• "brain dump"
• "capture this"
• "let me dump some ideas"
• "I've got a bunch of thoughts"
• "here's everything on my mind"
• "idea dump"
• "let me just get this out of my head"
• "I need to organize my thoughts"
• "here's what I'm thinking"

• User pastes or dictates a long unstructured block of mixed ideas, tasks, plans
• Multiple unrelated thoughts in one message without organizing framing
• A wall of bullet-y text covering 3+ unrelated topics

1. Capture everything. Zero loss. Trivial items go in; the user prunes later. Never silently drop something because it "seemed unimportant".
2. Preserve voice. If the user said "build something crazy with AI", do NOT restate as "Explore innovative AI-driven solutions." Keep the energy and the casual register. See

   references/voice_preservation.md

   for concrete anti-patterns.
3. Match output complexity to input. A 5-task dump does NOT get forced into 4 elaborate sections. See

   references/complexity_matching.md

   and the Compressed Output Pattern below.
4. Be honest about ambiguity. If you're unsure what something means, flag it. Don't guess silently.
5. No action without approval. The ONLY immediate action is the organization itself. Every offer in Section 4 waits for the user's explicit pick.

Quick clarification — one item in your dump could go either way. Is [X] a one-shot task or a multi-step project?

Why I'm asking: If I guess wrong on a borderline item I either bury a project as a task or inflate a task into a project that doesn't need the structure. One question per dump prevents that.

• Standalone creative sparks
• Half-formed concepts
• "What if" thoughts
• Embedded decisions (

  Decide: X or Y

  ) and open questions (

  Q: ...

  ) — kept WITHIN the relevant project, NOT extracted into a separate top-level category

undefined

• {component / sub-idea}
• {component}
• Q: {open question this project needs answered}
• Decide: {decision this project requires}

Use the user's words for the project name. If the user wrote "ai dating app for ferrets", do NOT rename it to "AI-Powered Pet Companion Platform".

• Explicit todos
• Decisions framed as

  Decide: ...

• Open questions framed as

  Resolve: ...

[Project: X]

- {task in imperative voice}  [Project: X if related]
- Decide: {decision}  [Project: X if related]
- Resolve: {open question}
- ...

1. Inventory the workspace — Glob for filename patterns matching dump keywords, Grep for content matches, read the top-level directory structure. Use

   scripts/workspace_inventory.py

   to do this deterministically.
2. Match dump items to existing content — files / folders relating to dumped items, prior thinking in documents, in-progress projects with overlap.
3. Surface dependencies within the dump — items that affect each other, themes, ordering implications.
4. Be honest about inaccessibility — if you can't inspect the workspace (no filesystem available, MCP not connected), say so explicitly. Do NOT make up plausible-sounding connections.

Connections: No connections found — workspace inventory clean.

Connections: No workspace accessible from here. If you're running this from Claude Code or have a project with files attached, I can fill this in. Want to share where this work lives?

references/workspace_detection.md

docs/consensus-options.md

docs/q3-launch.md

src/users/

src/auth/

Which of these should I tackle?

• {item}
• {item}
• {item}
• ...

• {concrete offer with what + where}
• {concrete offer with what + where}

The trigger is the `complexity_estimator.py` recommendation OR your judgment when no clusters exist. See `references/complexity_matching.md` for worked examples of when each format applies.

• Wait for the user's explicit pick before doing anything else.
• If the user says "go" without picking a specific offer: honor it, but explicitly note any items you weren't 100% sure about so they can correct.
• The organization itself is the only auto-action. Every Section 4 offer requires green light.

• references/workspace_detection.md

  — context-specific detection tactics (CLI / web / MCP / inaccessible)

• references/voice_preservation.md

  — corporate-speak anti-patterns with concrete examples

• references/complexity_matching.md

  — compressed vs full output, worked examples

• Fabricating workspace connections that weren't actually Glob/Grep-verified
• Dropping items deemed "trivial" — capture everything, let the user prune
• Corporate-ifying the user's casual language
• Forcing 4-section structure when input is small (5 simple tasks doesn't need it)
• Acting on Section-4 offers immediately without approval
• Splitting decisions/questions into a separate top-level category instead of embedding them in the relevant project
• Vague Section-4 offers ("you might want to consider…")
• Asking 3+ clarifying questions up front (breaks fast-to-action)

megaprompts/05-capture-megaprompt.md

/cs:grill-with-docs