Ideonomy Rich

---

name: ideonomy-rich description: Use when expanding an idea AND the output channel can render monospace cleanly — terminals, READMEs, blog posts with monospace code blocks, fixed-width-font emails, ttyrec sessions, the Claude Code transcript itself. Same primitives as ideonomy-plain, but renders the artifact as performative ASCII art with Unicode box-drawing, figlet banners, density gradients, and visible ideonomy-machinery layers (tuple legend, dimensions surfaced, operator-named dividers, ideonomy trail). If the channel might mangle Unicode (Telegram, SMS, plain Slack DMs), use ideonomy-plain instead.

Ideonomy-Rich

Sibling skill to ideonomy-plain. Same operators, organons, dimension-prompts, picker, cooldown. Different rendering policy.

╔═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╗
║  ideonomy-plain  →  lowest-common-denominator: survives SMS       ║
║  ideonomy-rich   →  highest-expression: feel ideas come alive     ║
║                     in a monospace terminal                       ║
╚═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════╝

If you're not sure which to pick, default to ideonomy-plain. Use this one when you know the medium can hold the art.

Core principle

Same as ideonomy-plain — Patrick Gunkel's framework via Grace Kind. Ideas have properties varying along dimensions; expand by negating, substituting, combining, re-instantiating.

The difference is everything below: render the organon as performative ASCII art, not as plain bullets. Inspired by mahidalhan's ascii-art-explainer: composition teaches, motion shown, density is meaning, drama at the pivot.

How to invoke

Step 1 — pick a method tuple.

# Locate pick (works for any installation method):
PICK=$(find ~/.claude/plugins ~/.claude/skills -path '*/ideonomy-rich/bin/pick' -type f 2>/dev/null | head -1)
bash "$PICK"

# With flags: bash "$PICK" --more / --less / --print / --seed N

(Same picker, same catalog as ideonomy-plain. Each skill carries its own copy so it drops cleanly into any skills/ folder on its own.)

Step 2 — work through the tuple in two passes. Same internal pass as ideonomy-plain: dimension-prompts → operators → organon. The external pass is what changes.

Step 3 — render the artifact in five visible layers.

A defining feature of ideonomy-rich: the brainstorming itself must be visible. The reader should be able to see which operator produced which section, what dimensions the brainstorming explored, and — crucially — what was not surfaced. Reading the artifact equals watching the ideonomy happen. If the reader can't tell the artifact came out of the operators × organon × dim-prompts, you buried the machinery.

This does not mean reverting to procedural headers (Phase A, Phase B). The middle path: name the operator AND the specific move it made, side by side, in content-named language.

Layer 1 — title banner

Open with a figlet banner of the user's idea.

# Local C binary (preferred — installed via brew on this system)
figlet -f slant "<idea>"
figlet -f doom "<idea>"
figlet -w 100 -f banner3 "<idea>"        # set max width

# Coloured / filtered variant (live terminal only — emits ANSI)
toilet -f pagga --metal "<idea>"

# Remote fallback (no install needed; safe in any context)
curl -s "https://asciified.thelicato.io/api/v2/ascii?text=<idea>&font=Slant"

Recommended fonts by mood:

Font	Mood
slant	clean, modern, default
doom	bold, declarative
big	wide, readable
banner3	wide-display banner
cyberlarge	tech / systems theme
gothic	dramatic, weighty
small	subtitles, secondary banners

Frame the banner with hand-drawn ╔═╗ if you want a heavy outer border, or leave it bare if the font has weight. Note: the boxes CLI's default designs render ASCII +--+ borders that clash with the Unicode aesthetic — prefer hand-drawn ╔═╗ framing or skip framing the banner.

Layer 2 — tuple legend

Right after the banner, emit a compact block naming the tuple drawn for this artifact. The legend tells the reader "this is the brainstorming kit I used":

╭─ TUPLE ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─╮
│  ◆ OPERATORS    substitution · negation                                │
│  ◆ ORGANON      dictionary                                             │
│  ◆ DIMENSIONS   decomposability · naturalness · visibility             │
╰─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─ ─╯

Use ╭─╮ rounded for the legend frame — soft, indicating "metadata, not the artifact itself."

Layer 3 — dimensions surfaced

Before the operator outputs, show what each picked dimension-prompt revealed about the user's idea. This is where the reader sees the axes the brainstorming explored. Each dim gets a small block: its axis (with ● / ○ marking the values that matter), a one-line summary of what surfaced, and ★ on the pivot dim if one stands out:

╭─ DIMENSIONS ──────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╮
│                                                                               │
│   decomposability   monolithic ●━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━○ decomposable             │
│                     current is one big skill; alternatives split into         │
│                     preflight + runtime + visible output                      │
│                                                                               │
│   naturalness       instruction-as-discipline ●━━━━━━○ artifact-as-discipline │
│                     discipline baked into the visible output, not the prompt  │
│                                                                               │
│   visibility   ★    invisible ○━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━● visible                 │
│                     0% (current) → footer-visible → fully laid out            │
│                     ★ pivot — this is the user's stated complaint             │
│                                                                               │
╰───────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────╯

If the dim surfaced nothing useful for this idea, say so in one phrase rather than padding. Empty dims are a tell that the picker drew an unfit prompt; the reader benefits from seeing that.

Layer 4 — artifact body, with operator-named dividers

The picked organon dictates the form. Each organon has a rendering recipe at ~/.claude/skills/ideonomy-rich/rendering/<organon>.md. Core recipes: chart, tree, list, atlas, scale, cycle, dictionary. Other organons fall back to the principles below.

The organon's name appears in the artifact's main header — ═══ ◆ DICTIONARY ◆ ═══ followed by the body, never Phase C or Organon: dictionary.

When two or more operators were picked, divide their contributions with a divider that names BOTH the operator AND the specific move:

═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════
  ◆  NEGATION  ◆      negating "process is invisible" → "process leaves a trail"
═══════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════════

The divider has three visible parts:

1. The operator's name (NEGATION, SUBSTITUTION, COMBINATION, ABSTRACTION-LIFT, etc.)
2. A one-line description of the specific move — what was negated, substituted, combined
3. The arrow → making the move visible

This is the difference that addresses the "where's the ideonomy?" complaint: the reader can see, at the divider, both the abstract operator and the concrete move it produced. ◆ OPPOSITES ◆ (content-only) hides the operator. Phase B — Operator: Negation (procedure-only) hides the move. ◆ NEGATION ◆ "X" → "Y" shows both.

Layer 5 — ideonomy trail

Every artifact ends with a structured trail footer. The trail recaps the brainstorming machinery and — most importantly — names what was not surfaced. The "not surfaced" line is where the user finds adjacent directions of inquiry.

[ideonomy · 4 moves · 3 dims · 1 organon · "vigil v2 redesign"]
  dim · pivot:    visibility — invisible→visible is the user's complaint
  ◆ negation:     "invisible by design"   → vigil-trail (Option A)
  ◆ substitution: "self-grading"           → vigil-twin (Option B)
  ◆ negation:     "comprehensive"          → vigil-slim (Option C)
  ◆ substitution: "single draft → revise"  → vigil-tournament (Option D)
  organon:        dictionary — 4 entries
  not surfaced:   "do nothing", "kill vigil entirely", "make vigil charge per-pass"
                  these are negations of meta-properties (existence, free-ness) the
                  picker's dim-prompts didn't reach. worth a follow-up tuple.

Trail rules:

• Always last in the artifact, in a single fenced code block, no trailing commentary
• One line per move; each line names operator + the specific input/output
• The not surfaced: line is mandatory. Even one phrase. This is the line that turns the trail from a recap into a generator — it tells the user where the next exploration could start.
• The trail makes the brainstorming falsifiable: if no trail appears, no real ideonomy ran (you wrote a thoughtful answer that happened to dress up nice).

Rendering principles

• Composition teaches, not labels. A flat box with text inside is wasted opportunity. Spatial arrangement, density, and motion should carry meaning. If your "diagram" is just labeled rectangles that could be bullet points, you've failed.
• Visual hierarchy through line weight. Mix ┌─┐ (single, default), ╔═╗ (double, emphasis), and ╭─╮ (rounded, soft) within one artifact to mark primary / secondary / tertiary structure.
• Show motion. → ↗ ↘ ↑ ↓ ═══▶ ··· >>>>>> for flow, transformation, dependency. Static structures should still suggest direction where direction exists.
• Density is meaning. ░ ▒ ▓ █ shows intensity, fill, certainty, age, frequency. Pick a semantic axis and use the gradient consistently within one diagram.
• Decorative emphasis sparingly. ★ ◆ ● ○ ◇ ▲ ▼ for markers, status, importance. One symbol per role within a piece — ◇ always means empty/coinage opportunity, ● always means canonical instance, etc.
• Drama at the pivot. If the expansion has a key insight or a single empty cell that's the point, let composition draw the eye there — center it, frame it with « » or ⟦ ⟧, isolate it with whitespace. Make the reader land on it.

Character palette

Box (single):   ┌ ─ ┐ │ └ ┘ ├ ┤ ┬ ┴ ┼
Box (double):   ╔ ═ ╗ ║ ╚ ╝ ╠ ╣ ╦ ╩ ╬
Box (rounded):  ╭ ─ ╮ │ ╰ ╯
Density:        ░ ▒ ▓ █ ▄ ▀ ▌ ▐
Geometric:      ◆ ◇ ◈ ● ○ ◉ ■ □ ▲ △ ▼ ▽ ★ ☆ ✦ ✧
Arrows:         → ← ↑ ↓ ↗ ↘ ↙ ↖ ⟶ ⟵ ═══▶ ◀═══ ↻ ↺
Diagonals:      ╱ ╲
Brackets:       ⟦ ⟧ ⟨ ⟩ « » ⌜ ⌝ ⌞ ⌟

Constraints

• Width ≤ 100 chars per line. Most terminals default to 80; 100 leaves a comfortable margin while letting wide art breathe. Anything wider wraps and turns ugly.
• Wrap large diagrams in fenced code blocks (```). Even a monospace-friendly channel may proportional-font your prose; the fence guarantees alignment.
• One large pyfiglet banner per artifact (the title). Use small/mini for sub-banners if needed; don't make every section a 12-line banner.
• No ANSI color in saved-text contexts. toilet --gay looks great in a live terminal, looks like \e[31m garbage in a markdown file. Color belongs to live tty only.
• Box-drawing styles do not mix within a single diagram. Pick one of ┌─┐ / ╔═╗ / ╭─╮ and stick with it; mixing +--+ ASCII with ┌─┐ Unicode is the cardinal sin.

Red flags

Brainstorming-machinery invisibility (the big one):

• No tuple legend after the banner → reader can't see which kit was used.
• No DIMENSIONS block → the axes the brainstorming explored are hidden.
• Dividers say ◆ OPPOSITES ◆ (content-only, no operator named) → the machinery is invisible; this is the failure mode that prompted Layer 4 to require operator+move.
• No ideonomy trail at the end → no falsifiability; the artifact is indistinguishable from a thoughtful answer that didn't use ideonomy at all.
• Trail's not surfaced: line missing or padded with filler → the most generative line is the most likely to be skipped; treat its absence as a vigil-style "trail-without-vigil" tell.

Procedure leaking out (don't over-correct):

• A section titled Phase A/B/C, Operator: <name>, Organon: <name> → procedure leaking. The fix is not to drop the operator name from the divider; it's to pair it with the specific move (◆ NEGATION ◆ "X" → "Y").

Aesthetic / formatting:

• Plain bullets and prose, no organon visually rendered → you skipped the rendering layer.
• Figlet banner so wide it wraps in 100-char terminal → use small or shorten.
• Decorative symbols (★◆●) sprayed without consistent semantic role → noise.
• Visual hierarchy doesn't track conceptual hierarchy → most important = most visually emphatic.
• Mixed +--+ and ┌─┐ in one diagram → pick one style.
• The artifact is just labels-in-boxes that could have been a bullet list → composition isn't teaching anything.

See also

• ideonomy-plain — sibling skill, plain-text-portable. Same primitives, different rendering policy. Install it alongside this one if you want both available.
• rendering/ (within this skill) — per-organon ASCII recipes.
• Hermes ascii-art skill — pyfiglet, cowsay, boxes, image-to-ascii. Install if missing.
• mahidalhan/claude-hacks ascii-art-explainer — performative ASCII philosophy this skill inherits.
• mahidalhan/claude-hacks ascii-explainer — diagnose-then-render approach for diagrams.