problem-validation

problem-validation is a skill for Claude Code from assimovt/productskills. It costs 59 tokens per session (948 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A framework for checking whether a problem is real and worth solving before building a product.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to assess problem-solution fit and decide whether to build, using scores for frequency, intensity, existing workarounds, and willingness to pay.
Why use it?
It replaces guesswork with evidence about how often the problem occurs, how painful it is, what people already do about it, and whether they would pay for a solution.

Skill for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: shipped in a Claude Code plugin.

Part of the product-skills plugin — 16 skills shipped together

Good fit Use it to assess problem-solution fit and decide whether to build, using…

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/assimovt/productskills/problem-validation
Install

Getting it into your agent

One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.

Any agent
npx skills add assimovt/productskills --skill problem-validation
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/assimovt/productskills

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install product-skills, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 16 skills.

Wrote this? Show the measurements

A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.

agentmods badge for problem-validation

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/assimovt/productskills/problem-validation.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/assimovt/productskills/problem-validation)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/assimovt/productskills/problem-validation"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/assimovt/productskills/problem-validation.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 59 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 948 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

What it costs to keep this loaded

Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00059 $0.00948
Opus 5 $0.00030 $0.00474
Sonnet 5 $0.00012 $0.00190
Haiku 4.5 $0.00006 $0.00095

Measured 7d ago against content hash 5f455cb8d0a0, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-06, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

problem-validation scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 7d ago.

A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.

Nothing flagged

None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.

skills/problem-validation/SKILL.md · 95 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 95 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Validate problems with evidence, not opinions. A problem worth solving is one that people encounter frequently, feel intensely, and have already tried to solve. If nobody has attempted a workaround, the problem isn't painful enough to build for.

Scoring Framework

Rate each dimension 1-5 based on evidence:

Frequency (How often does this happen?)

  • 5: Daily or multiple times per day
  • 4: Weekly
  • 3: Monthly
  • 2: Quarterly
  • 1: Rarely or once

Intensity (How painful is it when it happens?)

  • 5: Blocks critical work, causes real losses (money, time, reputation)
  • 4: Major friction, significant workarounds needed
  • 3: Annoying but manageable
  • 2: Minor inconvenience
  • 1: Barely noticeable

Existing Workarounds (Are people already trying to solve it?)

  • 5: Paying for imperfect solutions or built custom tools
  • 4: Cobbled together multi-tool workflows (spreadsheets + email + manual steps)
  • 3: Have a basic process but it's tedious
  • 2: Occasionally Google for solutions
  • 1: Haven't tried to solve it

Willingness to Pay (Would they pay to make this go away?)

  • 5: Already spending money on partial solutions
  • 4: Have explicitly said they'd pay (and named a number)
  • 3: Would "probably" pay (hypothetical — discount this)
  • 2: Want it free
  • 1: Haven't considered paying

Validation Score = Frequency x Intensity x Workarounds x WTP

  • 250+: Strong signal. Build.
  • 100-249: Promising. Needs more evidence on weak dimensions.
  • Under 100: Weak. Either pivot the problem framing or walk away.

Example: "PDF Export" — Frequency: 3 (monthly board reports), Intensity: 2 (screenshot workaround exists), Workarounds: 4 (3 users built browser-print-to-PDF workflows), WTP: 1 (nobody has paid for an export tool). Score = 3 x 2 x 4 x 1 = 24. Verdict: Kill — not painful enough.

Evidence Requirements

Every score MUST cite evidence. Acceptable evidence types, strongest first:

  1. Observed behavior: You watched someone struggle with this
  2. Spending: They pay for alternatives or workarounds
  3. Time invested: They built custom solutions (scripts, spreadsheets, processes)
  4. Quotes from interviews: Direct quotes about past behavior (Mom Test compliant)
  5. Support tickets / forum posts: Public complaints with specifics
  6. Survey responses: Weakest — people say one thing and do another

Read the full file on GitHub · 95 lines

Changes

What this file has done since we first saw it

Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.

  1. 7d ago First seen · 95 lines · 59 tokens per session scan A 5f455cb8d0a0

Subscribe to this mod's changes

problem-validation is a skill published in the GitHub repository assimovt/productskills (66 stars, last pushed 6mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 59 tokens to every session and 948 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-30.

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