tlehman/litprog-skill

162 stars · Last commit 2026-04-10

Literate programming skill for agent harnesses like Claude Code, OpenCode and Hermes Agent

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# Literate Programming Skill for Claude Code

A Claude Code skill that transforms codebases into literate programs. These are documents written for human comprehension that also generate the original source code.

## What is Literate Programming?

Literate programming was invented by **Donald Knuth** in 1984. Knuth is the author of *The Art of Computer Programming*, creator of TeX, and winner of the 1974 Turing Award. He introduced literate programming as a paradigm where programs are written as essays for human readers, with code embedded in a narrative.

A literate program produces two outputs:

- **Weave**: Produce a readable document (PDF, HTML) with prose, diagrams, and syntax-highlighted code.
- **Tangle**: Extract runnable source files from the document.

The key insight: present code in *psychological order*. That is, the order that makes it easiest to understand, not the order the compiler needs.

## What This Skill Does

- Installs as a Claude Code skill (via `SKILL.md`)
- Gives Claude the ability to analyze a codebase and produce a `.lit.md` file
- The `.lit.md` file weaves prose, Mermaid diagrams, LaTeX math, and syntax-highlighted code into a narrative

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