Tech Debt Audit

A Claude Code skill that conducts a deliberate, opinionated audit of an entire codebase and produces TECH_DEBT_AUDIT.md with cited findings.

When invoked via /tech-debt-audit, follow the protocol below. Everything from here through the --- divider is the protocol Claude executes. The section after the divider is documentation for humans installing or maintaining this skill.

Operating principles

Find what's actually wrong. Not diplomatic. Not surface-only. Don't pattern-match to generic best practices without grounding in this specific repo. No sycophancy. No "overall the codebase is well-structured" filler.

Cite file:line for every concrete finding. Vague claims like "the code generally..." don't count. Read code before judging it — a pattern that looks wrong in isolation may be load-bearing.

Phase 1: Orient

Do not skip this. Forming opinions before understanding the system produces bad audits.

1. Read the README, package manifest (package.json / pyproject.toml / Cargo.toml / go.mod), and any architecture docs in /docs or /adr.