stardust:uplift

One entry point. One URL. Three presales-quality redesign variants.

uplift collapses the extract → direct → prototype × 3 chain into a single opinionated command that picks every variability axis from the captured brand surface rather than asking the user. The output is the same as the long-form chain (state.json, brand-review.html, three proposed files, motion validation) — the user just doesn't have to coordinate it.

Opinionated defaults

• Single-page extract — the homepage by default (the brand owner's first surface) unless --page <slug> overrides.
• Brand-faithful Mode A — palette + typography pinned. No invented colors, no fonts outside the captured surface.
• Three variants, fixed role contract — A is the green-light, B is the design-team motivator, C is the visionary cinematic pitch.
• Cinematic register auto-picked — C's motion register is selected from the captured PRODUCT.md Brand Personality per ../prototype/reference/motion-registers.md § Selection heuristic.
• "What if..." candidates are evidence-shaped — B and C each pick one captured-but-underused trait, from the eight worked candidates in reference/what-if-candidates.md or a derived candidate per its § Extension rule. Different traits per variant.
• Validation cascade runs — every gate in prototype/SKILL.md Phases 2.5–2.8 fires, including cinematic Pass 6 for variant C.

Inputs

• <URL> — required. The page to redesign. Defaults to homepage when the URL has no path (https://example.com/ → home).
• --page <slug> — optional. Override the slug if the URL points elsewhere or the user wants a different surface.
• --cinematic-register <name> — optional. Override the auto-picked register for variant C. One of arrival, kinetic-display, live-systems, editorial, kinetic-grid. Recorded as registerSource: "user-override" in C's provenance.
• --two-variants — optional. Render only A and C (skip B). Useful when the brand surface is thin and a forced three-way differentiation would produce a weak middle (per the stop condition below).
• --re-extract — optional. Force a fresh crawl even when a prior extraction of the same URL is < 7 days old (see § Setup, reuse-if-fresh).

There are no other flags. Everything else is derived from the captured brand surface or governed by the underlying skills' contracts.

Setup

1. Run the master skill's setup (../stardust/SKILL.md § Setup): impeccable dep check, context loader, state read.
2. Verify Playwright is available (extract will fail without it — surface the same install message extract would).
3. Read stardust/state.json if present. Reuse-if-fresh: when a prior extraction of the same URL is < 7 days old, skip Phase 1 and render against the existing capture, with a one-line notice ("reusing extraction from — pass --re-extract for a fresh crawl"). --re-extract forces a fresh crawl regardless of age; extractions ≥ 7 days old re-extract without asking.

Procedure

Six phases plus a reference-grounding interphase. Phases 1, 4, 5 delegate to existing skills; phases 2, 2.5, 3, 6 are owned by uplift.

Phase 1 — Extract (delegate to stardust:extract)

Invoke stardust:extract <URL> --single (single-page mode). Extract owns:

• Live Playwright render with the standard wait recipe.
• stardust/current/_brand-extraction.json (palette + type + motifs
  • voice + system components + photography).
• stardust/current/pages/home.json (full per-page capture).
• stardust/current/brand-review.html with the tensions detectors applied — this is the load-bearing input for Phase 2.
• stardust/current/PRODUCT.md and DESIGN.md (descriptive — the current state, not the target).

uplift does not crawl beyond one page. The brand surface from a single homepage is sufficient for three variants; multi-page extract is what stardust:extract (without --single) is for.

Phase 2 — Tension and trait identification (owned by uplift)

Read stardust/current/brand-review.html § Tensions surfaced and _brand-extraction.json. Produce two artifacts:

2a — stardust/uplift-improvements.md

At least 3 specific weaknesses observed in the captured site — as many as the evidence supports, no fixed count. Same load-bearing contract as the existing presales workflow: without specifics, "make it better" has no claim. Category tags (MAY repeat across items when the evidence supports it):

• [dated-pattern] — patterns the design world has moved past (be specific: "centered hero with stock photo + double CTA in primary blue reads as the SaaS template circa 2019")
• [ia-clutter] — cluttered IA / unclear hierarchy / weak CTAs / redundant sections
• [contrast-or-density] — contrast failures, accessibility gaps, density issues
• [cliché] — conventions the brand could move past while staying recognisably itself
• [missed-opportunity] — the captured surface doesn't capitalise on its own strengths ("captured photography is excellent but the layout crops it to thumbnail-size")

Specificity bar — every item. Each item cites a measurement, tension ID, or screenshot observation from the capture, names the pattern at fault, and proposes one concrete fix. An item that fails the bar is cut, not padded.

Audit consumption. When stardust/audit/<domain-slug>/audit.json exists for this origin (written by the stardust:audit skill), consume its design findings as candidate improvements instead of re-deriving them from scratch — cite the finding IDs in the item's evidence and add the audit file to readArtifacts.

Refuse to proceed if fewer than 3 specific weaknesses can be named (see § Stop conditions).

Format (mirrors the provenance shape used by the rest of stardust):

---
_provenance:
  writtenBy: stardust:uplift
  writtenAt: <ISO-8601>
  againstInput: <URL>
  readArtifacts:
    - stardust/current/_brand-extraction.json
    - stardust/current/pages/<slug>.json
    - stardust/current/brand-review.html
---

# Improvements — <URL>

1. **[<category-tag>]** <one-line headline> — <measurement /
   tension ID / screenshot observation> · <pattern at fault> ·
   fix: <one concrete fix>.
2. **[<category-tag>]** … (≥ 3 items; tags may repeat)

The bracketed tag preceding each weakness is a category from the list above. The headline is the one-sentence summary the agent will restate when variant A's shape brief applies the fix.

2b — stardust/uplift-questions.md

Six to eight "what if we leaned into…" candidates derived from the captured brand surface. Each candidate cites the captured evidence that makes it concrete. Candidates are drawn from the catalog in reference/what-if-candidates.md — eight worked examples that are the floor, not a ceiling:

1. Display-typography amplification
2. Photography re-foregrounding
3. Live-data promotion
4. Signature-gesture extension
5. Voice-register pivot
6. Color-ladder re-weighting
7. Audience-routing reframe
8. Motif vocabulary swap

An out-of-catalog derived candidate is admissible when it carries the same evidence shape as the catalog entries: ≥ 2 captured citations + an explicit disqualification test + the variant role it serves (per reference/what-if-candidates.md § Extension rule). Record each candidate's source — catalog | derived — in the candidate list.

For each candidate the agent generates: a one-line "what if…" phrasing, the captured evidence that makes the candidate concrete, the variant role it best serves (B's composition bet vs C's cinematic bet), and whether the candidate is disqualified for this brand (e.g. "Photography re-foregrounding disqualified — the captured photography is generic stock; amplifying it would expose the weakness").

The disqualification step is what keeps the agent from reflexively picking the same candidate for every brand.

Phase 2.5 — Reference grounding (owned by uplift)

When reference research is available (per skills/stardust/reference/reference-research.md — when to fire, the 3–5 reference budget, the evidence shape, and provenance recording are all defined there), ground the Phase 2 claims in real-world references before Phase 3 picks directions:

(a) Ground each [dated-pattern] claim in uplift-improvements.md with a named contemporary counter-example — a real site / screen citation showing what the pattern's world moved to. (b) Anchor variant B's composition bet with a named real-world compositional anchor — a real screen whose composition the bet resembles. (c) Verify C's register pick against how motion is actually used in the vertical — does the register match observed contemporary practice for this kind of brand?

Record the references per reference-research.md's provenance contract (_provenance.referencesUsed[] on the artifact each grounding serves). When reference research is unavailable, skip with a one-line note in that provenance and proceed — the phase degrades gracefully.

This phase never replaces captured-evidence discipline: references justify the MOVE, captured evidence justifies the TRAIT. A candidate without captured citations is inadmissible no matter how well-referenced its move is.

Phase 3 — Pick three variant directions (owned by uplift)

Default: three variants (A + B + C). When --two-variants is active, skip § 3c (B's candidate selection) and the direction.md authored in § 3d declares only A + C. Phase 4 then writes only DESIGN-A and DESIGN-C files at the project root, and Phase 5 renders accordingly. All downstream contracts (variant differentiation, motion validation on C, summary in Phase 6) operate over the reduced variant set without modification.

3a — Pick the cinematic register for variant C

Read PRODUCT.md Brand Personality (from stardust/current/PRODUCT.md) and apply the heuristic in ../prototype/reference/motion-registers.md § Selection heuristic. Record the picked register + the one-line rationale.

3b — Pick C's "what if" candidate

The candidate must be the one the picked register naturally amplifies through motion. The per-candidate Natural register for C fields in reference/what-if-candidates.md are the single source of truth for the register→candidate mapping — read the mapping there (a derived candidate admitted per its § Extension rule must declare the same field). This file does not duplicate the table.

Fallback when C's natural candidates are all disqualified: re-pick the second-choice register — the next-best match from ../prototype/reference/motion-registers.md § Selection heuristic — and take its natural candidate. If the second-choice register's natural candidates are also all disqualified, fall through to --two-variants via stop condition (d): drop B and let C take the strongest remaining non-disqualified candidate.

3c — Pick B's "what if" candidate

Pick from the remaining (non-disqualified, non-C) candidates in uplift-questions.md. Prefer:

1. A candidate that addresses a tension surfaced in brand-review.html § Tensions.
2. A candidate whose visual move is composition / IA / voice rather than motion (so B and C are differentiated by axis, not just intensity).

3d — Author stardust/direction.md

Write the resolved direction with three variant declarations:

## Variant A — Faithful + improvements

Role: risk-averse green-light. "Yes, that's us, with the obvious
fixes."
Composition: same as captured.
Motion: static (no cinematic layer).
Improvements applied: <list from uplift-improvements.md>.

## Variant B — What if we amplified <captured trait>?

Role: design-team motivator. The brand's underused capability
foregrounded.
What if: "<one-line "what if…" framing>"
Captured trait amplified: <trait from uplift-questions.md>
Evidence: <captured citation>
Composition: <specific layout strategy that amplifies the trait>
Motion: static (no cinematic layer).

## Variant C — What if motion was part of the identity?

Role: visionary pitch. The brand's third dimension — kinetic.
What if: "<one-line "what if…" framing tied to the register>"
Cinematic register: <register> (auto-picked from PRODUCT.md
Brand Personality)
Captured trait amplified: <trait — the one register naturally
amplifies>
Evidence: <captured citation>
Composition: identical IA to A; the bet is motion, not layout.
Motion: cinematic, register <register>.

Phase 4 — Direct (delegate to stardust:direct)

Invoke stardust:direct with the resolved direction. Pass the three-variant declaration as the input phrase ("uplift presales redesign — three variants per stardust/direction.md"). Direct owns:

• Mode A authoring of PRODUCT.md, DESIGN.md, DESIGN.json (root).
• Per-variant DESIGN-A / DESIGN-B / DESIGN-C files.
• The motion register block in DESIGN-C.json (read from the direction.md declaration).
• IA-priority preservation audit.
• Density floor enforcement.
• Anti-toolbox audit.
• Variant differentiation contract.

uplift does not duplicate any of those checks; it relies on direct's existing validators to refuse if the variants violate the brand-faithful contract.

Phase 5 — Prototype × 3 (delegate to stardust:prototype)

Render A first, then B and C:

1. Render A — invoke stardust:prototype <slug> scoped to variant A. A establishes and freezes the canon (tokens, chrome, module renderings) that B and C inherit; rendering it first removes the ordering race.
2. Render B, then C (default: sequential). B and C prototype the same slug, and same-slug concurrent runs are last-write- wins on state.json per ../stardust/reference/state-machine.md § Concurrency — so in-place parallel rendering is unsafe. Parallel is permitted only via isolated workspace copies: each subagent gets a copy of the project (git worktree or directory copy) containing only its own DESIGN-<id>.json at the root (siblings stashed), so prototype's file-presence detection renders exactly that variant. The subagent returns its <slug>-<id>-shape.md, <slug>-<id>-proposed.html (and C's -cinematic.html) plus provenance; the parent copies the artifacts back and performs the single state.json update for both variants.
3. Open each prototype as it completes (via the open mechanics in Phase 6 step 1) rather than waiting for all three.

Prototype detects the variant set from the per-variant DESIGN-A, DESIGN-B, DESIGN-C files that direct wrote in Phase 4 — authoring <slug>-A-shape.md / -B-shape.md / -C-shape.md and emitting <slug>-A-proposed.html / <slug>-B-proposed.html / <slug>-C-proposed.html per the variant-convergence detector contract (../prototype/SKILL.md § Phase 2.5 / Discipline 10).

Cinematic motion fires per-variant from the per-variant DESIGN file, not from a CLI flag. Never pass --cinematic to prototype from uplift. Because Phase 4 wrote extensions.motion.register into DESIGN-C.json only (A and B omit it), prototype's Phase 2.4 (motion application) fires only for variant C. Variant C emits both <slug>-C-proposed.html (the static reference) and <slug>-C-cinematic.html (the register-applied surface). Variants A and B render static, never acquiring the motion runtime.

Prototype owns:

• Page-shape brief authoring per Phase 1 of prototype.
• Render via $impeccable craft delegation, per variant.
• Phase 2.4 motion application for variants whose DESIGN-<id>.json declares an extensions.motion.register.
• Phases 2.5–2.8 quality gates (critique, audit, adapt, motion) per variant.
• Variant C's cinematic-mode gates (Pass 6) per ../prototype/reference/motion-validation.md.
• Variant-convergence detector (≥ 2 structural changes per pair) per Discipline 10.

Multi-variant rendering is driven by the presence of multiple DESIGN-<id>.json files at the project root, not by a CLI selector — prototype has no --variant <id> input. That is exactly why the parallel path in step 2 requires isolated workspace copies with a single pinned DESIGN-<id>.json each: file presence is the only variant selector prototype has. The A-first ordering above is what keeps canon consistent across the B and C runs in either path.

Phase 6 — Open and summarize (owned by uplift)

After all three prototypes mark prototyped in state.json:

1. Confirm all three are open in the browser — each variant was opened as it completed (Phase 5 step 3); open any that weren't, using the open shell command (not playwright-cli open) so VFS paths are served via the preview service worker:

   open stardust/prototypes/<slug>-A-proposed.html
   open stardust/prototypes/<slug>-B-proposed.html
   open stardust/prototypes/<slug>-C-cinematic.html

   playwright-cli open bypasses the preview service worker and produces a FILE NOT FOUND error for VFS paths. Always use open <vfs-path> for local prototype files.

2. Print the three-pitch summary in the chat:

   uplift complete — three variants for <URL>
   
   A · Tomorrow's version of the site you have today.
      Improvements applied: <count>.
      File: stardust/prototypes/<slug>-A-proposed.html
      Pitch: "yes, that's us, fixed."
   
   B · What if we amplified <captured trait>?
      Trait: <name>.
      Composition bet: <one-line summary>.
      File: stardust/prototypes/<slug>-B-proposed.html
      Pitch: "the brand's underused capability, foregrounded."
   
   C · What if motion was part of the identity?
      Cinematic register: <register>.
      Motion bet: <one-line summary>.
      File: stardust/prototypes/<slug>-C-cinematic.html
      Pitch: "the brand's third dimension."
   
   Differentiation: A vs B ≥ 2 changes (✓), A vs C ≥ 2 changes (✓),
   B vs C ≥ 2 changes (✓).
   
   Validation: all three pass critique + audit + adapt; C additionally
   passes motion validation Pass 6.
   
   Next: iterate any variant via chat ("make B's hero quieter") or
   approve via the standard prototype approval flow (records the
   approval in state.json).

The summary is the user's only direct touchpoint with the three variants. Keep it short — the work is on disk and openable.

The three-variant role contract (hard)

This contract is non-negotiable. The "C is cinematic" rule is how uplift reliably ships a third proposition that's defensibly different from A and B (rather than the C-cliff failure mode of "everything from B but bigger").

If the captured brand surface can't support three differentiated variants (e.g. the palette has only one color, the captured page has only two sections, the brand register doesn't map cleanly to any motion register), reduce to two variants (A + C) via --two-variants rather than ship three weak ones.

Hard constraints

Inherited from the underlying skills — uplift does not re-state them but relies on them being enforced:

• Mode A pinning — palette + typography from captured brand surface. Enforced by direct/SKILL.md § Mode A.
• IA priority preservation — configurator stays above the fold, crisis affordances stay first-viewport, etc. Enforced by direct/SKILL.md § IA-priority preservation audit.
• Density floor — brand-register pages with > 5 sections cap sectionPadding.desktop at ≤ 64px. Enforced by direct/SKILL.md § Hard floor enforcement.
• Variant differentiation — each variant differs from the others by ≥ 2 changes. Enforced by direct/SKILL.md § Variant differentiation contract.
• Captured images reused in semantic positions — hero stays hero, story image stays story image. Enforced by prototype/reference/proposed-file-shell.md § Content sourcing hierarchy.
• No fabricated content — stats, addresses, quotes, named persons rendered as [data-placeholder] not invented. Enforced by prototype/SKILL.md Phase 2 § Content sourcing scan.
• Site favicon in every variant's head — when stardust/current/assets/favicon.<ext> exists, each variant page inlines it as a data: URI <link rel="icon">. Enforced by prototype/reference/proposed-file-shell.md § Hard requirements #8.
• C-cliff refusal for variant C — variant C bets on motion, not on "everything from B but more." Enforced by prototype/reference/motion-validation.md § Pass 6f motion C-cliff detector.
• Reduced-motion fallback for variant C — every motion element is neutralized under prefers-reduced-motion: reduce. Enforced by prototype/reference/motion-validation.md § Pass 6b.

When any of these gates refuses, uplift surfaces the refusal verbatim from the underlying skill — the user sees the specific violation, not a generic "uplift failed" message.

Stop conditions

Stop and ask only if:

(a) Extract fails — site unreachable, structure unparseable, bot-management blocks past the headed-Chrome fallback. (b) Brand surface insufficient — palette has fewer than 2 distinct colors after clustering; OR the captured page has fewer than 3 sections; OR the captured PRODUCT.md Brand Personality maps to none of the five motion registers. Surface honestly: "the captured brand surface is too thin for three differentiated variants — render one strong variant instead?" (c) Improvements list empty — Phase 2a cannot name 3 specific weaknesses. Without specifics, variant A has no brief and "uplift" has no claim. Surface honestly. (d) Two candidates equally weak — if B's "what if…" candidate and C's cinematic candidate would amplify the same captured trait, the variants would not differentiate. Switch to --two-variants (A + C only). (e) Hard rule conflict — captured palette has a single color, captured typography has no display register, captured site has no system components. Brand-faithful constraint impossible without invention. Surface and ask.

The skill does not stop for confirmation in normal flow. The "PROCEED. Run all phases without stopping" property of the original presales prompt is preserved.

Outputs

stardust/
├── state.json                              ← extracted + 3× prototyped
├── direction.md                            ← resolved direction + 3 variant declarations
├── uplift-improvements.md                  ← load-bearing weakness list (≥ 3 items)
├── uplift-questions.md                     ← 6–8 "what if…" candidate list with disqualifications
├── current/                                ← from extract
│   ├── PRODUCT.md
│   ├── DESIGN.md
│   ├── DESIGN.json
│   ├── brand-review.html
│   ├── _brand-extraction.json
│   ├── _crawl-log.json
│   ├── pages/<slug>.json
│   └── assets/
└── prototypes/
    ├── <slug>-A-shape.md
    ├── <slug>-A-proposed.html              ← faithful + improvements
    ├── <slug>-B-shape.md
    ├── <slug>-B-proposed.html              ← "what if amplifying <trait>"
    ├── <slug>-C-shape.md
    ├── <slug>-C-proposed.html              ← static fallback for C
    ├── <slug>-C-cinematic.html             ← cinematic variant C
    ├── lenis.min.js                        ← copied from skill assets
    └── lenis.min.css

PRODUCT.md                                  ← shared (Mode A)
DESIGN.md / DESIGN.json                     ← shared
DESIGN-A.md / DESIGN-A.json
DESIGN-B.md / DESIGN-B.json
DESIGN-C.md / DESIGN-C.json                 ← carries motion.register

Scope

• One page per run. Multi-page redesigns use the standard extract → direct → prototype chain.
• Three review surfaces, not a deployable bundle. After the brand owner picks a variant, iterate via chat-driven impeccable commands and approve via the standard prototype approval flow. Migration is stardust:migrate.

References

• reference/what-if-candidates.md — the eight worked captured-trait amplification candidates that B and C pick from, plus the § Extension rule for evidence-shaped derived candidates.
• skills/stardust/reference/reference-research.md — procedure for sourcing real-world design references (Phase 2.5): when to fire, the 3–5 reference budget, the evidence shape, provenance recording.
• ../prototype/reference/motion-registers.md — register catalog and selection heuristic used in Phase 3a.
• ../prototype/reference/motion-validation.md § Pass 6 — cinematic-mode validation gates that fire for variant C.
• ../prototype/SKILL.md — multi-variant rendering and motion driven by the per-variant DESIGN-<id>.json files direct wrote in Phase 4, not by a CLI selector or flag (uplift never passes --cinematic).
• ../direct/SKILL.md § Phase 2.6 — multi-variant fork; uplift passes the three-variant declaration through.
• ../stardust/reference/data-attributes.md — structural section attributes applied by prototype to all three variants.
• ../prototype/reference/proposed-file-shell.md — content sourcing hierarchy and placeholder convention.