/sc:principles – Code Principles Validator

Mandatory validation skill enforcing four fundamental software engineering principles:

1. KISS (Keep It Simple, Stupid) – Code should be as simple as possible
2. Functional Core, Imperative Shell – Business logic must be pure; I/O belongs at edges
3. SOLID – Single Responsibility, Open-Closed, Liskov Substitution, Interface Segregation, Dependency Inversion
4. Let It Crash – Fail fast for bugs; handle errors explicitly at boundaries

Quick Start

# Full validation (all four principles)
/sc:principles src/

# KISS only validation
/sc:principles src/ --kiss-only

# Purity only validation
/sc:principles src/ --purity-only

# SOLID only validation
/sc:principles src/ --solid-only

# Let It Crash only validation
/sc:principles src/ --crash-only

# Strict mode (warnings become errors)
/sc:principles src/ --strict

# Generate detailed report
/sc:principles src/ --report

Behavioral Flow

1. INITIALIZE
   ├── Detect scope root
   ├── Find changed Python files (git diff)
   └── Determine file contexts (core vs shell)

2. ANALYZE
   ├── Parse AST for each file
   ├── Calculate complexity metrics (KISS)
   ├── Detect I/O patterns (Purity)
   ├── Check structural patterns (SOLID)
   └── Analyze error handling (Let It Crash)

3. VALIDATE
   ├── Compare against thresholds
   ├── Classify violations (error vs warning)
   └── Apply context rules (core stricter than shell)

4. REPORT/BLOCK
   ├── Output violations with locations
   ├── Generate actionable recommendations
   └── Exit 0 (pass) or 2 (blocked)

Validation Rules

KISS Gate

Cognitive vs Cyclomatic Complexity:

• Cyclomatic counts decision points (branches)
• Cognitive weights nested structures more heavily: 1 + nesting_depth per control structure
• Example: if (if (if ...)) has low cyclomatic but high cognitive (hard to read)

Purity Gate

The “Functional Core, Imperative Shell” pattern:

Note: Files in */archive/*, */examples/*, */benchmarks/*, conftest.py, setup.py, and *__main__.py are treated as shell (I/O allowed).

Detected I/O Patterns:

SOLID Gate

Detects structural violations of SOLID design principles.

Code Smells to Flag:

Let It Crash Gate

Detects anti-patterns in error handling based on the “Let It Crash” philosophy.

When to Let It Crash:

• Validation failures → crash with clear error
• Programming errors → surface immediately
• Internal operations → let them fail

When to Handle Errors (exceptions to rule):

• Data persistence → protect against data loss
• External APIs → retry, fallback, graceful degradation
• Resource cleanup → RAII, finally blocks
• User-facing operations → graceful error messages

Not Flagged (appropriate handling):

• Error handling in */adapters/*, */api/*, */cli/* paths
• Explicit logging before swallowing
• Re-raise after logging

Flags

Integration Flags

For use by other skills and pre-commit hooks:

Exit Codes

Personas Activated

• code-warden – Primary reviewer for principles enforcement
• refactoring-expert – For complex refactoring guidance
• quality-engineer – For metrics integration

Validator Scripts

Located in scripts/ directory:

validate_kiss.py

python .claude/skills/sc-principles/scripts/validate_kiss.py \
  --scope-root . \
  --threshold 10 \
  --max-lines 50 \
  --json

validate_purity.py

python .claude/skills/sc-principles/scripts/validate_purity.py \
  --scope-root . \
  --core-only \
  --json

Pre-commit Integration

Add to .pre-commit-config.yaml:

repos:
  - repo: local
    hooks:
      - id: kiss-check
        name: KISS Validation
        entry: python .claude/skills/sc-principles/scripts/validate_kiss.py --scope-root . --json
        language: python
        types: [python]
        pass_filenames: false

      - id: purity-check
        name: Purity Validation
        entry: python .claude/skills/sc-principles/scripts/validate_purity.py --scope-root . --json
        language: python
        types: [python]
        pass_filenames: false

Refactoring Guidance

When violations are detected, apply these patterns:

For Complexity Violations

1. Extract Method – Split large functions into smaller, named pieces
2. Guard Clauses – Replace nested if/else with early returns
3. Strategy Pattern – Replace complex switch/if-else with polymorphism
4. Decompose Conditional – Name complex conditions as explaining variables

Before:

def process(data, config, user):
    if data:
        if config.enabled:
            if user.has_permission:
                for item in data:
                    if item.valid:
                        # deep logic here

After:

def process(data, config, user):
    if not can_process(data, config, user):
        return None
    return process_items(data)

def can_process(data, config, user):
    return data and config.enabled and user.has_permission

def process_items(data):
    return [process_item(item) for item in data if item.valid]

For Purity Violations

1. Dependency Injection – Pass dependencies as arguments
2. Repository Pattern – Isolate database operations
3. Adapter Pattern – Wrap external APIs
4. Return Don’t Print – Return values, let callers handle output

Before:

# In domain/calculator.py (CORE - should be pure)
def calculate_discount(user_id):
    user = db.query(User).get(user_id)  # I/O in core!
    print(f"Calculating for {user.name}")  # Side effect!
    return 0.2 if user.is_premium else 0.1

After:

# In domain/calculator.py (CORE - now pure)
def calculate_discount(user: User) -> float:
    """Pure function - no I/O, just logic."""
    return 0.2 if user.is_premium else 0.1

# In adapters/discount_service.py (SHELL - I/O allowed)
def get_user_discount(user_id: int) -> float:
    user = user_repository.get(user_id)
    discount = calculate_discount(user)
    logger.info(f"Discount for {user.name}: {discount}")
    return discount

For SOLID Violations

1. SRP (Single Responsibility) – Extract into modules
2. OCP (Open-Closed) – Use strategy pattern or registry
3. LSP (Liskov Substitution) – Honor base contracts
4. ISP (Interface Segregation) – Split fat interfaces
5. DIP (Dependency Inversion) – Inject dependencies

Before (OCP violation):

def process_payment(payment_type, amount):
    if payment_type == "credit":
        return process_credit(amount)
    elif payment_type == "debit":
        return process_debit(amount)
    elif payment_type == "crypto":  # New type = code change!
        return process_crypto(amount)

After (OCP compliant):

PROCESSORS = {
    "credit": process_credit,
    "debit": process_debit,
    "crypto": process_crypto,  # Add here, no function change
}

def process_payment(payment_type, amount):
    processor = PROCESSORS.get(payment_type)
    if not processor:
        raise ValueError(f"Unknown payment type: {payment_type}")
    return processor(amount)

For Let It Crash Violations

1. Remove catch-all blocks – Let bugs surface
2. Remove defensive guards – Validate at boundaries instead
3. Flatten try/except – Handle at edges, not everywhere

Before (catch-all anti-pattern):

def get_user(user_id):
    try:
        user = db.query(User).get(user_id)
        return user
    except:  # BAD: catches everything, hides bugs
        return None

After (let it crash):

def get_user(user_id):
    # Let database errors surface - they indicate real problems
    return db.query(User).get(user_id)

# Handle at the boundary (API layer)
@app.get("/users/{user_id}")
def api_get_user(user_id: int):
    try:
        return get_user(user_id)
    except DBError as e:
        logger.error("Database error", error=e, user_id=user_id)
        raise HTTPException(500, "Database unavailable")

Examples

Example 1: Full Validation

$ /sc:principles src/ --report

KISS Validation: BLOCKED
Files analyzed: 12
Errors: 3, Warnings: 5

Violations:
  [ERROR] src/services/order.py:45 process_order: complexity = 15 (max: 10)
  [ERROR] src/utils/parser.py:12 parse_data: length = 78 (max: 50)
  [WARNING] src/domain/calc.py:8 calculate: parameters = 7 (max: 5)

Purity Validation: BLOCKED
Core violations: 2, Shell warnings: 1

Violations:
  [ERROR] src/domain/user.py:23 get_status: database - db.query (context: core)
  [ERROR] src/services/report.py:56 generate: file_io - open (context: core)

Recommendations:
  - COMPLEXITY: Extract helper functions, use early returns
  - DATABASE: Use repository pattern. Business logic receives data, not queries
  - FILE I/O: Move file operations to adapter layer

Example 2: KISS Only

$ /sc:principles src/ --kiss-only --threshold 8

KISS Validation: PASSED
Files analyzed: 12
Errors: 0, Warnings: 2

Example 3: Strict Mode

$ /sc:principles src/ --strict

# All warnings become errors
# Any warning will block

Quality Integration

This skill integrates with SuperClaude quality gates:

• Contributes to simplicity dimension (weight: 0.08)
• Contributes to purity dimension (weight: 0.02)
• Triggers simplification strategy when simplicity < 70
• Triggers purification strategy when purity < 70

Related Skills

• /sc:improve --type principles – Auto-refactor for principles compliance
• /sc:implement – Includes principles validation by default
• /sc:analyze – Code analysis includes principles metrics

Test Coverage

The validators have comprehensive test coverage (27 tests):

Purity Validator Tests:

• Async function detection (async def)
• Await expression detection
• Async for loop detection
• Async with context manager detection
• Shell vs core severity differentiation
• Edge cases (syntax errors, unicode, empty files)

KISS Validator Tests:

• Function length (inclusive count)
• Cyclomatic complexity
• Cognitive complexity
• Nesting depth
• Parameter count
• Edge cases (syntax errors, unicode, empty files)

Run tests:

python -m pytest .claude/skills/sc-principles/tests/ -v

Version: 2.0.0 Validators: validate_kiss.py, validate_purity.py, validate_solid.py (heuristic), validate_crash.py (heuristic) Agent: code-warden Traits: solid-aligned, crash-resilient Tests: 27 passing (KISS + Purity)