Architecture Review (orchestrator)
Comprehensive multi-perspective architecture review. This skill is an orchestrator — it dispatches one subagent invocation per active team member in parallel, then aggregates the returned reviews into a consolidated document. The deep-perspective work happens in the subagents (agents/<id>.md), not in this skill's main thread.
See ADR-013 for the rationale.
Process
1. Determine scope
Identify the review target from the user's request:
- Version — "version 2.0.0" → filename
2-0-0.md - Feature — "authentication feature" → filename
feature-authentication.md - Component — "payments module" → filename
component-payments-module.md
Apply input sanitization from ../_patterns.md. If the scope is ambiguous, ask one clarifying question and stop.
2. Load team and config
Read .architecture/config.yml and .architecture/members.yml:
config.yml.pragmatic_mode.enableddecides whether to include thepragmatic_enforcersubagent.members.yml.members[]is the list of subagents to dispatch.
Each member's id (e.g., security_specialist) maps to agents/<kebab-id>.md (e.g., agents/security-specialist.md). The drift check in CI guarantees these files exist and are in sync.
Active set: every member in members.yml, excluding pragmatic_enforcer if config.yml.pragmatic_mode.enabled == false.
3. Optional pre-analysis (orchestrator-side)
For broad reviews, an initial scan helps the orchestrator give every subagent a shared starting context. Use Glob, Grep, and Bash(git:*) (e.g., git log --oneline -20, git diff main...HEAD --stat) to assemble a short brief: target description, recent activity, key files. Keep this brief under ~500 tokens — it's a shared header, not a review.
If the review target is narrow (a single feature or ADR), this step can be skipped.
4. Dispatch subagents in parallel
Issue one Agent call per active member, all in the same response (parallel dispatch is the documented best practice for independent work):
Agent({
subagent_type: "<kebab-id>",
description: "<Title> review of <target>",
prompt: <see template below>
})
Prompt template (used for every subagent — vary only the <target> and the optional shared brief):
Conduct a focused review of: <target>.
<optional shared brief from step 3>
Apply your perspective (your subagent file lists your specialty,
disciplines, skillsets, and domains). Stay within your specialty —
other team members are reviewing concurrently and will cover their
own areas.
Return a markdown review with:
- Perspective statement (1-2 sentences from your unique vantage)
- Key observations (3-5)
- Strengths within your domain (3-5)
- Concerns with severity (critical / high / medium / low), each with
location (file:line where applicable), why-it-matters, concrete fix
- Recommendations, ordered: immediate / short-term / long-term, with
rough effort estimates (S/M/L)
- Risks if unaddressed
Read code, configs, and ADRs as needed via your scoped tools. Cite
exact file paths and line numbers. Do not range outside your
specialty.
For pragmatic_enforcer (when included), append: Apply the Pragmatic Enforcer Analysis structure from .architecture/templates/adr-template.md (Necessity, Complexity, Ratio, Recommendation).
5. Aggregate
When all subagent calls return, build the consolidated review:
- Cross-cut analysis — identify themes that appear in 3+ subagent reviews (these are the high-leverage findings).
- Conflict resolution — when two subagents disagree (e.g., security wants strict validation, performance wants minimal overhead), surface the disagreement explicitly under "Trade-offs" rather than picking a winner. Naming the trade-off is the value.
- Prioritization — bucket every concern into Critical (0-2 weeks) / Important (2-8 weeks) / Nice-to-Have (2-6 months) based on the subagents' severity ratings and the cross-cut analysis.
- Verbatim per-perspective sections — preserve each subagent's full review under a per-member section. This is the source data; aggregation summarizes but does not replace it.
6. Write the consolidated review
Use the review template. Key sections:
- Executive summary (3-5 sentences, overall assessment + top concerns)
- Individual member reviews (verbatim from step 5.4)
- Cross-cutting themes (from step 5.1)
- Trade-offs and disagreements (from step 5.2)
- Prioritized recommendations (from step 5.3)
- Risks if unaddressed (highest-severity items)
- Success metrics and follow-up plan
Save to .architecture/reviews/<filename> (filename from step 1).
If pragmatic mode is enabled, ensure the pragmatic_enforcer review's Necessity / Complexity / Ratio analysis is surfaced in the executive summary, not buried in the member section. See references/pragmatic-integration.md.
7. Report to the user
Architecture Review Complete: <target>
Location: .architecture/reviews/<filename>
Overall Assessment: <Strong | Adequate | Needs Improvement>
Top 3 priorities:
1. <Critical priority>
2. <Critical priority>
3. <Important priority>
Immediate actions:
- <Highest-severity concrete fix>
- <Next>
Cross-cutting themes:
- <Theme that appeared in 3+ specialist reviews>
Next steps:
- Review with team
- `create-adr` for the priorities that need a decision recorded
- `specialist-review` to deep-dive any concern that needs more work
Why this skill is small
The previous version (~130 lines) inlined the review process for each persona. With subagents, persona and per-perspective review structure live in agents/<id>.md (generated from members.yml). This skill's job is the orchestration layer: scope, dispatch, aggregate, write, report.
One source of truth per concept — the framework principle holds. Specialist behavior lives in the subagent files, not duplicated here.
Related skills
Before: architecture-status (what's already documented), list-members (who is on the team)
During: specialist-review (deep-dive any single subagent's findings)
After: create-adr (record decisions arising from priorities), architecture-recalibration (translate findings into a plan)
References
- ADR-013 — orchestrator pattern rationale
- Review process — process guidance the orchestrator follows
- Pragmatic integration — how pragmatic mode shapes the review
- Review template — consolidated document structure
- Common patterns — input sanitization