Workflow overview

Summary

Introduces the complete SDD workflow: starting with a project constitution (mission, tech stack, roadmap), then iterating through feature development loops (plan, implement, validate) with replanning phases between features. Emphasizes providing the right level of detail to the agent.

Key Takeaways

• The Constitution anchors the project: mission (why), tech stack (how), and roadmap (what’s next) formalize project-level decisions
• Feature loop is repeatable: plan the feature, implement it, validate the result — then replan before the next feature
• Right level of detail is key: treat the agent as a highly capable pair programmer — provide context on goals and constraints, let it figure out low-level decisions

视频信息：Workflow overview

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English Script

Spec-driven development tells the agent how to build what you want. up front for the project, then for each feature, getting better as you go. With SDD, we help the agent with the best quality context. First with decisions about the project, then with details about each feature. This spec is very detailed. One key skill in SDD is knowing the right level of detail. If you treat your agent as a highly capable pair programmer, you’ll often hit the right level. Lots of context about the Goals, mission, target audience and constraints. and less about the low-level decisions the agent can figure out on its own.

What does this SDD workflow look like? First, we specify the Constitution. What is the mission, the Tech stack, the Roadmap? A Constitution is just one way to formalize these project level details. Many developers use a top-level agents.md file for this purpose. But a project Constitution is agent agnostic and more structured. The Constitution captures the agreement on key decisions between the human and the agent, but also the agreement between the humans. The mission explains the why. This project’s vision, audiences, scope, etc. Defining these parameters in advance is very common in software projects and helps guide ongoing decisions. The tech stack is for the engineering team, a common understanding of development and deployment technologies and constraints. The Roadmap is a living document with a sequence of phases, each implemented with their own feature spec process.

Once the Constitution has been drafted, we work on each feature with a repeatable process. First, plan the feature, implement it, and finally, validate the result. In between features, it’s time for the Replanning phase. Revise your Constitution, update the road map, even improve the process itself. As you heard a moment ago, one of the key skills of SDD is providing the right level of detail to create the highest quality context. In the feature phase and the replanning phases, you steer the agent. Look at it this way. Imagine that you are an architect and you give detailed drawings of a building to builders. Then it’s up to them. Your role is to design, supervise the construction, then review and accept the results, or ask for changes. You’ll want to avoid telling the builders how to do their jobs and focus on providing the context they don’t know.

Spec-Driven Development gets you from thinking at the start to delivering at the finish. Best of all, it keeps you improving from there. This is one SDD workflow that modern developers are starting to use. Soon we’ll look at the start, the project constitution. But first, let’s do a little setup preparation. To get set up with the project repo, follow instructions in the next reading item. The following video setup is optional. If you’re already comfortable with setting up a coding agent like Claude Code in an IDE such as WebStorm, feel free to skip this optional video. See you in the next video or the next one.