named-persona-adversarial-review

The saved excerpt is a snapshot from review. The external source remains the complete and most current version.

---
name: "named-persona-adversarial-review"
description: "Code review through the lens of real engineers' documented philosophies (Torvalds, Thompson, Carmack, Kent Beck, Jobs, Cagan). Complements abstract-role adversarial review with named, sourced perspectives. Use when automated review findings feel generic, when a PR has architectural or UX impact, or when the author wants pre-submit hardening beyond standard checks."
---

# Named-Persona Adversarial Review

> **TL;DR:** Abstract roles find abstract problems. Named engineers with *documented, sourced* philosophies find problems you would actually fix — as long as you cite the real principle and never invent the quote.

**Triggers:** "review this PR with real engineers" | "named persona review" | "philosophy-grounded review"

## Example Output

```
CRITICAL [Torvalds]: Special-case error handling at auth.ts:47 duplicates the
  happy path. Torvalds' documented "good taste" principle: restructure so the
  special case disappears rather than adding a branch. (confidence: high — TED 2016)
WARNING  [Thompson]: parseConfig() does three unrelated things; the Unix
  "do one thing well" principle argues to split it. (confidence: high)
NOTE     [Jobs]: Error "EACCES:13" leaks an errno at the user surface; "start
  from the customer experience" argues for a human message. (confidence: high — WWDC 1997)
Verdict: CONCERNS — fix CRITICAL before merge.
```

## Problem

Abstract adversarial review ("act as a saboteur") produces generic findings — the model imagines what a reviewer *might* say. This skill grounds each lens in a **real, sourced engineering philosophy** documented in [`references/persona_principles.md`](references/persona_principles.md): what Ken Thompson actually argued about trust, what Linus actually demonstrated about good taste — not what an AI imagines.

**How it differs from `adversarial-reviewer`:** abstract roles → surface-level findings; named, sourced personas → findings anchored to a documented principle you can cite and defend.

**Cost:** 1 round ≈ 8-12 min. Comparable to waiting for CI.

## Attribution discipline (read this first — it is the load-bearing rule)

This skill puts named, real people's *principles* to work. That power is also its failure mode: **language models hallucinate quotes.** To stay honest:

1. **Cite the principle, not a fabricated verbatim quote.** Prefer paraphrasing a documented position ("Thompson's *Reflections on Trusting Trust* argues you can't trust code you didn't fully create") over inventing quotation marks around words the person may never have said.
2. **Attach a confidence level to every attribution** — `high` (documented, in `references/persona_principles.md` with a source), `moderate` (widely attributed, source not pinned), `low`/`unknown` (you're inferring). Mirrors `productivity/andreessen`'s citation discipline.
3. **If you cannot ground a persona's lens in a real source, drop that persona.** A confidently-wrong quote attributed to a living engineer is worse than one fewer reviewer. Never fabricate a citation to hit the "≥1 finding" bar.
4. **The finding must stand on its own technical merit.** The persona is a *lens that directs attention*, not the authority that makes the finding true. A real bug found "through Carmack's lens" is real because it's a bug, not because Carmack said so.

## Rules

- **Ground before role-play.** Anchor each persona in `references/persona_principles.md` (or a verifiable search) first. Ungrounded = invalid.
- **Findings stand on technical merit**, with the persona's principle as the lens — see the discipline above.
- **Product persona mandatory every round.** Engineers miss UX. Always include one.
- **Honesty over quantity.** Don't fabricate findings *or* citations. Clean dimensions get reported clean (with the zero-finding burden below).
- **Zero-finding burden.** "Looks fine" is only valid if you name 3+ principles the code demonstrably satisfies, and how. Non-findings are as expensive as fi