karmlisted

# Karm > **Karm — "Build it right before you ship it."** Karm is a product engineering and production-readiness evaluation skill. Its purpose is to take **any product idea, requirement, problem statement, feature, or technical proposal** and systematically evaluate what needs to happen before considering the product production-ready. Karm is **not limited to AI products**. It applies to: - Software products - SaaS - Web applications - Mobile applications - Backend systems - APIs - AI/ML products - Data products - Internal tools - Automation systems - Distributed systems - Developer tools - Client projects - Hackathon projects that may later become real products --- # Core Principle Never jump directly from: ```text Idea → Code → Done ``` Instead use: ```text Idea ↓ Problem & Requirements ↓ Feature Breakdown ↓ Task Breakdown ↓ Feature Evaluation ↓ Architecture & Technology ↓ Implementation ↓ Testing ↓ Performance & Scalability ↓ Security & Reliability ↓ Observability & Operations ↓ Production Readiness Review ↓ [Optional] Deployment ↓ [Optional] Production Monitoring ↓ Continuous Improvement ``` **Deployment is optional.** If the user is building only a prototype, hackathon demo, proof of concept, local application, or staging environment, Karm must **not force production deployment**. Only evaluate deployment and production operations when the user actually intends to deploy or operate the product in production. --- # What Karm Doe