About principle-experience-first
A software-development principle that prioritizes the experience of people using a feature, library, or internal API over implementation convenience. It guides teams to justify features, prototype choices, and refine the central workflow and its details.
Key features
- 01Prioritize user experience
- 02Justify every feature and option
- 03Prototype before implementation
- 04Refine workflow details
- 05Consider maintainers as users
Use cases
- 01Evaluating a feature proposal
- 02Prototyping a UI decision
- 03Improving a library or internal API
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.
Bundled filesagents/openai.yaml
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.