vibe-check

A skill for AI coding tools that guides complete beginners from a vague app idea to a buildable blueprint.

grill-me is for engineers. vibe-check is for everyone else.

What it does

When someone who's never coded before says "I want to build an app that does X," this skill turns their AI tool into a patient mentor that:

1. Discovers what they actually need: not features, but the real problem they're solving
2. Maps the entire user experience: happy flows, failure flows, and edge cases
3. Surfaces decisions they don't know they need to make: auth, databases, payments, hosting, legal
4. Recommends a modern tech stack: with plain-language explanations of what each piece does and why
5. Produces a complete plan document: structured as the AI coding tool's onboarding manual, plus a visual HTML blueprint the human opens in their browser
6. Includes build checkpoints: so the beginner is never lost during construction. The AI stops after each phase to explain what was just built, why, and what's next.
7. Teaches the build-time basics in language for someone who has never touched code: local vs. GitHub vs. live, how to save and back up code (commit/push/deploy), and keeping secret keys safe.
8. Keeps the app healthy as it grows: a Checkup Mode that gently looks over a messy, grown codebase and tidies it safely, so the AI keeps building cleanly instead of breaking things.

Who it's for

• People who have an app idea but have never built software
• "Vibe coders" who can get something working on their screen but need help thinking through the full picture
• Anyone who wants to go from idea → structured plan before touching code

How to use it

With Claude Code

Copy the skills/vibe-check/ folder into your project's .claude/skills/ directory (or wherever your agent reads skills from), then tell Claude:

Use the vibe-check skill to help me plan my app.

With other AI tools

Copy the contents of skills/vibe-check/SKILL.md into your AI tool's system prompt or project instructions.

What the skill produces

By the end of a vibe-check session, you'll have a plan document that includes:

• Problem statement: in your own words
• User flows: mermaid diagrams for happy path, failure path, and edge cases
• Feature breakdown: V1 (build now) vs V2+ (build later)
• System architecture: visual diagram with beginner-friendly labels
• Tech stack: every tool, what it does, why it was chosen, what it costs
• Data model: what gets stored, in plain language
• Cost breakdown: monthly estimates with free tier details
• Pre-launch checklists: security, legal, accessibility
• Build phases with checkpoints: numbered phases with guided explanations at every step

This plan is designed to be handed directly to your AI coding tool to start building.

Version

Current version: 1.3.0 (see VERSION and CHANGELOG.md).

When you use vibe-check, it does a quick best-effort check for a newer version and tells you if you're behind. To update, git pull or re-download this repo. Versioning is semantic (MAJOR.MINOR.PATCH).

Who made this

Built by Amer Arab. I spent 12-plus years as a product manager, most of it taking products from zero to one. Discovery is the part I care about most: working out whether a problem is real before anyone writes a line of code, then shaping something people actually want instead of something that merely works. Those years were also spent shoulder to shoulder with engineers, which is where the "you're the PM, the AI is the engineer" idea at the heart of this skill comes from. vibe-check is me handing a first-timer the instincts I had to learn the hard way.

Inspiration

• grill-me by Matt Pocock: the relentless questioning energy
• improve-codebase-architecture by Matt Pocock: the deep-vs-shallow module wisdom and the visual HTML report, translated here into beginner metaphors (Checkup Mode + the navigability guidance)
• andrej-karpathy-skills by multica-ai: the four "how your AI should behave" ground rules (think before coding, keep it simple, surgical changes, goal-driven), translated here for beginners
• autoresearch by Udit Goenka: the verify-and-iterate loop (one change, check it, keep or revert, repeat), translated here as the beginner's supervised improvement loop
• /office-hours by Garry Tan: the problem reframing and premise challenging
• The Design Sprint by Jake Knapp / Google Ventures: the future press release (vision extraction) and Crazy 8s, adapted here to Crazy 3s with sharing and voting
• User Story Mapping by Jeff Patton: walking the chosen journey step by step to surface the features each step requires
• Bob Moesta (Jobs to be Done): demand is born in the struggling moment, the demand-side lens behind the worst-moment question
• The Last Mile Playbook by Amer Arab: the PM vs Engineer mindset, payment processor gotchas, and the hard-won lessons of shipping a real product as a non-developer

License

MIT licensed. Use it however you want.