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name: tech-debt-analysis description: Analyze and address technical debt in codebases.

Tech Debt Analysis Skill

This skill enables you to analyze codebases for technical debt and provide actionable insights to improve code quality and maintainability.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when you need to:

• Assess the health of a codebase and identify areas of technical debt.
• Provide recommendations for refactoring and improving code quality.
• Create a plan to address and reduce technical debt over time.

How to Use This Skill

To effectively analyze and address technical debt in codebases, follow these steps:

1. Identify Technical Debt:

   • Review the codebase for common signs of technical debt, such as:
     • Code smells (e.g., duplicated code, long methods, large classes)
     • Outdated dependencies or libraries
     • Lack of documentation or comments
     • Poor test coverage
     • Inconsistent coding style
     • Commit history indicating quick fixes or workarounds
     • Architectural issues, such as tight coupling or lack of modularity

2. Prioritize Issues:

   • Categorize identified technical debt based on its impact on the project:
     • High Impact: Issues that significantly affect performance, security, or maintainability.
     • Medium Impact: Issues that affect development speed or introduce minor bugs.
     • Low Impact: Cosmetic issues or those with minimal effect on functionality.

3. Create a Remediation Plan:

   • Develop a plan to address the prioritized technical debt:
     • Set clear goals and timelines for remediation.
     • Allocate resources and assign responsibilities to team members.
     • Consider refactoring code, updating dependencies, improving documentation, and increasing test coverage.

4. Report Findings:

   • Prepare markdown file named TECHNICAL_DEBT_REPORT.md summarizing findings and recommendations for stakeholders.
   • Document the identified technical debt, its impact, and the proposed remediation plan.