A comprehensive collection of steering documents and agent hooks for Kiro IDE that enforces development best practices, automates quality checks, and streamlines workflows.

# Clone this repository as a template for your new project
git clone https://github.com/awsdataarchitect/kiro-best-practices.git your-project-name
cd your-project-name
rm -rf .git
git init
git add .
git commit -m "feat: initialize project with Kiro best practices"

# Add only the .kiro directory to existing project
cd your-existing-project
mkdir -p .kiro && curl -L https://github.com/awsdataarchitect/kiro-best-practices/archive/main.tar.gz | tar -xz --strip-components=2 -C .kiro kiro-best-practices-main/.kiro

# Download and extract only .kiro directory
cd your-project
mkdir -p .kiro
curl -L https://github.com/awsdataarchitect/kiro-best-practices/archive/main.tar.gz | tar -xz --strip-components=2 -C .kiro kiro-best-practices-main/.kiro

# Or use git sparse-checkout for updates
git clone --filter=blob:none --sparse https://github.com/awsdataarchitect/kiro-best-practices.git temp-kiro
cd temp-kiro
git sparse-checkout set .kiro
cp -r .kiro/* ../.kiro/
cd .. && rm -rf temp-kiro

After installation:

• 🎯 Steering Documents: Automatically refresh and become active immediately - no restart needed
• 🔄 Hooks: Require restarting Kiro or reopening the project to become active

💡 Tip: After installation, restart Kiro to ensure all hooks are properly loaded and functional.

Automatically guide all AI interactions with established best practices:

• AWS CLI Best Practices - --no-cli-pager and AWS integration patterns
• CDK Best Practices - Project structure, testing, and deployment patterns
• Development Standards - Dependency management, code quality, documentation
• Docker Best Practices - Container security and optimization
• Git Best Practices - Conventional commits, branching, and security
• MCP Best Practices - Model Context Protocol server configuration and usage
• Python Best Practices - Code style, virtual environments, and testing
• React Best Practices - Component patterns, hooks, and accessibility
• Security Best Practices - Code security, dependency management, data protection
• Testing Best Practices - Minimal verbosity, output management, performance
• TypeScript Best Practices - Code style, type safety, and testing guidelines

Quality checks that run automatically when you save files:

• Auto Test on Save - Runs tests with minimal verbosity when code changes
• Lint and Format on Save - Auto-formats and lints code following project standards
• Security Scan on Dependencies - Audits when package files change
• CDK Synth on Change - Validates CDK code and runs synthesis
• Validate Docker on Change - Checks Docker files for best practices and security
• MCP Config Validation - Validates MCP server configurations
• Environment File Validation - Checks .env files for security issues
• API Schema Validation - Validates OpenAPI/GraphQL schemas and generates types

On-demand tools available in the Kiro Agent Hooks panel:

• Commit Message Helper - Creates conventional commit messages
• README Spell Check - Fixes spelling and grammar in documentation
• MCP Server Test - Tests all configured MCP servers
• Dependency Update Check - Finds outdated packages and security issues
• Code Coverage Check - Analyzes test coverage gaps
• Performance Analysis - Identifies optimization opportunities

Performance-sensitive hooks you can enable as needed:

• Accessibility Audit - Checks React components for accessibility issues
• Update Documentation - Updates docs when code changes
• Translation Update - Syncs translation files

Edit any .kiro.hook file and change the enabled field:

{
  "enabled": true,  // Change to false to disable
  "name": "Hook Name",
  // ... rest of configuration
}

Modify the patterns array in hook files to match your project structure:

{
  "when": {
    "type": "fileEdited",
    "patterns": [
      "src/**/*.ts",     // Your source files
      "lib/**/*.js",     // Your library files
      "**/*.custom"      // Your custom extensions
    ]
  }
}

Create additional steering documents in .kiro/steering/:

---
title: Your Team Standards
inclusion: always
---

# Your Team-Specific Guidelines
- Team-specific coding standards
- Project-specific patterns
- Custom workflows

This boilerplate includes best practices for:

• Languages: TypeScript, JavaScript, Python
• Frameworks: React, CDK, Docker
• Tools: Git, npm/yarn, pytest, ESLint, Prettier
• Cloud: AWS (CLI, CDK, services)
• APIs: OpenAPI/Swagger, GraphQL
• Testing: Jest, pytest, coverage analysis
• Documentation: Markdown, JSDoc, docstrings

Includes best practices for Model Context Protocol servers:

• Context7 - For dependency compatibility checking
• AWS Knowledge - For current AWS documentation and best practices
• AWS API - For programmatic AWS interactions
• Proper configuration patterns and testing workflows

Built-in security practices:

• Dependency vulnerability scanning
• Environment file validation (no secrets in code)
• Docker security best practices
• AWS security patterns
• MCP server security configurations

1. Review all steering documents - Modify for your team's standards
2. Adjust hook sensitivity - Enable/disable based on your workflow
3. Update file patterns - Match your project structure
4. Add team-specific hooks - Create custom automation for your needs

• Web Applications: Enable accessibility audit, focus on React patterns
• Infrastructure: Enable CDK hooks, focus on AWS patterns
• Libraries: Enable documentation updates, focus on API patterns
• Microservices: Enable Docker validation, focus on testing patterns

• Steering Documents - Individual best practice guides
• Hook Configurations - All available automation hooks

1. Create steering document in .kiro/steering/
2. Add corresponding hook in .kiro/hooks/
3. Update documentation
4. Test with sample project

1. Fork this repository
2. Add your improvements
3. Submit pull request with description
4. Include examples of usage

MIT License - Feel free to use this in your projects and modify as needed.

• Issues: Report bugs or request features via GitHub issues
• Discussions: Share your customizations and ask questions
• Wiki: Community-contributed examples and patterns

After setup, verify everything works:

1. Check Steering: AI responses should reference best practices
2. Test Hooks: Save a TypeScript file to trigger auto-test hook
3. Manual Hooks: Look for buttons in Kiro Agent Hooks panel
4. MCP Integration: Test MCP servers if configured

Happy coding with consistent, high-quality development practices! 🚀