementation Roadmap

    1. Spec Maturity Assessment

    FieldValue
    ModeSlice
    Maturity level3
    Blocking gapsCatch-weight pricing undecided; late-order policy undecided; auth only sketched
    Ready to sliceyes (with assumptions)

    2. Capabilities (excerpt)

    Catalog browse · Cart + place order · Cutoff lock · Route pick lists · AM weekly totals · QB export (later)

    3. Architecture hypothesis

    Web app + Postgres; server-enforced Monday 2pm cutoff in distributor timezone;
roles buyer / warehouse / AM; printable pick lists from locked orders;

    catch-weight estimate with optional pick adjustment after ops decision.

    Decision log (excerpt): catch-weight (estimate vs pick) · late orders (next window only) · auth (CSV-provisioned passwords for v1)

    4–5. Vertical slices & walking skeleton

    IDSliceEffortConfidenceMVP
    VS1Walking skeleton: login → catalog from DB → cart shellSHighBUILD
    VS2Cart + place order (pre-cutoff)MMediumBUILD
    VS3Monday 2pm hard lock (server time)MMediumBUILD
    VS4Route assignment + warehouse pick listLMediumBUILD
    VS5AM weekly totals dashboardMHighBUILD
    VS6Catch-weight pick adjustmentMLowDEFER
    VS7QuickBooks exportLMediumCUT (v1)

    Walking skeleton = VS1: real auth + catalog + deploy; stub cutoff/routes/picks.
    Retires “can we ship a secured catalog app?” risk first.

    6. Risk-weighted build order

    1. VS1 — retire deploy/auth/DB risk
    2. VS2 — core buyer value
    3. VS3 — launch-critical lock
    4. VS4 — warehouse can operate
    5. VS5 — commercial visibility
    6. VS6 — only after catch-weight spike
    7. VS7 — post-MVP finance

    7. MVP cut-line

    BUILD: VS1–VS5 · DEFER: catch-weight adjust, late-order override · CUT: QB, mobile, GPS, payments

    8–9. Spikes & checkpoints

    • Spike: cutoff TZ/DST fixtures → exit: boundary tests pass
    • Spike: ops workshop on catch-weight → exit: written rule
    • Checkpoint after VS3: any post-cutoff path in v1?
    • Checkpoint after VS5: schedule QB or not?

    10. Anti-patterns watched

    Avoid warehouse-first horizontal build; avoid gold-plating QuickBooks/payments in v1.

    11. Downstream handoff

    Phases: P1 orders live (VS1–2) · P2 cutoff+picks (VS3–4) · P3 pilot visibility (VS5)
    Backlog seeds: VS1–VS5 + spike tickets for TZ and catch-weight

    12. JSON

    Full Vertical Slice JSON: maturity, decision_log, slices[], build_order, risks,
    mvp_verdict per slice, handoff.phase_seeds / backlog_seeds, labeled assumptions

    product-spec-to-vertical-slices-mvp-buil.csv

    CSV · data export

    Generated

    Example file from a real run - the skill writes it into your workspace.

    Connects securely to your tools. The creator never sees your data.

    What you get

    Convert a PRD into an ordered vertical-slice implementation planShape a founder’s raw idea into a sliceable MVPCritique a horizontal or big-bang engineering plan and re-slice itDecide BUILD / DEFER / CUT before a fixed launch windowSurface architecture decisions and spikes before sprintiHand phase seeds and backlog seeds to later planning work

    About this skill

    The problem

    • Product specs and PRDs often become horizontal task lists (all database, then all API, then all UI) so nothing is demoable until the end.
    • Teams start coding without a walking skeleton, so integration and deploy risk explode mid-project.
    • MVP scope balloons because there is no explicit build / defer / cut line for the first release.
    • Technical choices (auth, pricing rules, third-party sync) stay implicit until they block delivery.

    What it does

    • Assesses spec maturity (levels 1–5) and chooses Slice, Shape, or Critique mode.
    • Decomposes capabilities and user journeys with clear value statements.
    • Proposes an architecture hypothesis and a technical decision log (options, trade-offs, decide-by).
    • Creates end-to-end vertical slices with layers touched, integration points, effort, confidence, validation, and acceptance criteria.
    • Defines the walking skeleton (what is real vs stubbed, which risk it retires).
    • Builds a typed dependency graph and a risk-weighted build order with one-line rationale per position.
    • Draws an MVP cut-line (BUILD / DEFER / CUT), spikes with exit criteria, decision checkpoints, and anti-pattern findings.
    • Outputs phase seeds, backlog seeds, and machine-readable JSON for downstream planning.

    Frameworks & tools

    • Stack-agnostic product and feature planning (web, B2B, internal tools, marketplaces).
    • Works from PRDs, feature briefs, Notion docs, or rough founder notes.
    • Compatible with Claude Code, Cursor, Codex CLI, OpenClaw, and other SKILL.md agents—no SaaS roadmap tool required.
    • Complements later sprint refinement and phase gating; this skill owns what/order/cut, not velocity math.

    Why this beats prompting it yourself

    • Enforces vertical slices and rejects pure layer tasks by design.
    • Forces a walking skeleton first instead of big-bang delivery.
    • Types dependencies (hard/soft × data/integration/knowledge/resource) so sequencing is defensible.
    • Separates BUILD vs DEFER vs CUT so “nice-to-have” does not sink the launch.
    • Requires spikes with exit criteria when confidence is low—no silent uncertainty.
    • Anti-fabrication: maturity gaps and assumptions are explicit; estimates stay relative.

    How to install

    Works the same in every agent - Claude, Cursor, Codex, Copilot and 20+ more.

    ~30 seconds
    1. 1

      Download the ZIP

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    2. 2

      Unzip into your skills folder

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    3. 3

      Ask your agent to use it

      Restart the agent if it was already running. It picks the skill up automatically - no config needed.

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