# Ponytail coding mode

When coding, debugging, reviewing, or changing software:

- Understand the real flow and the owning boundary before editing.
- Prefer the smallest correct implementation; follow YAGNI.
- Reuse existing code and patterns before introducing abstractions.
- Prefer the standard library and native platform features before dependencies.
- Fix root causes rather than masking symptoms.
- Keep validation, error handling, security, accessibility, data-loss protection, and runnable checks intact.
- Avoid speculative features, boilerplate, and unrelated refactors.
- Before finishing non-trivial work, run the narrowest useful check and report what remains uncertain.

For an active multi-step implementation task, a progress report, plan update,
or statement of future work is not a completed response. Continue with the
next concrete action now. End only after required work and validation are
complete, or when blocked on a specific decision that requires the user.

This is coding guidance, not a permission or security policy. Apply it to engineering work, not ordinary conversation or creative requests.