plan-refactor

A workflow for planning a refactor as small, safe steps before changing code. A refactor changes the internal structure of software while preserving its intended behavior.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to investigate an existing code structure, compare refactoring options, define the exact scope and save a detailed plan in specs/REFACTOR_LATEST.md.
Why use it?
It makes the current behavior, preserved invariant and test coverage explicit before the refactor begins. It also exposes missing tests and breaks the work into commits that are easier to check and undo.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

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.

agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/danielvm-git/bigpowers/plan-refactor
Any agent
npx skills add danielvm-git/bigpowers --skill plan-refactor
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/danielvm-git/bigpowers

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 56 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 724 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
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 $0.00056 $0.00724
Opus 5 $0.00028 $0.00362
Sonnet 5 $0.00011 $0.00145
Haiku 4.5 $0.00006 $0.00072

Measured 2d ago against content hash 290ad2d032d9, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

plan-refactor 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 2d 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.

.cline/skills/plan-refactor/SKILL.md · 88 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 88 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Plan Refactor

HARD GATEHARD GATE — Before refactoring, document the current behavior and why it is wrong. Extract one invariant that must be preserved. If you skip this, you will break things you don't expect.

Create a detailed refactor plan through a user interview. Save output to specs/REFACTOR_LATEST.md.

Steps

  1. Ask the user for a long, detailed description of the problem they want to solve and any potential ideas for solutions.

  2. Explore the repo to verify their assertions and understand the current state of the codebase.

  3. Ask whether they have considered other options, and present other options to them.

  4. Interview the user about the implementation. Be extremely detailed and thorough.

  5. Hammer out the exact scope of the implementation. Work out what you plan to change and what you plan not to change.

  6. Look in the codebase to check for test coverage of this area. If there is insufficient test coverage, ask the user what their plans for testing are.

  7. Break the implementation into a plan of tiny commits. Remember Martin Fowler's advice: "make each refactoring step as small as possible, so that you can always see the program working."

  8. Save the refactor plan to specs/REFACTOR_LATEST.md. Create the specs/ directory if it doesn't exist.

Problem Statement

The problem that the developer is facing, from the developer's perspective.

Solution

The solution to the problem, from the developer's perspective.

Commits

A LONG, detailed implementation plan. Write the plan in plain English, breaking down the implementation into the tiniest commits possible. Each commit should leave the codebase in a working state.

Each commit entry follows this format:

N. <commit description> → verify: <runnable command>

Decision Document

A list of implementation decisions that were made:

  • The modules that will be built/modified
  • The interfaces of those modules that will be modified
  • Technical clarifications from the developer
  • Architectural decisions
  • Schema changes, API contracts, specific interactions

Read the full file on GitHub · 88 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. 2d ago First seen · 88 lines · 56 tokens per session scan A 290ad2d032d9

Subscribe to this mod's changes

plan-refactor is a skill published in the GitHub repository danielvm-git/bigpowers (156 stars, last pushed 25d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 56 tokens to every session and 724 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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