pstack

How Aura uses Lauren Tan’s pstack so developers and agents ship design-system work with trust—not more slop.

Aura already gives agents a visual contract (rules, DESIGN.md, @shadcn/lint) and procedures (skills like port-component-to-aura, the Agent blueprint). pstack adds the missing layer: engineering playbooks + verification—the same habits Lauren Tan open-sourced as a Cursor plugin so agents can investigate, design, implement, prove, and ship like a careful teammate.

This page is context for humans and for agents. Prefer /poteto-mode for multi-step or risky changes. Keep Aura skills for porting UI and brand images. Keep lint and rules as the Gardener gates.

Audit and install steps for a whole project live in the Agent blueprint—this page does not duplicate that runbook.

What pstack is

pstack is a Cursor marketplace plugin (skills + playbooks + principles). The main entry is:

/poteto-mode

You describe the goal and how you’ll know it’s done. poteto-mode picks a playbook (bug fix, feature, refactor, investigation, perf, …), builds a visible task list, calls specialist skills when needed, and demands evidence before “done.”

Internally Lauren called her mode /lauren-mode; in the public plugin it is /poteto-mode.

pstack is not a replacement for:

pstack sits beside those: playbooks for hard work, verification on the real artifact, multi-model review when needed.

Marketplace: pstack on Cursor (plugin id 9717366).

Why Aura cares (trust before scale)

Lauren’s thesis (shipping thousands of PRs with cloud agents): trust is the bottleneck. Spawning more agents without verification and a paved codebase creates regressions and “slop PRs.”

Patterns that map cleanly onto a design system:

1. Codebase as memory — Agents extend what they see. Clean Aura patterns get copied; hacks go viral.
2. Gardener — Someone (or CI + lint) keeps one paved path; delete anti-patterns before agents multiply them.
3. Hierarchy of correction (strong → weak): make bad code impossible in architecture → linters → rules/Bugbot → skills → style guide / human review alone.
4. Verification — “CI green” is not enough. Drive the real UI (Ladle stories, docs, package exports) and capture proof.
5. Feature map — Materialized map of how to reach and assert features so agents can navigate DS surfaces.

Aura’s tokens, registry ownership model, and @shadcn/lint are already Gardener tools. pstack teaches agents how to work; Aura rules teach them what good UI looks like.

Install (easy path)

1. Cursor plugin (preferred)

In a Cursor chat on your Aura consumer app or the somosgented/aura-design-system monorepo:

/add-plugin pstack

Pick pstack, then:

/setup-pstack

That writes optional model-role overrides to ~/.cursor/rules/pstack-models.mdc. Start a new chat, then:

/poteto-mode <what you want>
Done means <something the agent can run or inspect>.
Keep <behavior that must not change>.

Marketplace plugin id: 9717366 (also listed as pstack for Grok Bot). Account install helps Grok Bots; still run /setup-pstack in the IDE for local model roles.

2. Wire Aura AI context first (if the project is incomplete)

For an existing app, prefer the agent runbook:

Ejecuta https://auradesignsystem.com/docs/mcp-agent-blueprint

That audits/installs Aura rules, skills, DESIGN.md, shadcn MCP, lint, and also audits pstack (see blueprint § E). Use that page for the full check table.

Targeted AI context without full theme rewrite:

pnpm dlx shadcn@latest add \
  @aura/rules \
  @aura/skills \
  @aura/rule-design-md \
  @aura/eslint-shadcn-lint

(@aura/skills includes port-component-to-aura and generate-brand-images. See MCP and Lint.)

3. Cloud agents caveat

Cloud Agents run on a remote VM. Marketplace plugins sometimes do not load there even when installed locally. If /poteto-mode is missing on a cloud agent:

• Prompt in plain words: “use pstack / poteto-mode …”
• Prefer cursor.com/agents if desktop autocomplete hides the skill
• Optional (team decision): thin repo skill under .cursor/skills/ or monorepo AGENTS.md requiring poteto-mode — do not vendor the entire pstack plugin into every consumer app by default

4. Monorepo AGENTS.md

On somosgented/aura-design-system, keep a short AGENTS.md + Aura constraint skills (tokens, exports, stories, no drive-by API changes). That is Aura-specific pavement; pstack remains the general engineering router.

How to work day to day

Humans

• Small UI tweak → Aura skill / normal Cursor chat + pnpm lint.
• Multi-step, bug with unclear cause, refactor, or “ship while I sleep” → /poteto-mode with an explicit Done means.
• After UI edits → always pnpm lint (Aura @shadcn/lint policy).

Agents (read this)

When this page is in context or the user asks for rigorous Aura work:

1. Prefer /poteto-mode for non-trivial tasks; put Done means in the same message.
2. Obey Aura rules / DESIGN.md / lint (13px spacing, accent/gray tokens, no restyle on form controls, mobile inputs ≥ 17px).
3. Consumer project: write into app aliases; do not invent Ladle/registry metadata.
4. Aura monorepo: registry mode — component + Default story + metadata + registry:generate / registry:build as in MCP docs.
5. Do not claim verification you did not run. Prefer real Ladle stories, docs pages, or export checks.
6. Never invent API keys. Never force-push.

Example prompts

Read-only orientation:

/poteto-mode how does @aura button spacing and variants map to the 13px scale in this repo?
Done means cite real file paths. Do not edit.

Consumer change:

/poteto-mode port this dialog to Aura tokens in our app.
Done means it compiles, matches DESIGN.md, and pnpm lint is clean for touched files.

Monorepo registry:

/poteto-mode add a new @aura checkbox following existing registry patterns.
Done means Default story + metadata + registry generate/build succeed.

Useful pstack commands (cheat sheet)

You do not need all of these daily. /poteto-mode routes most work.

For the full skill set and playbooks, see the pstack marketplace page and pstack guide.

Related

• Agent blueprint — audit + install Aura AI context + pstack check
• MCP — shadcn MCP, rules, and Aura skills
• Lint — @shadcn/lint Gardener gates
• Rules — install @aura/rules
• Monorepo AGENTS.md — Aura-specific agent constraints