Content Design System

Content type onboarding guide

A process for bringing a new content type into the CDS.

What this process produces

Every content type in the CDS is defined by artifacts that work together as a system. When all of these artifacts exist and pass integrity checks, an agent can generate content of that type, and an evaluator can score it.

content_type_taxonomy.yaml

Registers the content type by family, purpose, distinguishing criteria, and classification signals.

component_registry.yaml

Defines the structural components the content type uses, such as composition, reuse class, and boundary conditions.

{type}_terminology.yaml

Preferred structural terms, prohibited alternates, and disambiguation notes for this content type's vocabulary.

{type}_rules_bundle.json

Numbered, severity-tiered rules that govern each component.

{type}-pattern_SKILL.md

Agent skill file: classification decision tree, per-type assembly instructions, output templates, validation checklist. The generator's source of truth.

Process overview

The following are the phases in the process of preparing your content for onboarding.

1

Corpus selection

Assemble a corpus of representative examples of your content type.
2

Classification exercise

Run the corpus-classifier agent for a first-pass structural sort. Validate clusters in human review.
3

Pattern evaluation

Make keep / refine / combine / deprecate decisions for each candidate pattern.
4

Artifact authoring

Write the five artifacts in dependency order: pattern(s) → taxonomy → registry → terminology → rules → skill file(s).
5

Cross-artifact integrity testing

Run integrity_check.py.
6

Generation testing

Verify the skill file produces correctly structured, correctly classified output.
7

Evaluation testing

Verify the rules produce correct verdicts.
8

Feedback loop

Fix findings until you are satisfied with your content architecture.

Before you start

Confirm all inputs are available before beginning Phase 1.

Input	Source	Required for
A corpus of ≥50 real published examples of the target content type	Published docs, export, or crawl	Phase 1
Rules from any existing style guide or quality framework that already govern this content type	AWSStyleGuide, AWSDevDocsStyleGuide, existing team rubrics	Phase 4 (rules bundle)
A team content SME who owns the keep/refine/combine/deprecate decisions	Team	Phases 2–3

Exit criteria

The content type is fully onboarded when all of the following are true.

All INT checks (Phase 5) pass with zero failures
All generation test cases produce correct output: correct classification, assembly, components, terminology, and taxonomy alignment
GEN-01 output (post-manual-verification) passes the evaluation protocol with zero sev ≤300 findings
All evaluation test cases produce the expected verdict: EVAL-03/06 FAIL, EVAL-04/05 PASS with flags, EVAL-07 flags per rule severity, EVAL-01/02 PASS
Zero open findings in the feedback loop table

Worked examples in this repo

Content type	Family	Artifacts
Procedure	Procedural	`procedures_68000_reconciled.json`, `procedure-pattern_SKILL.md`
Knowledge Center Article (Types A–F)	Hybrid / Procedural / Reference	`kc_124000.json`, `kc-article-pattern_SKILL.md`

Discovery: Phases 1–3