Setup & Installation
Or with the ClawHub CLI, for registry-managed skill folders outside a full OpenClaw workspace:
What This Skill Does
A structured workflow for designing and verifying API contracts with a focus on backward compatibility. Takes code, docs, and constraints as inputs, runs through defined checkpoints with quality gates, and returns prioritized findings with a concrete action plan.
The checkpoint-and-quality-gate structure forces evidence-backed claims and explicit tradeoffs, reducing the chance that risky changes ship without a documented fallback.
When to use it
- Checking an API change for breaking changes before merging
- Turning informal notes into a ranked action plan with acceptance criteria
- Reviewing a public endpoint refactor with rollback options documented
- Planning a deprecation timeline with owner and ETA per step
- Auditing a third-party integration contract before a release
Example Workflow
Here's how your AI assistant might use this skill in practice.
User asks: Here's my updated /payments endpoint diff. Check it for backward compatibility issues and give me an action plan.
- 1Defines success criteria: no breaking changes to existing consumers
- 2Identifies the smallest-valid execution path by listing all changed request/response fields
- 3Executes checkpoints: compares old and new schemas, flags removed fields and changed types
- 4Applies quality gates: confirms findings are evidence-backed and assumptions are explicit
- 5Returns ranked findings, a today/this-week action plan, risks with mitigations, and a checklist of exact fixes
A prioritized list of compatibility issues, each with impact rating, a concrete fix or migration step, and a fallback if the primary plan fails