ccc-systematic-debugging

ccc-systematic-debugging is a skill for Claude Code from KevinZai/commander. It costs 42 tokens per session (1,162 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A root-cause debugging workflow built around reproducing a problem, forming a hypothesis, checking evidence, and then fixing it. Root cause means the underlying reason a bug happens, rather than the visible symptom.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to investigate bugs, failing tests, error messages, configuration problems, and failures that cross several application components.
Why use it?
It reduces random patches that hide the real problem or create new bugs. The workflow requires evidence before a fix is attempted.

Skill for Claude Code

Written for Claude Code: allowed-tools in frontmatter. Also seen: names the AskUserQuestion tool; mentions Codex; $skill-name invocation.

Good fit Use it to investigate bugs, failing tests, error messages, configuration problems, and failures that cross several application components.

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/kevinzai/commander/ccc-systematic-debugging
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 KevinZai/commander --skill ccc-systematic-debugging
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/KevinZai/commander

Made for: Claude Code.

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 ccc-systematic-debugging

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/kevinzai/commander/ccc-systematic-debugging.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/kevinzai/commander/ccc-systematic-debugging)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/kevinzai/commander/ccc-systematic-debugging"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/kevinzai/commander/ccc-systematic-debugging.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 42 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,162 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 $0.00042 $0.01162
Opus 5 $0.00021 $0.00581
Sonnet 5 $0.00008 $0.00232
Haiku 4.5 $0.00004 $0.00116

Measured 4d ago against content hash 442081b0d876, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-07, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

ccc-systematic-debugging 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 4d 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.

commander/cowork-plugin-codex/skills/ccc-systematic-debugging/SKILL.md · 119 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 119 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

$ccc-systematic-debugging — Root-cause debugging

The Iron Law

NO FIX WITHOUT CONFIRMED ROOT CAUSE

Random fixes waste time and create new bugs. Quick patches mask underlying issues. This skill enforces a four-phase process: Reproduce → Hypothesize → Verify → Fix.

For deep dives requiring extended investigation, delegate to the debugger persona.

The Four Phases

You MUST complete each phase before the next.

Phase 1: Root Cause Investigation

Before attempting ANY fix:

  1. Read error messages completely — stack traces, line numbers, error codes. Don't skim.
  2. Reproduce consistently — Can you trigger it reliably? If not reproducible, gather more data first.
  3. Check recent changesgit diff, recent commits, new dependencies, config changes.
  4. Gather evidence in multi-component systems — For each component boundary: log what enters, log what exits, verify config propagation. Run once to gather evidence showing WHERE it breaks before analyzing WHY.
  5. Trace data flow — Where does the bad value originate? Trace backward through the call stack to the source. Fix at source, not symptom.

Phase 2: Pattern Analysis

  1. Find working examples — Locate similar working code in the same codebase.
  2. Compare against references — Read reference implementations completely. Don't skim.
  3. Identify differences — List every difference, however small.
  4. Understand dependencies — What config, environment, state does the broken code assume?

Phase 3: Hypothesis and Testing

  1. Form a single hypothesis — "I think X is the root cause because Y." Write it down.
  2. Test minimally — The SMALLEST possible change to test the hypothesis. One variable at a time.
  3. Verify before continuing — Worked? → Phase 4. Didn't work? Form new hypothesis. Don't stack fixes.
  4. When you don't know — Say so explicitly. Don't pretend. Research more.

Phase 4: Implementation

  1. Create a failing test case first — Simplest possible reproduction. Automated if possible.
  2. Implement single fix — Address the root cause. ONE change. No "while I'm here" additions.
  3. Verify fix — Test passes? Other tests still passing? Issue actually resolved?
  4. If fix doesn't work — Count your attempts. If ≥ 3 failed: STOP, question the architecture.

Read the full file on GitHub · 119 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. 4d ago First seen · 119 lines · 42 tokens per session scan A 442081b0d876

Subscribe to this mod's changes

ccc-systematic-debugging is a skill published in the GitHub repository KevinZai/commander (6 stars, last pushed yesterday), licensed MIT. It adds 42 tokens to every session and 1,162 once invoked, about $0.0002 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 2026-09-03.

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