architecture-decision-records

architecture-decision-records is a skill for Claude Code, Codex from onfire7777/universal-ai-skills-library. It costs 41 tokens per session (2,859 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

An instruction set for writing and maintaining Architecture Decision Records, or ADRs. An ADR is a short document that records an important technical choice, its reasons, and its consequences.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to document significant design choices, review earlier architecture decisions, and establish a repeatable process for recording technical trade-offs.
Why use it?
It provides a consistent way to preserve why an architecture decision was made, so future developers can understand and review it.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Written for no agent in particular: nothing here depends on one.

Good fit Use it to document significant design choices, review earlier architecture decisions, and establish a repeatable process for recording technical trade-offs.

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Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/onfire7777/universal-ai-skills-library/architecture-decision-records
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 onfire7777/universal-ai-skills-library --skill architecture-decision-records
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/onfire7777/universal-ai-skills-library

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

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README.md
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Per session 41 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 2,859 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

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ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5.1 $0.00041 $0.02859
Opus 5 $0.00020 $0.01430
Sonnet 5 $0.00008 $0.00572
Haiku 4.5 $0.00004 $0.00286

Measured today against content hash 9062e0496cc2, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-12, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

architecture-decision-records 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 today.

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/architecture-decision-records/SKILL.md · 442 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 442 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Architecture Decision Records

Comprehensive patterns for creating, maintaining, and managing Architecture Decision Records (ADRs) that capture the context and rationale behind significant technical decisions.

When to Use This Skill

  • Making significant architectural decisions
  • Documenting technology choices
  • Recording design trade-offs
  • Onboarding new team members
  • Reviewing historical decisions
  • Establishing decision-making processes

Core Concepts

1. What is an ADR?

An Architecture Decision Record captures:

  • Context: Why we needed to make a decision
  • Decision: What we decided
  • Consequences: What happens as a result

2. When to Write an ADR

Write ADR Skip ADR
New framework adoption Minor version upgrades
Database technology choice Bug fixes
API design patterns Implementation details
Security architecture Routine maintenance
Integration patterns Configuration changes

3. ADR Lifecycle

Proposed → Accepted → Deprecated → Superseded
              ↓
           Rejected

Templates

Template 1: Standard ADR (MADR Format)

# ADR-0001: Use PostgreSQL as Primary Database

## Status

Accepted

## Context

We need to select a primary database for our new e-commerce platform. The system
will handle:

- ~10,000 concurrent users
- Complex product catalog with hierarchical categories
- Transaction processing for orders and payments
- Full-text search for products
- Geospatial queries for store locator

The team has experience with MySQL, PostgreSQL, and MongoDB. We need ACID
compliance for financial transactions.

## Decision Drivers

- **Must have ACID compliance** for payment processing
- **Must support complex queries** for reporting
- **Should support full-text search** to reduce infrastructure complexity
- **Should have good JSON support** for flexible product attributes
- **Team familiarity** reduces onboarding time

## Considered Options

### Option 1: PostgreSQL

- **Pros**: ACID compliant, excellent JSON support (JSONB), built-in full-text
  search, PostGIS for geospatial, team has experience
- **Cons**: Slightly more complex replication setup than MySQL

### Option 2: MySQL

- **Pros**: Very familiar to team, simple replication, large community
- **Cons**: Weaker JSON support, no built-in full-text search (need
  Elasticsearch), no geospatial without extensions

### Option 3: MongoDB

- **Pros**: Flexible schema, native JSON, horizontal scaling
- **Cons**: No ACID for multi-document transactions (at decision time),
  team has limited experience, requires schema design discipline

## Decision

We will use **PostgreSQL 15** as our primary database.

## Rationale

PostgreSQL provides the best balance of:

1. **ACID compliance** essential for e-commerce transactions
2. **Built-in capabilities** (full-text search, JSONB, PostGIS) reduce
   infrastructure complexity
3. **Team familiarity** with SQL databases reduces learning curve
4. **Mature ecosystem** with excellent tooling and community support

The slight complexity in replication is outweighed by the reduction in
additional services (no separate Elasticsearch needed).

## Consequences

### Positive

- Single database handles transactions, search, and geospatial queries
- Reduced operational complexity (fewer services to manage)
- Strong consistency guarantees for financial data
- Team can leverage existing SQL expertise

### Negative

- Need to learn PostgreSQL-specific features (JSONB, full-text search syntax)
- Vertical scaling limits may require read replicas sooner
- Some team members need PostgreSQL-specific training

### Risks

- Full-text search may not scale as well as dedicated search engines
- Mitigation: Design for potential Elasticsearch addition if needed

## Implementation Notes

- Use JSONB for flexible product attributes
- Implement connection pooling with PgBouncer
- Set up streaming replication for read replicas
- Use pg_trgm extension for fuzzy search

## Related Decisions

- ADR-0002: Caching Strategy (Redis) - complements database choice
- ADR-0005: Search Architecture - may supersede if Elasticsearch needed

## References

- [PostgreSQL JSON Documentation](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/datatype-json.html)
- [PostgreSQL Full Text Search](https://www.postgresql.org/docs/current/textsearch.html)
- Internal: Performance benchmarks in `/docs/benchmarks/database-comparison.md`

Read the full file on GitHub · 442 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. today Changed · +433 lines 9062e0496cc2
  2. 12d ago First seen · 9 lines · 41 tokens per session scan A 1eaaf93f989f

Subscribe to this mod's changes

architecture-decision-records is a skill published in the GitHub repository onfire7777/universal-ai-skills-library (16 stars, last pushed yesterday), licensed MIT. It adds 41 tokens to every session and 2,859 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 2026-08-30.

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