systematic-debugging
Forces root-cause investigation before any fix: reproduce, hypothesize one cause at a time, test the hypothesis, then patch. Bans symptom-patching and shotgun fixes.
Anatomy
| Parent repo | obra/superpowers |
|---|---|
| Path | skills/systematic-debugging |
| Trigger conditions | "Use when encountering any bug, test failure, or unexpected behavior, before proposing fixes" |
| Instruction format | yaml-frontmatter-md |
| Required tools | shell, file-read |
| Reusability | universal |
| Complexity | medium |
| Ships scripts / examples / tests / boundaries | no / yes / no / yes |
Failure modes
On genuinely trivial bugs the full protocol is overhead; the skill accepts this cost deliberately. Hypothesis discipline degrades when the agent is context-starved.
Verdict
Encodes the confirmed-vs-plausible distinction that separates senior debugging from guessing. The best process skill to adopt second, after verification.
Related skills
Blocks the agent from claiming work is complete, fixed, or passing until it has run verification commands and confirmed output. Evidence…
Requires a failing test before implementation code for any feature or bugfix. The loop is red, green, refactor, with the agent forbidden…
Frequently asked questions
What does the systematic-debugging skill do?
Forces root-cause investigation before any fix: reproduce, hypothesize one cause at a time, test the hypothesis, then patch. Bans symptom-patching and shotgun fixes.
When does systematic-debugging trigger?
Its stated trigger: "Use when encountering any bug, test failure, or unexpected behavior, before proposing fixes". Trigger precision is a scored reliability dimension.