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Add-ons

Version 2.0. Add-ons are optional extensions to the core Deep Work Plan methodology. They are never required for conformance — a repository with zero addons is fully AI-first and DWP-conformant. Each addon is offered during onboarding, accepted or declined explicitly, and — when accepted — reconciles with existing setup instead of clobbering it.

The addon contract

Every shipping addon ships four mandatory components:

Component Purpose
Spec Normative RFC-2119 description of what the addon provides and what “conformant to this addon” means
Reasoning templates Guides the agent fills by reasoning about the target repo’s stack — not copy-paste
Onboarding hook SKILL.md entry point the onboard flow calls when the developer accepts
Validation step Checklist confirming the addon was applied correctly

Discovery: the onboard flow enumerates skills/deepworkplan/addons/ and presents each addon as an opt-in step in Phase 7b, after core scaffolding.

Shipping addons (five)

Five addons ship today. Each has a kit catalog page with user-facing detail and a normative spec inside the Deep Work Plan skill.

Devcontainer (first addon)

A compose-based .devcontainer/ + docker/ setup reasoned from the detected stack.

  • Kit page: Devcontainer
  • What it adds: persistent AI-CLI auth volumes (Claude, Codex, Cursor, gh, Dailybot), dailybot-project-network, DOCKER_DEV_ENV=vscode, validation aliases (codecheck, check, fix, test), public-OSS secret hygiene
  • Behavior: ~85% stable skeleton; ~15% reasoned per stack. Existing devcontainers are reconciled, never clobbered
  • When offered: most repos with Docker or services that benefit from an isolated dev container

Dailybot (second addon)

An opt-in connection to the developer’s Dailybot team for agent progress visibility.

  • Kit page: Dailybot — full capability reference
  • What the DWP addon wires: four plan-lifecycle reports (kickoff, significant task, blocked, completion) via the dailybot report sub-skill; optional deterministic hook enforcement (dailybot hook, CLI >= 3.7.0)
  • Paired skill: installing DailybotHQ/agent-skill (currently 3.10.3) exposes 14 capabilities — chat on Slack/Teams/Discord/Google Chat, check-ins, forms authoring, ask AI, kudos, per-repo API keys (.dailybot/env.json), email, and more. The DWP addon wires only report; other capabilities are invoked through the Dailybot skill directly
  • Auth: fully deferred to the Dailybot skill (dailybot login or DAILYBOT_API_KEY); this addon never stores credentials
  • Vendor-neutral guardrail: core DWP has zero Dailybot dependency; never auto-install for everyone
  • When offered: developer or team already uses Dailybot, or explicitly asks for team reporting

Dependency upgrade (third addon)

Package-manager-agnostic, batched, validated, revertible dependency upgrades.

  • Kit page: Dependency upgrade
  • What it adds: detects the repo’s real manager (npm/pnpm/yarn + ncu, pip/poetry/uv, cargo, go mod, bundler, composer, …), upgrades in semver-classified batches, runs the repo’s validation gate after each batch, reverts failures, summarizes without auto-committing
  • Command: installs /lib-upgrade into .agents/commands/ only when accepted
  • When offered: lockfile present and dependency-heavy stack; recommend only when relevant

Design system (fourth addon)

An interface-surface-scoped DESIGN.md any coding agent reads for consistent UI, CLI, or conversational output.

  • Kit page: Design system
  • What it adds: docs/DESIGN.md (referenced from AGENTS.md) with up to three profiles stacked in one file: visual-ui (rendered UI tokens and components), cli-output (semantic terminal styles, TTY/NO_COLOR degradation), conversational (voice, message anatomy, per-platform rendering with plain-text fallbacks)
  • Profile strength: visual-ui is default-on when detected; cli-output and conversational are recommended when detected, always asked, never auto-applied
  • When offered: only when a user-facing interface surface is detected — not for pure libraries, headless services, or infra-only repos

AI Diff Reviewer (fifth addon)

An opt-in connection to the AI Diff Reviewer (marketplace “AI Diff Reviewer”, current v2.0.0) that augments the mandatory Security Review with a structured local review, and optionally gates pull requests in CI.

  • Kit page: AI Diff Reviewer — full capability reference
  • What the DWP addon wires: local Security Review augmentation via the upstream parent default flow; required .review/extension.md (skill alone is incomplete); Flow B optionally installs pr-review.yml (DailybotHQ/ai-diff-reviewer@v2) and surfaces apply-review as a developer-invoked companion — never a plan task
  • Flows: A — local-only (skill + extension) or B — dual-surface (skill + extension + CI Action). The addon MUST ask which flow; never default
  • Soft-fail vs gate: missing skill/extension/invocation errors never block; critical findings from a completed local pass still follow the Security Review contract
  • Parity (Flow B): shared prompt.md + extension align methodology/severity; CI Iteration-Aware Review may shorten round 2+ while local stays a full pass
  • Vendor-neutral guardrail: core DWP has zero AI Diff Reviewer dependency; never auto-install for everyone
  • When offered: developer or team wants structured local review and/or a CI PR merge gate

Skills

Skills are reusable procedures invoked by name. A skill packages a repeatable workflow (running tests, fixing lint, creating a component).

The methodology ships a small set of core sub-skills. Among them, the author sub-skill lets a repository grow its own kit: invoked through /skill-create and /agent-create, it reasons about the repository’s existing .agents/ layout and conventions, then authors a new skill, agent, or thin command delegator that matches them, and keeps the catalog in sync. The same sub-skill executes the mandatory Skills & Agents Discovery task.

Kit entry: Skill create, Agent create.

Agents

Agents are specialized workers with a defined role (reviewer, executor, architect). They live under .agents/agents/ and are cataloged in .agents/docs/.

Maintenance add-ons

The dependency-upgrade add-on (above) is the primary maintenance addon. It reasons about the repository’s actual package manager rather than assuming npm, classifies upgrades by semver, upgrades in safe batches, runs validation after each batch, and reverts any batch that fails.

Design-system add-on

See Design system under shipping addons. The repo-level DESIGN.md is distinct from a per-feature technical design document: DWP’s plan README, task acceptance criteria, and validation gates already cover per-feature design. The design-system addon fills durable, repo-native interface design context.

Presets

Presets adapt DWP to a specific tech stack (Django, React, Go, Astro + Svelte, and more). Browse the kit catalog.

Adapters

Adapters map DWP commands to a specific agent’s command system (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex, Gemini, Copilot, OpenClaw, and others). Adapter entries live in the kit under each agent name.

Examples

Examples demonstrate DWP in practice: before/after comparisons, sample plans, case studies. See Examples and Dogfood this site.

Conformance reminder

A repository MUST be fully conformant with zero addons. Addons are layered opt-in capabilities — never preconditions. See Conformance.