/content-gate — Quality Assurance

See also: /voice-gate — the complementary subjective-voice pass. Run /content-gate first for mechanical rule checks (banned words, SEO lint, Four U's), then /voice-gate for cadence, signature-move overuse, and voice-guide violations that require interpretation.

Run the full quality gate on any content. Scores against 28 rules across 4 categories, applies the approval policy, and produces a detailed scorecard with fix suggestions.

Can be used standalone on any file, or as part of the content sprint chain after /content-write.

Preamble

source "$(dirname "$0")/../lib/preamble.sh"

Arguments

Optional:

• file path: Path to a markdown file to score. If omitted, uses the most recent draft from ~/.kai-marketing/drafts/.
• --policy: Gate policy name (blog-publish, linkedin-article, cold-email, default). Auto-detected from file if omitted.

Example: /content-gate path/to/article.md --policy blog-publish Example: /content-gate (uses most recent draft)

The Skill

Step 1: Find the Content

If a file path is provided in ARGUMENTS, use that file.

If no file path, find the most recent .md file in ~/.kai-marketing/drafts/. If no drafts exist, tell user: "No draft found. Run /content-write first, or provide a file path: /content-gate path/to/file.md"

Step 2: Detect Policy

If --policy is specified, use it. Otherwise, detect from the filename or content:

• Contains "blog" or in drafts/ → blog-publish
• Contains "linkedin" → linkedin-article
• Contains "email" or "cold" → cold-email
• Contains "ad" or "meta" or "google" → default (no SEO lint)
• Otherwise → default

Step 3: Run the Gate

Run two commands:

Score the content:

kai-gate score {file} --format json

Run gate decision:

kai-gate gate {file} --policy {policy}

Step 4: Display the Scorecard

Present the results:

QUALITY GATE SCORECARD
══════════════════════════════════════════

File:   {filename}
Policy: {policy}

OVERALL: {score}/100 ({grade}) — {PASS|FAIL|HOLD}

┌─────────────────────────┬───────┬────────┐
│ Category                │ Score │ Weight │
├─────────────────────────┼───────┼────────┤
│ Algorithmic Authorship  │  {aa}%│  35%   │
│ GEO/AEO Signals        │ {geo}%│  20%   │
│ Content Structure       │  {cs}%│  25%   │
│ Four U's               │{4u}/16│  20%   │
├─────────────────────────┼───────┼────────┤
│ TOTAL                   │{total}│ 100%   │
└─────────────────────────┴───────┴────────┘

VIOLATIONS ({count}):
  {severity} {rule_id}: {description}
    Fix: {suggestion}
    Line: {line_number}

TOP FIXES:
  1. {most impactful fix}
  2. {second most impactful fix}
  3. {third most impactful fix}

Step 5: Gate Decision

Based on the score and policy:

• PASS (score >= threshold, no tier-1 banned words): "Content approved. Ready to publish."
• HOLD (score close to threshold or policy=hold): "Content held for review. Score: {score}. Threshold: {threshold}."
• FAIL (score below threshold or tier-1 violations): "Content rejected. {N} violations must be fixed."

If FAIL, offer to auto-fix: "Want me to revise the draft to fix these {N} violations? (Only failing rules will be touched — passing sections protected.)"

Step 6: Save Gate Result

Save the gate result to ~/.kai-marketing/gates/{date}-{slug}.json:

{"file": "{filename}", "policy": "{policy}", "score": {score}, "grade": "{grade}", "status": "{pass|hold|fail}", "violations_count": {N}, "timestamp": "{ISO datetime}"}

Error Handling

• File not found: Show helpful message with file path
• SQLite locked: Retry once after 1 second, then warn user
• LLM unavailable (Four U's scoring): Score without LLM, note "Four U's scored rule-based only (LLM unavailable)"

Chain State

Reads from: ~/.kai-marketing/drafts/{date}-{slug}.md (or any file) Writes to: ~/.kai-marketing/gates/{date}-{slug}.json