iterate

Interrogate one rough idea until both of you understand what it actually is — the shape it takes, the intent behind it, and how it fits the root already there.

It writes no file

The entire output is a shared understanding. eidos turns that into a blueprint afterwards.

When to reach for it

• “I want to add X — help me think it through”
• “Flesh this out”
• “I’m not sure what this actually is”
• “Poke holes in this before I write it”
• Any request that arrives as one vague line

Why it exists as its own skill

This is the pass that usually gets skipped, because it produces nothing you can commit.

A blueprint authored straight from a single line of prompt reads as settled while nobody has decided anything. It has an intent paragraph, plausible acceptance criteria, a non-goals section with three reasonable entries — and no author. The cost surfaces later as scope no one agreed to, in code built against a criterion nobody chose.

Eidos leans on the owner’s thinking. iterate is how that thinking gets pulled out before anything is written down.

What it does

Reads the actor and the framework first, then asks — about intent, about the boundary, about where this sits among what already exists. It presses hardest on the things you left implicit.

You should expect to be asked more than you’re told. A session that ends with four unresolved questions surfaced is a success; one that ends with a finished blueprint is the failure mode it exists to prevent.

Where it sits

You have	Use	It produces
An idea, half-formed	iterate	An understanding. No file.
Something you’ve decided	eidos	The blueprint
A draft already written	format	The same words, in shape