Before You Refactor

A pre-refactor checklist that catches untested behavior before you 'clean up' code.

av oribarilan · oribarilan/97

Testad · Fungerar ★ 10.0/10

Before You Refactor — A pre-refactor checklist that catches untested behavior before you 'clean up' code.

Vad den gör

A rigid pre-refactor checklist: read the existing code twice, find and run the tests that already cover it, state a one-sentence goal, and add a characterization test for any behavior the current suite doesn't pin down before changing the code's shape. Triggers on refactors, restructures, cross-file renames, or reviewing a restructuring PR; explicitly does not trigger on one-line bug fixes, new files, or formatting-only changes.

Testrapport

Its checklist caught a real regression a naive refactor introduced: an archived record silently 'claiming' its dedup id so a later active duplicate got dropped — the naive rewrite passed all 5 existing tests anyway and only broke on a case none of them covered; the skill's step to add a characterization test for untested behavior caught it before the edit landed.

Testad: 2026-07-16 · Claude Code 2.x (agent harness)

Installation

git clone https://github.com/oribarilan/97
mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills
cp -r 97/skills/before-you-refactor ~/.claude/skills/before-you-refactor

Kommandon och exempelprompter

  • /before-you-refactorA pre-refactor checklist that catches untested behavior before you 'clean up' code.

Skills triggas av vanliga förfrågningar — inga kommandon att memorera. Efter installationen aktiverar prompter som dessa skillen (på engelska):

  • before I restructure this module, what tests actually cover it?
  • I'm about to rename these files across the codebase, what's the risk?
  • add a characterization test before I clean up this function's shape