> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.engineeringframework.dev/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# The Framework Checklist

> Categories, subcategories, items, definitions, and templates

The **Engineering Planning Framework** checklist is the core of the product:
a structured set of categories and items that describe what "good" planning
looks like for a software project — things like technical design, security
review, and rollout planning. Every project tracks its own progress against
this checklist, so at any point you can see what's been done and what's
still missing.

## Why this matters

Without a shared checklist, planning quality depends entirely on who happens
to be running the project — some teams write a thorough design doc and
rollback plan, others skip straight to building. The framework checklist
gives every project the same baseline expectations, so gaps get caught
before launch instead of after an incident.

## Structure

The checklist has three levels:

* **Category** — a top-level grouping, like "Technical Design" or
  "Reliability & Operations."
* **Subcategory** — a more specific grouping within a category, like "System
  Architecture" under "Technical Design."
* **Item** — the actual checklist entry, like "High-level system design
  completed."

Some items are marked **optional** — relevant to some projects but not
required for every one.

## Definitions and templates

Many checklist items come with extra help:

* A **definition** — a short explanation of what the item actually means and
  what "done" looks like, so it's not just a vague label.
* A **template** — a ready-to-use artifact (like an ADR template or a
  rollback plan outline) that a project can start from instead of writing
  from scratch. The same template can be shared across multiple checklist
  items.

Not every item has both — some are simple status checks, others come with a
full definition and template.

## Customizing the checklist for your organization

The built-in checklist is a starting point, not a fixed list. Your
organization can add its own categories, subcategories, items, and
templates on top of it. In practice, most organizations manage this custom
content through [GitHub Sync](/github-sync) rather than editing it by hand,
so changes go through the same review process as your code.

## Browsing the checklist in the dashboard

The **Framework** page shows the full checklist as a searchable,
expandable list, grouped by category and subcategory. Each item shows
whether it's optional, and whether it has a template and/or a definition
available. Clicking an item opens its full definition and template content,
with tabs to switch between the two when both are available.

## Using the checklist with an AI assistant

If your team connects an AI coding assistant to the
[Framework MCP server](/framework-mcp-server), the assistant can browse
categories and items, read definitions and templates, and help draft
artifacts directly — without anyone copying checklist content into a chat
window by hand. Every response is filtered to what that person is actually
allowed to see, the same as the dashboard — see
[Permissions & Roles Explained](/permissions-explained).

## Related reading

* [Project Phases](/project-phases) for how checklist categories get
  prioritized as a project moves through its lifecycle
* [GitHub Sync](/github-sync) for managing your own checklist content as
  version-controlled files
* [Framework MCP Server](/framework-mcp-server) for connecting an AI
  assistant to the checklist