Superpowers (Ruby/Rails Edition)

A Ruby on Rails–focused fork of obra/superpowers — a complete software development workflow for coding agents built on composable "skills".

Ruby/Rails Focus

This fork extends the core superpowers workflow with a full Ruby on Rails skills library:

• Ruby language idioms, modern features (3.x+), OOD philosophy
• Rails testing with Minitest and fixtures (no RSpec, no Capybara, no system tests)
• Brakeman security scanning
• Sandi Metz rules for maintainable OOP
• Official Rails guides indexed for quick reference
• 37signals/Basecamp patterns derived from Fizzy codebase analysis
• Hotwire (Turbo + Stimulus) skills from Hotwire Club
• Commit messages following Conventional Commits with Ruby-specific body guidance

All examples, test commands, and file references use Ruby/Rails conventions throughout.

Superpowers is a complete software development workflow for your coding agents, built on top of a set of composable "skills" and some initial instructions that make sure your agent uses them.

Here are the sources that I used to get the skills that are embeded here:

• https://github.com/el-feo/ai-context
• https://github.com/nateberkopec/dotfiles
• https://github.com/marckohlbrugge/unofficial-37signals-coding-style-guide
• https://github.com/rails/rails/tree/main/guides
• https://github.com/TheHotwireClub/hotwire_club-skills
• https://github.com/EveryInc/compound-engineering-plugin/tree/main/plugins/compound-engineering/skills/ce-compound

How it works

It starts from the moment you fire up your coding agent. As soon as it sees that you're building something, it doesn't just jump into trying to write code. Instead, it steps back and asks you what you're really trying to do.

Once it's teased a spec out of the conversation, it shows it to you in chunks short enough to actually read and digest.

After you've signed off on the design, your agent puts together an implementation plan that's clear enough for an enthusiastic junior engineer with poor taste, no judgement, no project context, and an aversion to testing to follow. It emphasizes true red/green TDD, YAGNI (You Aren't Gonna Need It), and DRY.

Next up, once you say "go", it launches a subagent-driven-development process, having agents work through each engineering task, inspecting and reviewing their work, and continuing forward. It's not uncommon for Claude to be able to work autonomously for a couple hours at a time without deviating from the plan you put together.

There's a bunch more to it, but that's the core of the system. And because the skills trigger automatically, you don't need to do anything special. Your coding agent just has Superpowers.

Sponsorship

If Superpowers has helped you do stuff that makes money and you are so inclined, I'd greatly appreciate it if you'd consider sponsoring my Jesse's opensource work.

Thanks!

• Jesse

Installation

superpowers-ruby ships as a native plugin for three platforms — Codex, Claude Code, and Copilot CLI — using each platform's plugin marketplace. A single repo with three platform-specific manifests (.codex-plugin/plugin.json, .claude-plugin/plugin.json, and .cursor-plugin/plugin.json), plus dedicated install paths for OpenCode and Gemini CLI.

Quick reference:

Detailed instructions per platform follow below.

Claude Code — Option 1: Install from GitHub

Register the marketplace, then install the plugin:

/plugin marketplace add lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby
/plugin install superpowers-ruby@superpowers-ruby

Claude Code — Option 2: Install from local clone

Clone the repository and install from the local directory:

git clone https://github.com/lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby.git
/plugin install ./superpowers-ruby

Cursor

Until the plugin is published on the cursor marketplace, use this command :

cd ~/.cursor/plugins/local/ && git clone https://github.com/lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby

Codex

superpowers-ruby 7.0.0+ ships with a Codex plugin manifest, so it installs via Codex's native plugin system:

codex plugin marketplace add lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby
codex plugin add superpowers-ruby@superpowers-ruby

If you previously added the marketplace and Codex says the plugin was not found, refresh the marketplace snapshot and retry the add command:

codex plugin marketplace upgrade superpowers-ruby
codex plugin add superpowers-ruby@superpowers-ruby

A legacy symlink install (clone + ln -s …skills ~/.agents/skills/) is also supported for users already on it. See .codex/INSTALL.md for both paths and the migration guide.

Detailed docs: docs/README.codex.md

OpenCode

Tell OpenCode:

Fetch and follow instructions from https://raw.githubusercontent.com/lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby/refs/heads/main/.opencode/INSTALL.md

Detailed docs: docs/README.opencode.md

GitHub Copilot CLI

copilot plugin marketplace add lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby
copilot plugin install superpowers-ruby@superpowers-ruby

Gemini CLI

gemini extensions install https://github.com/lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby

See the Updating section below for update commands.

Verify Installation

Start a new session in your chosen platform and ask for something that should trigger a skill (for example, "help me plan this feature" or "let's debug this issue"). The agent should automatically invoke the relevant superpowers skill.

The Basic Workflow

1. brainstorming - Activates before writing code. Refines rough ideas through questions, explores alternatives, presents design in sections for validation. Saves design document.

2. using-git-worktrees - Activates after design approval. Creates isolated workspace on new branch, runs project setup, verifies clean test baseline.

3. writing-plans - Activates with approved design. Breaks work into bite-sized tasks (2-5 minutes each). Every task has exact file paths, complete code, verification steps.

4. subagent-driven-development or executing-plans - Activates with plan. Dispatches fresh subagent per task with two-stage review (spec compliance, then code quality), or executes in batches with human checkpoints.

5. test-driven-development - Activates during implementation. Enforces RED-GREEN-REFACTOR: write failing test, watch it fail, write minimal code, watch it pass, commit. Deletes code written before tests.

6. requesting-code-review - Activates between tasks. Reviews against plan, reports issues by severity. Critical issues block progress.

7. finishing-a-development-branch - Activates when tasks complete. Verifies tests, presents options (merge/PR/keep/discard), cleans up worktree.

The agent checks for relevant skills before any task. Mandatory workflows, not suggestions.

What's Inside

Skills Library

Ruby/Rails

• ruby - Ruby 3.x+ idioms, error handling, performance, OOD philosophy
• brakeman - Rails security static analysis
• sandi-metz-rules - OOP design rules for maintainable Ruby
• rails-guides - Official Rails documentation index (ActiveRecord, routing, controllers, views, jobs, mailers, Action Cable, etc.)
• 37signals-style - 37signals/Basecamp Rails patterns (controllers, models, Hotwire, testing, etc.)
• ruby-commit-message - Conventional Commits for Rails projects with body written for junior developers
• rails-upgrade - Systematic Rails version upgrade workflow (5.2+) with live railsdiff.org diffs, breaking change detection, and gem compatibility checks
• ruby-upgrade - Ruby interpreter version upgrade workflow (3.x → 4.0.x) with breaking-change risk audit, mechanical toolchain edits (.ruby-version, Dockerfile, CI, RuboCop), and verification

Hotwire / Turbo / Stimulus

• hwc-stimulus-fundamentals - Stimulus controller lifecycle, values, targets, outlets
• hwc-forms-validation - Hotwire form workflows, inline editing, validation errors
• hwc-navigation-content - Turbo Frame pagination, tabbed navigation, lazy loading
• hwc-realtime-streaming - Turbo Streams over WebSocket/SSE, live updates
• hwc-ux-feedback - Loading states, optimistic UI, progress indicators
• hwc-media-content - Image/video/audio uploads, previews, playback

Testing

• test-driven-development - RED-GREEN-REFACTOR cycle with Ruby/Minitest examples (includes testing anti-patterns and Rails testing strategy)

Debugging

• systematic-debugging - 4-phase root cause process (includes root-cause-tracing, defense-in-depth, condition-based-waiting techniques)
• verification-before-completion - Ensure it's actually fixed

Collaboration

• brainstorming - Socratic design refinement
• writing-plans - Detailed implementation plans
• executing-plans - Batch execution with checkpoints
• dispatching-parallel-agents - Concurrent subagent workflows
• requesting-code-review - Pre-review checklist
• receiving-code-review - Responding to feedback
• using-git-worktrees - Parallel development branches
• using-sqlite-worktrees - Copies Rails SQLite development databases (incl. Solid Queue/Cache/Cable) into a new worktree, with WAL checkpointing and backup-before-overwrite
• finishing-a-development-branch - Merge/PR decision workflow
• subagent-driven-development - Fast iteration with two-stage review (spec compliance, then code quality)

Meta

• writing-skills - Create new skills following best practices (includes testing methodology)
• using-superpowers - Introduction to the skills system

Philosophy

• Test-Driven Development - Write tests first, always
• Systematic over ad-hoc - Process over guessing
• Complexity reduction - Simplicity as primary goal
• Evidence over claims - Verify before declaring success

Read more: Superpowers for Claude Code

Contributing

Skills live directly in this repository. To contribute:

1. Fork the repository
2. Create a branch for your skill
3. Follow the writing-skills skill for creating and testing new skills
4. If your change touches plugin manifests, skill frontmatter, or any cross-platform contract, smoke-test the branch on each affected platform before opening the PR — see docs/testing-plugin-installs.md for per-platform install/verify/restore commands.
5. Submit a PR

See skills/writing-skills/SKILL.md for the complete guide on writing skills, and docs/testing.md for running the integration test suite.

Updating

Skills update automatically when you update the plugin. Pick the command for the platform you installed on.

Claude Code

/plugin update superpowers-ruby

Codex

codex plugin marketplace upgrade superpowers-ruby

If you're on the legacy symlink install (skills under ~/.agents/skills/), update by pulling the clone instead:

cd ~/.codex/superpowers-ruby && git pull

See .codex/INSTALL.md for migrating from symlink to plugin.

GitHub Copilot CLI

copilot plugin update superpowers-ruby

Cursor

Pull the latest in the plugin directory:

cd ~/.cursor/plugins/local/superpowers-ruby && git pull

OpenCode

Pull the latest in the install directory and restart OpenCode. See .opencode/INSTALL.md for the exact path on your machine.

Gemini CLI

gemini extensions update superpowers-ruby

License

MIT License - see LICENSE file for details

Community

Superpowers is built by Jesse Vincent and the rest of the folks at Prime Radiant.

For community support, questions, and sharing what you're building with Superpowers, join us on Discord.

Support

• Discord: Join us on Discord
• Issues: https://github.com/lucianghinda/superpowers-ruby/issues