post-implementation-review

Post-Implementation Review

Review the completed implementation, apply obvious safe Bucket I fixes by default, and make a bounded best-effort to keep rechecking until no Bucket I items remain. Do not stage, commit, or push unless explicitly asked.

Workflow

1. Establish scope.

   • Default to current uncommitted changes when the user does not name a scope.
   • Inspect git status --short, relevant diffs, and nearby code needed to judge the change.
   • Distinguish issues introduced by the reviewed change from pre-existing debt.

2. Review for material issues.

   • Prefer no finding over a weak finding.
   • Record only discrete, actionable issues with concrete affected paths, trigger scenarios, and likely maintainer action.
   • Check correctness, state/lifecycle ordering, validation and invariants, type/schema fit, ownership boundaries, integration contracts, tests, and user-visible regressions. The review pass is complete when every changed file in scope has been checked against this list.

3. Use subagents when useful.

   • Use the lightest review shape that materially improves confidence: often none, sometimes one focused reviewer, and multiple only for broad or risky changes with distinct review angles.
   • Good subagent tasks include fresh-context review of any step 2 angle, plus concurrency, security/privacy, performance, UI behavior, or broad reconnaissance across an unfamiliar subsystem.
   • Keep subagents review-only. Ask for concise findings with evidence, affected paths, trigger scenarios, likely validation, and Bucket I / Bucket II / Keep As-Is recommendations.
   • Treat subagent output as leads, not verdicts. Verify evidence yourself before recording findings or applying fixes.
   • Do not use subagents to create autonomous review/fix loops, edit concurrently, or keep reviewing after the bounded pass is complete.

4. Run the Bucket I clean loop.

   • Bucket I fixes are narrow, local, in-scope, mechanically verifiable or self-evident, and free of product, design, architecture, rollout, compatibility, churn, or risk judgment.
   • Apply all current Bucket I fixes by default, unless the user says review-only, do not edit, or equivalent.
   • After Bucket I edits, re-inspect the new diff and affected code paths. If new Bucket I items appear, apply them and recheck again.
   • Keep going while useful until no Bucket I items remain, only Bucket II decisions remain, validation/scope/context blocks safe continuation, or another pass would just be churn.
   • Do not apply removals of intentional-looking code unless the artifact is trivially dead, such as an unused import or broken doc link.

5. Preserve human decision boundaries.

   • Put broader refactors, ambiguous fixes, risky behavior changes, and design choices in Bucket II.
   • Do not implement Bucket II without explicit user approval.
   • If validation is blocked, unavailable, or failing for an external reason, report it and stop; do not compensate with broader static churn.

6. Validate.

   • Run the most relevant existing validation when practical.
   • Prefer targeted checks for touched areas over broad expensive suites unless the change risk warrants them.
   • Separate unrelated existing failures from failures introduced by the review fixes.

Final Response

Report:

• Bucket I — applied safe fixes: issue, changed files, and validation evidence; or none
• Bucket II — needs decision: the decision needed and the main tradeoff; or none
• Keep As-Is — meaningful concerns inspected and intentionally rejected, when useful
• validation run and result
• residual risk if validation was skipped or blocked