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ido4shape

You have an idea, or a half-written PRD, or a stack of meeting notes. What you don’t yet have is a clear picture of what’s actually being built — the capabilities, the boundaries, the success conditions, the dependencies. Most spec tooling assumes you’ve already done that thinking. The blank page just waits for you to fill it.

ido4shape is a Claude Code and Claude Cowork plugin that runs the discovery. It reads whatever you bring in — documents, sketches, raw notes, or nothing at all — and conducts a Socratic conversation that builds a knowledge canvas across sessions. Stop and resume any time. When the canvas is mature enough, one command crystallizes it into a structured strategic spec that downstream tooling (or your team) can act on.

In the ido4 suite, ido4shape captures the WHY and the WHAT (strategic intent + capabilities). ido4specs takes the WHAT and adds the HOW (concrete tasks grounded in your codebase). ido4dev — or any downstream tool you bring — handles execution (turning the spec into issues your team works against). This page is about the upstream plugin: idea → strategic spec.

The point is thinking that doesn’t evaporate. A founder’s intuition, an architect’s risk read, a PM’s user-pain insight — each gets attributed and preserved through the rest of the pipeline. The synthesis step is reproducible: same canvas, same spec format, same parser contract. When engineering asks “why are we building this?” four months in, the answer is in the file.

What it does, at a glance

StageSkillWhat you get
Discover/create-specA growing knowledge canvas in .ido4shape/ (Problem, Solution, Risks, Dependencies, Stakeholders, Tensions, Decisions)
Review/review-specIndependent multi-lens reviewers (technical feasibility, scope, dependencies, format)
Crystallize/synthesize-specA strategic spec markdown file ({project}-spec.md)
Verify/validate-specTwo-pass deterministic + content validation against @ido4/spec-format
Refine/refine-specNatural-language edits to the spec with re-validation
Onboard/stakeholder-briefRole-specific briefing (architect, UX, business, QA) for new joiners

Discovery wall time isn’t measured in minutes — it’s measured in conversations. A small spec might crystallize in one sitting; a complex multi-stakeholder project might span weeks of sessions before the canvas is mature enough to synthesize. The plugin doesn’t push you forward; the readiness signal comes from the canvas’s Understanding Assessment, which you can read at any time.

What this doesn’t do

ido4shape is deliberately scoped. It does not:

  • Make implementation decisions. The strategic spec doesn’t have effort estimates, task breakdowns, or AI-suitability flags. That’s ido4specs’ job, downstream.
  • Write code. It produces a spec describing intent and capabilities. No engineering happens here.
  • Track project execution. No tickets, no boards, no progress reporting. Output is a markdown file; what you do with it is up to your tooling.
  • Replace stakeholders. It probes assumptions and surfaces tensions, but the answers come from you (and your team). Single-perspective specs are weaker — bring the architect, the PM, the UX person.
  • Auto-progress. Nothing fires on a timer. You invoke skills explicitly when the canvas is ready, and the plugin tells you honestly when it isn’t.

What it does do is the upstream half of the spec problem — turning fuzzy intent into something concrete enough that downstream tools (or human engineers) have a real input to work from.

Where to go from here

Reference

  • Plugin source and changelog: github.com/ido4-dev/ido4shape
  • Marketplace install: /plugin install ido4shape@ido4-plugins from inside Claude Code, or marketplace ido4-dev/ido4-plugins in Cowork
  • Format reference: @ido4/spec-format on npm — the parser package the plugin ships
  • Downstream pair: ido4specs turns the strategic spec into a technical spec grounded in your codebase