Outline Driven Development: The whole new paradigm for the augumented LLM Code Agent workflows.

Vibes are too shallow, Specs are too complex.

Let there be the outline.

And Indeed... Here it is!

Prerequisites

ast-grep | ripgrep | fd | eza | lsd | tokei | bat | just | git-branchless | difftastic | procs | fend | hck | hyperfine | +other tools | MCPs (context7, sequentialthinking-tools, actor-critic-thinking, shannon-thinking, repomix)

Install Various Rust-based CLI Tools with highest native optimizations through cargo

Install Cargo (if not installed)

https://rustup.rs/

Linux/macOS with cargo

Install

export RUSTFLAGS="-C target-cpu=native -C link-arg=-fuse-ld=mold -C opt-level=3 -C strip=symbols -C panic=abort -C lto=thin"

cargo install --locked cargo-binstall
cargo install ast-grep ripgrep fd-find eza lsd
cargo binstall -y bat tokei git-delta just raff-cli difftastic git-branchless zoxide procs bfs fselect tealdeer srgn nomino shellharden grex mergiraf jaq jql hck huniq lemmeknow hyperfine rargs eva fend rip2 sccache

Windows with cargo

Install (run inside powershell)

$env:RUSTFLAGS="-C target-cpu=native -C opt-level=3 -C strip=symbols -C panic=abort -C lto=thin -C link-arg=/LTCG -C link-arg=/OPT:REF"

cargo install --locked cargo-binstall
cargo install ast-grep ripgrep fd-find eza lsd
cargo binstall -y bat tokei git-delta just raff-cli difftastic git-branchless zoxide procs bfs fselect tealdeer srgn nomino shellharden grex mergiraf jaq jql hck huniq lemmeknow hyperfine rargs eva fend rip2 sccache

Installation

• Gemini CLI: https://github.com/OutlineDriven/odin-gemini-cli-extension
  • Quick Install:
  • gemini extensions install https://github.com/OutlineDriven/odin-gemini-cli-extension
• Claude Code: https://github.com/OutlineDriven/odin-claude-plugin
  • Quick Install:
    • wget -O ~/.claude/CLAUDE.md https://raw.githubusercontent.com/OutlineDriven/odin-claude-plugin/refs/heads/main/CLAUDE.md && claude plugin marketplace add OutlineDriven/odin-claude-plugin && claude plugin install odin@odin-marketplace
• Codex CLI: https://github.com/OutlineDriven/odin-codex-plugin
  • Quick Install:
    • git clone https://github.com/OutlineDriven/odin-codex-plugin.git && rsync -a ./odin-codex-plugin/ ~/.codex/
• Prompt-only (Manual Apply for IDEs/Agents like Antigravity/Windsurf/Cursor/Augument Code ...): Prompt
• Compact Prompt-only (Manual Apply for IDEs/Agents like Antigravity/Windsurf/Cursor/Augument Code ...): Prompt

Recommended MCP Extensions

Crucial [Automatically installed]

ast-grep | context7 | sequentialthinking-tools | actor-critic-thinking | shannon-thinking

Additional [Manually install if needed]

Time, Tavily, Exa, Ref-tools

Outline-Driven Development Philosophy

Deterministic scaffolds harness non-deterministic LLM creativity only when the outline stays the single source of truth and every downstream stage revalidates against it.

Deterministic-with-Non-Deterministic-LLMs-by-Nature

• Outline-as-assembly: Human intent, compliance constraints, and architectural guardrails are compiled into a versioned outline whose hash becomes the control envelope for every agentic act.
• LLM-as-module: LLM calls are intentionally non-deterministic but bounded by the outline contract; disagreement between generated code and outline immediately halts or replays the step.
• Telemetry feedback: Execution traces, test verdicts, and rubric scores continuously feed back into the outline refinement loop to converge to a reproducible build.

Control Envelope Checklist

1. Canonical outline stored with content-addressable ID and time windowed approvals.
2. Every agent invocation receives a minimized delta (outline slice) plus explicit success metrics.
3. Determinism is measured: diff noise ≤ 2% between successive outline-conformant runs; higher variance triggers outline tightening before reattempting generation.

Design-First / Best-Practices Batteries Included

• Architecture-first: Each outline must include interfaces, pre/postconditions, error domains, latency and memory budgets before code exists.
• Tooling-first: eza, ast-grep, ripgrep, fd, LangGraph, and MCP stacks are treated as mandatory batteries so that structural edits, search, and orchestration are reproducible.
• Quality gates: Spec → outline → implementation is instrumented with lint/test/benchmark gates plus rollback hooks.
• Observability: Outline nodes ship tracing IDs and contract assertions so failures are attributable to outline leaves rather than opaque LLM conversations.

Traceability Matrix

| Diagram | Goal | Associated Invariants | | --- | --- | --- | | Architecture | Map outline-to-toolchain interfaces | Outline hash monotonicity | | Data-flow | Guarantee data never bypasses verification | Contract-bound IO only | | Concurrency | Preserve happens-before relationships | No circular waits; deadlock-free | | Memory | Ensure ownership + persistence model | Leak-free caches, append-only audit | | Optimization | Tie budgets to feedback loops | Regression triggers deterministic rollback |

Recent updates (2026-04)

• Execution default flipped: Review-Gated Sequencing is the default for dependent tasks; Parallel only when independence is provable. Reviewer subagent inserted between every worker phase.
• Testing charter narrowed: A test exists only if deleting it would let a real bug reach prod. Skip config-shape/constructor-output tests only when a static guarantee covers them (Rust, TS-strict, Kotlin, Java, C++); keep boundary shape/type tests in dynamic languages (Python, JS, Ruby).
• Token-Efficient Output [MANDATORY]: ANSI/decoration suppression, discovery-then-targeted-read pattern, per-tool flag table.
• Completion Gate [MANDATORY]: Run repo-native verification (e.g., pytest+pyright, cargo test+clippy) before declaring task complete.
• DOD anchor in CS anchors: Data layout first (SoA vs AoS, alignment, padding), hot/cold split, batch homogeneity, zero-copy boundaries, no pointer-chasing in hot loops.
• OCaml 5.2+ language profile added: .mli-first, result+let*/let+, Eio direct-style, dune 3.x + opam 2.2+, Alcotest+QCheck.
• Commit hygiene tightened: never bundle unrelated changes; one concern touching N files = 1 commit, not N commits.
• Post-Agent Verify: read back modified files after subagent edits; line-count mismatch = critical failure → rollback.