Upstream Recon

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name: upstream-recon description: > Investigate an open-source project before interacting with it — PRs, issues, or comments. Use BEFORE: filing an issue, submitting a PR, or commenting on an existing thread. Triggers on: "upstream recon", "should I PR this", "will they merge", "check the project", "investigate the repo", "PR strategy", "file an issue", "check existing issues", "should I comment", or any time the user wants to interact with a repo they don't maintain. Also use proactively when about to file an issue or PR — checking existing threads prevents duplicates and wasted effort.

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Upstream Recon

Investigate a repo's culture and existing threads before interacting. Prevents duplicate issues, wasted PR effort, and uninformed comments.

Arguments: [topic-keyword]

Procedure

Use gh CLI throughout. Run independent queries in parallel.

1. Repo metadata — stars, forks, license, last push date, archived status 2. Top 10 contributors — commit counts. Is it one person with 90%+ commits? 3. Existing issues search — search open AND closed issues for the topic keyword. Check for duplicates, prior art, and maintainer responses. Report what was found. 4. Recent 30 PRs (all states) — get the lay of the land 5. Merged PRs (last 20) — who merges them? How fast? What types get accepted? 6. Closed-without-merge PRs (last 50, filter mergedAt == null) — deep-dive 2-3 notable rejections: read comments for maintainer reasoning 7. Open PRs — how many sit with 0 reviews? For how long? 8. Topic deep-dive (if keyword given) — read comments on 2-3 most relevant existing issues/PRs to understand maintainer sentiment and community workarounds

Analysis Dimensions

Governance: Solo maintainer / small team / community-driven

External PR reception: Welcoming / selective (bugs yes, features no) / closed shop

Issue responsiveness: How fast do maintainers respond to issues? Do they engage or auto-close?

Merge velocity: Days from open to merge for external contributors

Rejection patterns: Ghosted? "Building it myself"? "File issue first"? Bot auto-closed?

Topic overlap: Has this been attempted or discussed before? Active workarounds?

Recommendation

End the report with one of:

MERGE-LIKELY — project merges external feature PRs, no competing work, maintainer receptive

MERGE-UNLIKELY — maintainer builds features themselves, similar PRs closed/ignored, feature contradicts direction

FILE-ISSUE-FIRST — feature not yet discussed, maintainer is selective but responsive to issues, gauge interest before coding

COMMENT-ON-EXISTING — existing issue/PR already covers this, add your workaround or +1 there instead

DUPLICATE-EXISTS — exact issue already filed, do not create another

Include concrete next steps (e.g., "comment on #13738 with your workaround", "start with a bug fix PR to build credibility", "file an issue referencing #189", "fork and maintain independently").