principle-experience-first
About principle-experience-first
A design skill for product and engineering work that prioritizes user experience when it conflicts with implementation convenience. It emphasizes prototyping, polished details, and keeping work focused on the core workflow.
Key features
- 01Prioritize user experience in tradeoffs
- 02Justify every feature and option
- 03Prototype before implementation
- 04Refine transitions, spacing, and errors
- 05Keep features focused on core workflows
Use cases
- 01Assess whether a feature belongs
- 02Validate design decisions with HTML prototypes
- 03Improve interface details and error states
Install
Copy the command and run it in a terminal.
npx skills add https:/After installing, type/principle-experience-firstin Claude Code to confirm it loaded.
Details
From the project READMEExperience First
When implementation convenience conflicts with user delight, choose delight.
- Every feature, control, and option must be justified
- Ship less, ship better (polished experience with three features beats rough one with ten)
- Prototype before committing (design decisions are cheaper in throwaway HTML than production code)
- Get the details right (transitions, alignment, spacing, feedback, error states)
- Tighten the core loop (every feature should serve the central workflow or get out of the way)
The user is whoever consumes the work. For a UI that is the end user. For a library or an internal API it is the colleague who imports it. The engineer who maintains the code next is a user too. Weigh their experience the same way, and explain impact from their perspective.
Foundations should serve the experience. Foundational thinking governs the sequence of work. This principle governs the target.