Skip to content
Feature Forge

Ask forge-guide

Every other forge skill does something — writes a PRD, generates specs, runs the loop. forge-guide is the exception: it explains. Reach for it when you have a question about the pipeline rather than a stage to run.

/feature-forge:forge-guide
/feature-forge:forge-guide <topic>

When to reach for it

Section titled “When to reach for it”

Ask forge-guide when you want to understand rather than execute:

  • What is feature-forge, and should I use it for this? — the mental model, and when the pipeline is worth its overhead versus when to skip it.
  • How do I set it up? — forge-init vs forge-bootstrap, and the forge.config.json knobs that matter.
  • How does the pipeline actually work? — the stage-by-stage flow and what each produces.
  • What are the best practices? — verifying before the loop, keeping backlog items self-contained, when to /clear, and the common gotchas to avoid.
  • Something’s stuck — where do I look? — troubleshooting starters for the loop, stale stages, and dirty working trees.

An optional topic argument focuses the answer: overview, when, setup, config, stages, verify, context, epics, loop, or troubleshoot.

How it differs from the navigator

Section titled “How it differs from the navigator”

Both orient you, but at different altitudes:

  • forge (the navigator) is feature-specific: it reads a feature’s state and tells you where that feature stands and what to run next.
  • forge-guide is pipeline-general: it explains how forge works and how to use it well — no feature required.

Use the navigator to drive a feature; use forge-guide to learn the pipeline.

Grounded, not guessed

Section titled “Grounded, not guessed”

forge-guide answers from the project’s own canonical docs — the process overview, shared conventions, config schema, and these pages — rather than from memory, so its guidance stays current as the pipeline evolves. It never edits files or runs a stage; at most it tells you the command to run yourself.

Where to go next

Section titled “Where to go next”