code-review

The saved excerpt is a snapshot from when this skill was listed. The external source remains the complete and most current version.

---
name: code-review
description: "Review the changes since a fixed point (commit, branch, tag, or merge-base) along two axes: Standards (does the code follow this repo's documented coding standards?) and Spec (does the code match what the originating issue/spec asked for?). Runs both reviews in parallel sub-agents and reports them side by side. Use when the user wants to review a branch, a PR, work-in-progress changes, or asks to \"review since X\"."
---

Two-axis review of the diff between `HEAD` and a fixed point the user supplies:

- **Standards**: does the code conform to this repo's documented coding standards?
- **Spec**: does the code faithfully implement the originating issue / spec?

Both axes run as **parallel sub-agents** so they don't pollute each other's context, then this skill aggregates their findings.

The issue tracker should have been provided to you. If `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md` is missing, tell the user to run `/setup-matt-pocock-skills`.

## Process

### 1. Pin the fixed point

Whatever the user said is the fixed point (a commit SHA, branch name, tag, `main`, `HEAD~5`, etc.). If they didn't specify one, ask for it.

Capture the diff command once: `git diff <fixed-point>...HEAD` (three-dot, so the comparison is against the merge-base). Also note the list of commits via `git log <fixed-point>..HEAD --oneline`.

Before going further, confirm the fixed point resolves (`git rev-parse <fixed-point>`) and the diff is non-empty. A bad ref or empty diff should fail here, not inside two parallel sub-agents.

### 2. Identify the spec source

Look for the originating spec, in this order:

1. Issue references in the commit messages (`#123`, `Closes #45`, GitLab `!67`, etc.), fetched via the workflow in `docs/agents/issue-tracker.md`.
2. A path the user passed as an argument.
3. A spec file under `docs/`, `specs/`, or `.scratch/` matching the branch name or feature.
4. If nothing is found, ask the user where the spec is. If they say there isn't one, the **Spec** sub-agent will skip and report "no spec available".

### 3. Identify the standards sources

Anything in the repo that documents how code should be written, such as `CODING_STANDARDS.md` or `CONTRIBUTING.md`.

On top of whatever the repo documents, the Standards axis always carries the **smell baseline** below: a fixed set of Fowler code smells (_Refactoring_, ch.3) that applies even when a repo documents nothing. Two rules bind it:

- **The repo overrides.** A documented repo standard always wins; where it endorses something the baseline would flag, suppress the smell.
- **Always a judgement call.** Each smell is a labelled heuristic ("possible Feature Envy"), never a hard violation. Like any standard here, skip anything tooling already enforces.

Each smell reads *what it is* → *how to fix*; match it against the diff:

- **Mysterious Name**: a function, variable, or type whose name doesn't reveal what it does or holds. → rename it; if no honest name comes, the design's murky.
- **Duplicated Code**: the same logic shape appears in more than one hunk or file in the change. → extract the shared shape, call it from both.
- **Feature Envy**: a method that reaches into another object's data more than its own. → move the method onto the data it envies.
- **Data Clumps**: the same few fields or params keep travelling together (a type wanting to be born). → bundle them into one type, pass that.
- **Primitive Obsession**: a primitive or string standing in for a domain concept that deserves its own type. → give the concept its own small type.
- **Repeated Switches**: the same `switch`/`if`-cascade on the same type recurs across the change. → replace with polymorphism, or one map both sites share.
- **Shotgun Surgery**: one logical change forces scattered edits across many files in the diff. → gather what changes together into one module.
- **Divergent Change**: one file or module is edited for several unrelated reasons. → split so each module changes for one reaso