opencode-workflow/skills/architecture-research/SKILL.md

---
name: architecture-research
description: "Optional pre-work for investigating technical landscape, existing system constraints, and comparable architectures before the strict Architect pipeline begins. This skill produces internal analysis only — no file artifacts."
---

This is optional pre-work, not part of the strict Architect pipeline. It is invoked before `analyze-prd` when the PRD involves significant technical constraints that benefit from landscape understanding.

## Important

This skill produces **internal analysis only**. It MUST NOT write any file artifacts. The strict pipeline output is `docs/architecture/{date}-{feature}.md` only.

## Goals

Use research to answer:
- What existing systems, services, and infrastructure constrain this design?
- What architectural patterns are proven in this problem domain?
- What are the technical risks and trade-offs for candidate approaches?
- What storage, scaling, and reliability decisions have been made by comparable systems?

## What To Research

- Existing codebase architecture: service boundaries, data flow, communication patterns, technology stack
- System constraints: latency requirements, scale expectations, compliance requirements, existing SLAs
- Comparable system architectures: how similar problems were solved, what patterns succeeded or failed
- Technology landscape: available options for storage, messaging, compute, and their trade-offs for this use case
- Integration dependencies: upstream and downstream systems, contracts, protocols, versioning

## What Not To Do

- Do not design architecture yet; this is research only
- Do not make technology selections; catalog options and trade-offs only
- Do not reverse-engineer competitor internal implementation details
- Do not produce architecture decisions or recommendations
- Do not write code, schemas, or API definitions
- Do not break down tasks or create milestones
- Do not produce file artifacts

## Process

1. Read the PRD file at `docs/prd/{date}-{feature}.md` to understand requirements
2. Inspect the existing codebase for current architecture, service boundaries, and technology stack
3. Identify technical constraints and integration dependencies from the PRD and codebase
4. Research comparable system architectures and proven patterns for this problem domain
5. Catalog technology options with trade-offs relevant to the PRD requirements
6. Retain findings as internal analysis to inform `analyze-prd` and `design-architecture`

## Output

This skill produces **internal analysis only**. Findings are carried forward in memory to inform the next pipeline steps. No file is written.

## Guidance

- Prefer direct evidence from codebase inspection and documented architecture over speculation
- Prefer 3-5 proven patterns over 20 theoretical possibilities
- Call out confidence level when evidence is weak
- Tie findings back to specific PRD requirements and NFRs
- Do not make architecture decisions; that belongs in `design-architecture`