sow-tools/docs/superpowers/plans/2026-05-23-wiki-list-columns.md

Wiki List Columns Implementation Plan

For agentic workers: REQUIRED SUB-SKILL: Use superpowers:subagent-driven-development (recommended) or superpowers:executing-plans to implement this plan task-by-task. Steps use checkbox (- [ ]) syntax for tracking.

Goal: Add a template-driven topdata wiki option for splitting provider-backed lists into configured columns with a fixed item count and optional forced empty columns.

Architecture: The toolkit wiki renderer gains a generic columns data-provider source that wraps another provider and exposes one row per rendered column. Each column row exposes Items, Index, and count metadata so page templates own markup while YAML owns row selection and chunking behavior. The module class page uses this provider for ClassSkills.

Tech Stack: Go sow-toolkit, YAML topdata wiki config, local HTML templates, Go tests.

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Task 1: Renderer Provider

Files:

• Modify: toolkit/internal/topdata/wiki_data_providers.go

• Modify: toolkit/internal/topdata/wiki_template.go

• Test: toolkit/internal/topdata/wiki_native_test.go

• Write failing tests for a columns provider that chunks ClassSkills into rows with nested Items, including forced empty columns.

• Run go test ./internal/topdata -run 'TestWikiTemplate.*Column|TestBuildNativeWikiRendersClassSkillColumns' and confirm the new assertions fail because columns is not supported.

• Add provider, columns, items_per_column, and force_columns fields to wikiDataProviderDefinition.

• Validate that columns providers name an existing provider, use positive integer columns and items_per_column, and do not point at themselves.

• Allow nested {{#each Items}} loops by teaching template #each to iterate an array field from the current row before falling back to named providers.

• Implement deterministic chunking: each column receives up to items_per_column; extra source items continue into additional overflow columns; force_columns: true emits empty configured columns when there are fewer items.

Task 2: Module Template

Files:

• Modify: module/topdata/wiki/data.yaml

• Modify: module/topdata/wiki/templates/pages/classes.html

• Modify: module/topdata/wiki/README.md

• Add ClassSkillColumns using source: columns, provider: ClassSkills, columns: 3, items_per_column: 12, and force_columns: true.

• Replace the flat class skill <ul> with a .wiki-list-columns .wiki-list-columns--3 wrapper and nested {{#each Items}} loops.

• Document the generic columns provider fields for template authors.

Task 3: Verification

Files:

• Verify: toolkit/internal/topdata/...

• Verify: module/topdata/wiki/...

• Run go test ./internal/topdata -run 'TestWikiTemplate|TestBuildNativeWiki'.

• Run ./build-tool.sh from toolkit/.

• Run SOW_TOOLS_DEV_BINARY=../toolkit/tools/sow-toolkit ./build-wiki.sh --force from module/.

• Inspect generated class HTML for wiki-list-columns--3, three configured class-skill lists for shorter classes, and overflow columns for long lists.