Content
86%Weight 40%Scale 1-5Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.
The body is highly actionable with exact paths and a copy-paste example, and is well-structured for a simple skill. Minor gains are available from deduplicating the confirm instruction and adding an explicit verification checkpoint after writing the state file.
Suggestions
Remove the duplicate 'confirm the loop is active' instruction — keep it only in the Output section to tighten the Workflow.
Add an explicit verification step after writing `.cursor/ralph/scratchpad.md` (e.g., confirm the file exists with the expected frontmatter) before beginning work, to give the workflow a clear validate-then-proceed checkpoint.
Consider noting what to do if `.cursor/ralph/scratchpad.md` already exists from a prior run (resume vs. reset) to close a small actionability gap.
| Dimension | Reasoning | Score |
|---|---|---|
Conciseness | The body is lean and gives an exact state-file format plus a worked example without explaining concepts Claude already knows; it is not 5 because the 'confirm the loop is active' instruction appears in both the Workflow and Output sections, a minor redundancy that could be trimmed. | 4 / 5 |
Actionability | Provides exact directory (`.cursor/ralph/`), exact file path, an exact YAML frontmatter format with placeholders, and a fully copy-paste-ready example covering the common case. | 5 / 5 |
Workflow Clarity | A clearly sequenced 4-step workflow with guardrails acting as checkpoints; it is not 5 because there is no explicit validate-then-proceed feedback loop (e.g., confirming the scratchpad was written correctly before starting), and not 3 because the sequence and guardrails are otherwise complete. | 4 / 5 |
Progressive Disclosure | A simple, single-purpose skill under 50 lines with no need for external references; it is well-organized into Trigger, Workflow, Guardrails, and Output sections, satisfying the simple-skill exception for a top score. | 5 / 5 |
Total | 18 / 20 Passed |