compose:tdd

A coding practice based on Test-Driven Development (TDD), where you write a test before the code and first confirm that the test fails.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it when adding features, fixing bugs, changing behaviour, or refactoring code. It guides the cycle of writing a failing test, adding the smallest code that passes, and then improving the code.
Why use it?
It helps catch incorrect assumptions early and keeps feature, bug-fix, and refactoring work tied to checks that prove the intended behaviour.

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/lfyxhappy/lfcode/tdd
Any agent
npx skills add lfyxhappy/lfcode --skill tdd
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/lfyxhappy/lfcode

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 17 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 2,441 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin 97% copy Near-identical to another mod 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 $0.00017 $0.02441
Opus 5 $0.00009 $0.01221
Sonnet 5 $0.00003 $0.00488
Haiku 4.5 $0.00002 $0.00244

Measured yesterday against content hash 7d6c40fcbb29, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

compose:tdd 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 yesterday.

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.

Origin

This is a copy

97% identical to test-driven-development — 9 lines differ, which has more behind it and is treated as the original. This page carries a canonical link to it rather than competing with it.

packages/lfcode/src/skill/compose/.bundle/tdd/SKILL.md · 373 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 373 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Test-Driven Development (TDD)

Overview

Write the test first. Watch it fail. Write minimal code to pass.

Core principle: If you didn't watch the test fail, you don't know if it tests the right thing.

Violating the letter of the rules is violating the spirit of the rules.

When to Use

Always:

  • New features
  • Bug fixes
  • Refactoring
  • Behavior changes

Exceptions (raise them through compose:ask; if no user is available, use your best judgment and proceed):

  • Throwaway prototypes
  • Generated code
  • Configuration files

Thinking "skip TDD just this once"? Stop. That's rationalization.

The Iron Law

NO PRODUCTION CODE WITHOUT A FAILING TEST FIRST

Write code before the test? Delete it. Start over.

No exceptions:

  • Don't keep it as "reference"
  • Don't "adapt" it while writing tests
  • Don't look at it
  • Delete means delete

Implement fresh from tests. Period.

Red-Green-Refactor

digraph tdd_cycle {
    rankdir=LR;
    red [label="RED\nWrite failing test", shape=box, style=filled, fillcolor="#ffcccc"];
    verify_red [label="Verify fails\ncorrectly", shape=diamond];
    green [label="GREEN\nMinimal code", shape=box, style=filled, fillcolor="#ccffcc"];
    verify_green [label="Verify passes\nAll green", shape=diamond];
    refactor [label="REFACTOR\nClean up", shape=box, style=filled, fillcolor="#ccccff"];
    next [label="Next", shape=ellipse];

    red -> verify_red;
    verify_red -> green [label="yes"];
    verify_red -> red [label="wrong\nfailure"];
    green -> verify_green;
    verify_green -> refactor [label="yes"];
    verify_green -> green [label="no"];
    refactor -> verify_green [label="stay\ngreen"];
    verify_green -> next;
    next -> red;
}

RED - Write Failing Test

Write one minimal test showing what should happen.

const result = await retryOperation(operation);

expect(result).toBe('success'); expect(attempts).toBe(3); });

Clear name, tests real behavior, one thing
</Good>

Read the full file on GitHub · 373 lines

Files

What ships with it

1 file beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

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. yesterday First seen · 373 lines · 17 tokens per session scan A 7d6c40fcbb29

Subscribe to this mod's changes

compose:tdd is a skill published in the GitHub repository lfyxhappy/lfcode (2 stars, last pushed 1mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 17 tokens to every session and 2,441 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. It is 97% identical to test-driven-development, differing in 9 lines, and is treated as a copy.