Skills juliusbrussee/caveman Caveman
surgical-patch
- Use it when
- you're fixing a bug or making a small behavior change, and nothing else in the code should move
- It does
- reproduces the failure when that's cheap, traces it to its cause, and changes only the smallest part of the code responsible
- You get
- a minimal fix with a regression test, and no cleanup, renaming or new abstractions
- Unlike investigate-first
- which stops at a diagnosis, this makes the fix and proves it
- Runs
- on its own, whenever the agent sees a task that fits; it's a short list of rules, not a step-by-step guide
Skill 10 of 12 in the Caveman bundle · Before it: lean-build · After it: safe-refactor
TLDR
The agent reproduces the failure first if that's cheap, otherwise gathers the strongest evidence it can. It traces the symptom to what actually causes it and fixes the code there, as narrowly as possible, rather than patching wherever the symptom shows up. It leaves unrelated behavior and your own edits alone, skips any cleanup, renaming or abstraction beyond the fix, and adds only the regression test the task needs. It then runs that test plus the nearest wider check the change affects, and stops once the failure is fixed and the test passes.
Summarizes the skill at bad48a0.
npx skills add https://github.com/juliusbrussee/caveman --skill surgical-patchskills.sh page · Source on GitHub · All skills from juliusbrussee/caveman
- Installs
- 61,671 on skills.sh, Sep 21, 2026
- Repo stars
- 106,976 juliusbrussee/caveman
- First seen
- Aug 11, 2026 on skills.sh
Weekly values
| Week to | Installs |
|---|---|
| Aug 3 | 0 |
| Aug 10 | 0 |
| Aug 17 | 6,286 |
| Aug 24 | 8,872 |
| Aug 31 | 8,977 |
| Sep 7 | 11,094 |
| Sep 14 | 12,526 |
| Sep 21 | 13,142 |
| Category |
Test-first work, implementation from specs, git hygiene and scope control. Everything for building software: planning, coding, debugging, design, frameworks, cloud, agents and skills. |
|---|---|
| Type |
A multi-step process the agent follows: interview, debug, run a TDD loop, review. |
| Effect |
Its own steps create or change files, git state or local tools. |
| Needs |
Instructions only. Works in any agent that supports skills. |
| Publisher |
Everyone else. Unverified vendor claims default to community. |
| Topics |
SKILL.md
From juliusbrussee/caveman at bad48a0. Checked daily, last changed Oct 20, 2026.
Frontmatter
name: surgical-patch
description: Fix bugs and small behavior changes at the narrowest responsible layer. Use when regression proof, preserved surrounding behavior, and task-relevant tests matter.Surgical patch
Reproduce failure first when economical; otherwise capture strongest available evidence.
- Trace symptom to responsible mechanism.
- Change narrowest layer that owns incorrect behavior.
- Preserve unrelated behavior and user changes.
- Avoid cleanup, renaming, and abstraction outside fix.
- Add only regression proof relevant to task.
Run focused proof plus nearest affected gate. Stop when failure is fixed and regression proof passes.