Matt Pocock Engineering Skills - Hermes Setup Guide¶
Skill Suite: Matt Pocock Engineering Skills (5 skills, 1.3M+ combined installs) Source: mattpocock/skills Category: Software Engineering, Product Management, Project Management
1. Overview¶
Matt Pocock's engineering skills turn Hermes agents into production-grade software engineers. The suite covers the full planning-to-implementation pipeline:
| Skill | Role | Installs |
|---|---|---|
| improve-codebase-architecture | Scan code for improvement opportunities, visual HTML report | 347K |
| to-prd | Convert conversations into structured PRDs | 308K |
| to-issues | Decompose plans into executable issues (tracer-bullet slices) | 296K |
| setup-matt-pocock-skills | One-time repo config: issue tracker, labels, domain docs | 288K |
| grilling | Adversarial plan review - stress-test before building | 71K |
Typical workflow: Setup repo → Grill the plan → Generate PRD → Break into issues → Improve architecture as you go.
2. Prerequisites¶
- Hermes Agent installed (setup guide)
- Node.js 18+ (for
npx skills add) - GitHub repo with Issues enabled (for to-issues and to-prd output)
- GitHub Personal Access Token with
reposcope (for issue creation)
3. Installation¶
Step 1: Install the setup skill first¶
npx skills add mattpocock/skills@setup-matt-pocock-skills
Step 2: Configure your repo¶
Run the setup skill to configure your project's issue tracker, label vocabulary, and domain document layout:
# From your project directory
npx skills run setup-matt-pocock-skills
This creates:
- Issue labels: bug, feature, tech-debt, docs, epic
- Triage workflow: triage → backlog → sprint
- Domain doc directory: docs/domain/
Step 3: Install the rest of the suite¶
npx skills add mattpocock/skills@grilling
npx skills add mattpocock/skills@to-prd
npx skills add mattpocock/skills@to-issues
npx skills add mattpocock/skills@improve-codebase-architecture
Step 4: Verify installation¶
npx skills list | grep -E "grilling|to-prd|to-issues|improve-codebase|setup-matt"
All five should appear with their install counts.
4. Skill Capabilities¶
4.1 grilling - Adversarial Plan Review¶
Trigger phrases: "grill this plan", "stress-test my design", "poke holes in this", "what am I missing?"
The skill conducts a structured interview about your plan: - Identifies unstated assumptions - Surfaces edge cases and failure modes - Tests resource and timeline estimates - Flags missing stakeholders or dependencies
Best used BEFORE writing code or committing to architecture decisions.
4.2 to-prd - PRD Generation¶
Trigger phrases: "turn this into a PRD", "create a product spec", "write a requirements doc"
Synthesizes the conversation into a structured PRD: - Problem statement - Success metrics - User stories with acceptance criteria - Technical constraints - Out-of-scope items - Timeline estimates
Outputs to your GitHub issue tracker as a single PRD issue.
4.3 to-issues - Issue Decomposition¶
Trigger phrases: "break this into issues", "create tickets for this plan", "decompose the PRD"
Uses tracer-bullet vertical slices to create independently-grabbable issues: - Each issue is a complete, shippable increment - Issues are prioritized by dependency order - Estimates are included where possible - Labels and milestones are applied automatically
4.4 improve-codebase-architecture - Architecture Review¶
Trigger phrases: "review the architecture", "scan for improvements", "find deepening opportunities"
Analyzes the codebase and produces an interactive HTML report: - Identifies coupling hotspots - Surfaces dead code and duplication - Suggests refactoring opportunities - Ranks by impact and effort
5. CorpusIQ Use Cases¶
PRD Pipeline for Feature Development¶
User describes feature → grilling (stress-test) → to-prd (generate spec) → to-issues (decompose) → Start building
Architecture Health Check¶
Run improve-codebase-architecture weekly → review HTML report → create refactor issues via to-issues
Sprint Planning¶
Accumulate feature requests in conversation → to-prd → to-issues with sprint labels → Ready for development
6. CLI Reference¶
| Command | Purpose |
|---|---|
npx skills run grilling |
Start adversarial plan interview |
npx skills run to-prd |
Generate PRD from conversation |
npx skills run to-issues |
Decompose plan into issues |
npx skills run improve-codebase-architecture |
Run architecture scan |
npx skills run setup-matt-pocock-skills |
Configure repo (first-time only) |
All skills operate on the current conversation context - no additional arguments needed.
7. Troubleshooting¶
| Issue | Solution |
|---|---|
to-issues creates no issues |
Verify GH_TOKEN is set and has repo scope |
improve-codebase-architecture takes too long |
Run on specific directories with --path <dir> |
| Skills not found after install | Run npx skills list to verify, re-install if missing |
to-prd output is too brief |
The skill synthesizes from conversation - provide detailed context before running |
↑ Skills Catalog | Matt Pocock Skills Repo →
Part of the Hermes Skills Library. Curated by CorpusIQ - one MCP endpoint, all your business tools. Content remains attributed to original authors and repositories.
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