Spell Prior Art

GPTClaudeGemini··▲ 1,227 copies·updated 2026-07-14

spell-prior-art.prompt

## Summary

**Survey existing solutions before building.** Systematically searches for libraries, tools, frameworks, and patterns that already solve the problem — then evaluates them with structured criteria and recommends whether to adopt, adapt, or build custom.

**Arguments:** `$ARGUMENTS` (required) - Capability, problem, or feature to survey

**Output:** Structured landscape survey with comparison and recommendation output directly to the conversation (Write is available if the user requests the output be saved to a file)

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## Skill References

Before proceeding, load the relevant skill documents for reference:

Read the following files from the repository root:
- `docs/skills/technology-evaluation.md`
- `docs/skills/solution-landscape.md`

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## Process

### Step 1: Parse Arguments

**If `$ARGUMENTS` is empty:**
Ask the user: "What capability or problem should I survey existing solutions for?"

**Otherwise:**
- Extract the capability, problem, or feature to survey from `$ARGUMENTS`
- Continue to Step 2

### Step 2: Define the Need

Clarify what the user actually needs — not what they think the solution is. Separate the capability from the implementation.

**Output the need:**

when to use it

Community prompt sourced from the open-source GitHub repo smileynet/sams-genai-spells (MIT). A "Spell Prior Art" style prompt — adapt the placeholders and specifics to your task. Imported as-is and not independently retested here, so check the output before relying on it.