extended-problem-solving

Externalize reasoning to a scratchpad file for problems too large to hold in working memory — a persistent record of candidate approaches, eliminated branches and WHY they were eliminated, open questions, and current best hypothesis, updated as understanding evolves. Trigger this when a problem has more moving parts or branches than you can track in-context: multi-day investigations, complex design with many interacting subsystems, a debugging hunt across many hypotheses, or any reasoning you'll need to resume after a context break. Do NOT trigger for problems solvable in one sitting in-context (use structured-reasoning). The distinction: structured-reasoning thinks in the conversation; this skill thinks on disk because the conversation can't hold it.