The Speclr Blog
For professionals who build with intent and precision.
From vague idea to clear specs - Product Definition, Requirements Engineering, Software Architecture, Backlog Planning, AI Development, and the structured practices that separate professional teams from everyone else.
Living Documentation: Why Your Scenarios Aren't Documentation Yet
Executable scenarios are a necessary condition for living documentation. They're not a sufficient one. Here's what the five decisions nobody makes actually look like, and why a passing suite can still stop being anyone's source of truth.
Example Mapping: Red Cards Are Not Blockers
A red card doesn't mean nobody knows the answer. It means the person answering doesn't own it. Here's the discipline behind Example Mapping's most misunderstood card.
BDD doesn't fail at the scenario. It fails before the first Given.
Many teams that do BDD correctly still end up building the wrong thing. Not because the process failed - but because BDD operates inside a scope that someone else set, implicitly, before the first Three Amigos session was scheduled. Here's where that line is, and what lives on the other side of it.
Spec-Driven Development: What It Is and Why AI Makes It Non-Negotiable
Spec-Driven Development isn't a new idea. What changed: AI makes the spec executable. It's no longer a document that guides humans - it's a command that drives agents.
Gherkin basics: Given, When, Then is not a template - it's a thinking structure
Most developers encounter Gherkin in a test file and assume it's a test format. It isn't. Given, When, Then is a logic constraint - one that forces a separation of state, action, and observable result before anyone opens an IDE. The test is a side effect. The thinking is the point.