starter-kit/README.md

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# Methodology Starter Kit

This is a **portable engineering method**, not a code framework. It carries the belt (Brief → Design →
Build → Verify → Operate), the gates, the MUST/SHOULD rules, and the hard-won controls
(conformance = done, the build-completion testing battery, the production-readiness checklist,
honest-reporting discipline). No app code, no stack lock-in — drop it into any repo and the agent runs
the process against **your** brief and approved mockups.

## It works in three modes — same files, different starting phase
The method is **mode-aware** (see `CLAUDE.md §2` + Section 0 `Mode:`), so this kit is not
"new-project only":

1. **New project** → set `Mode: new`. Start at **Phase 1 (Brief)**. Use kickoff **A** (CLAUDE.md §13).
2. **Drop into an existing project** → set `Mode: existing`. Start at **Phase 0**: the agent inventories
   what's there, runs a **compliance audit** against the MUSTs/SHOULDs, reports, and remediates to
   compliance before moving forward. Use kickoff **B** (onboard) or **C** (compliance-check only).
3. **Keep it as a project's living base** → it stays in the repo as `CLAUDE.md` and the `design/`
   register. Every slice updates `conformance.md`; every change goes through `change-log.md`; every
   lesson feeds back into `CLAUDE.md` (Phase 5). That's exactly how the project this was extracted from
   uses it — the kit *is* that base, generalised.

## 3-minute setup
1. Copy this folder's contents into the new/existing repo root.
2. Open **`CLAUDE.md` → Section 0** and fill it in (project, **Mode**, stack, scope, sensitive data,
   reviewers). Fill the stack lines in **§11**.
3. Wire `scripts/verify.sh` + `scripts/security_check.sh` to your stack's commands (`<FILL IN>` lines),
   `chmod +x scripts/*.sh`.
4. Paste the matching **kickoff prompt** (CLAUDE.md §13) to the agent. It takes it from there, stopping
   at each gate.

## What's inside
```
CLAUDE.md                     the SOP — belt, gates, MUSTs, testing battery, prod-readiness, kickoffs
methodology/
  build-methodology-core.md   the portable core (belt + change-control §9)
roles/                        hat files: verification-agent (the STLC), design-agent, experience-agent

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Accompanies *The Verification Advantage*, Version 1.2. New in this edition: the oracle ladder (methodology §5.4), the denominator rule (§5.5), and the delegation boundary (§4.1).