dev-guidelines_skill

Overview

This skill provides general development guidelines focused on code quality, best practices, and autonomous coding capabilities. It helps create, improve, and validate scripts and prototypes across Python, JavaScript/TypeScript, and Google Apps Script. The goal is readable, secure, and testable code with clear development flow and guardrails for safe autonomy.

How this skill works

The skill inspects code for readability, error handling, input validation, and security considerations. It follows a simple development flow: requirements, design, implementation, testing, documentation, and reporting. It can propose tooling, refactor existing scripts, implement prototypes, and run technical experiments while flagging actions that need approval.

When to use it

• Automating repetitive tasks or data workflows in Python or Google Sheets
• Refactoring or improving existing scripts for readability and error handling
• Prototyping new features or tooling for developer workflows
• Running technical experiments or proof-of-concepts safely
• Preparing code for production with tests and documentation

Best practices

• Keep functions small and single-purpose; prefer meaningful names
• Follow DRY: avoid duplication by extracting reusable logic
• Include input validation and robust error handling everywhere
• Write tests for critical paths and edge cases before deployment
• Document intent, assumptions, and required permissions for changes
• Flag any production, security-sensitive, or billing-impacting changes for approval

Example use cases

• Create a Python script that ingests CSV, validates rows, and outputs sanitized JSON
• Refactor a Node.js function into smaller units with added unit tests
• Build a Google Apps Script to automate spreadsheet reports and email summaries
• Prototype a CLI tool to batch-process files with clear error reporting
• Improve legacy automation by adding logging, retries, and input checks