Principle Grid Layout

April 23, 2026 · View on GitHub

Layout: Row of numbered tenet cards, each carrying a short title with a paired anti-pattern and application block below Best for: Design principles, doctrine cards, methodology tenets, engineering values — anywhere a rule only makes sense next to what it rejects

Template

Doctrine · Principle Set

Five Rules We Will Not Bend

Every principle is paired with the failure mode it rejects. If the anti-pattern never shows up in practice, the principle is probably not worth stating.

1Problem before tool

Anti-Pattern Picking the framework first and searching for a problem to apply it to.
In Practice Every proposal starts from a named user pain and a measurable outcome.

2Shared primitives

Anti-Pattern Each team rebuilds the same auth, logging, and rate-limit glue.
In Practice Cross-cut concerns live in a shared core; teams extend, not re-invent.

3Tiered data access

Anti-Pattern One permission level for everything; sensitive data rides in plain traffic.
In Practice Classified tiers with explicit handlers; the highest tier never leaves its boundary.

4Human in the loop first

Anti-Pattern Full automation from day one, with unbounded blast radius.
In Practice Review gates on every outbound action until the error budget proves stable.

5Evaluate on a clock

Anti-Pattern Launch-day benchmarks, then silence; drift goes unnoticed for months.
In Practice Rolling metrics with thresholds that trigger rollback without a meeting.
Engineering Principles · Revision 3

Variations

  • Four principles: switch repeat(5, 1fr) to repeat(4, 1fr) for wider, more readable cards. Avoid six — density collapses readability.
  • Three-row variant: add an optional card-principle-row.metric block carrying a concrete KPI (e.g. "rollback within 15 minutes"). Keep to one metric per card.
  • Emphasis column: promote one card with a heavier border (border-top: 5px solid) when the principle carries more weight than the others.

When Not to Use

  • Only two positions to contrast → use pros-cons.
  • The points share no common shape (some are tenets, some are tactics) → use stacked-modules.
  • No anti-pattern exists; the items are just features → use badge-grid.