Required Plugin Installation: superpowers and ui-ux-pro-max | AI App Factory Tutorial

What You'll Learn

• Check if superpowers and ui-ux-pro-max plugins are installed
• Manually install these two required plugins (if automatic installation fails)
• Verify that plugins are correctly enabled
• Understand why these two plugins are prerequisites for the pipeline
• Troubleshoot common plugin installation failures

The Problem

When running the Factory pipeline, you may encounter:

• Bootstrap stage fails: Prompted that "superpowers:brainstorm skill not used"
• UI stage fails: Prompted that "ui-ux-pro-max skill not used"
• Automatic installation fails: Plugin installation errors during factory init
• Plugin conflicts: A plugin with the same name exists but has the wrong version
• Permission issues: Plugin not correctly enabled after installation

In fact, Factory will automatically try to install these two plugins during initialization, but if it fails, you need to handle it manually.

When to Use This

You need to manually install plugins when the following situations occur:

• factory init prompts plugin installation failure
• Bootstrap or UI stage detects that required skills are not used
• First time using Factory, ensure the pipeline can run normally
• Plugin version is outdated and needs reinstallation

Why These Two Plugins Are Required

Factory's pipeline depends on two key Claude Code plugins:

Plugin	Purpose	Pipeline Stage	Skills Provided
superpowers	Deep dive into product ideas	Bootstrap	superpowers:brainstorm - Systematic brainstorming, analyze problem, users, value, assumptions
ui-ux-pro-max	Generate professional design system	UI	ui-ux-pro-max - 67 styles, 96 color palettes, 100 industry rules

Mandatory Requirement

According to agents/orchestrator.checkpoint.md, these two plugins are mandatory requirements:

• Bootstrap stage: Must use superpowers:brainstorm skill, otherwise output will be rejected
• UI stage: Must use ui-ux-pro-max skill, otherwise output will be rejected

🎒 Prerequisites

Before starting, please ensure:

• [ ] Claude CLI installed (claude --version available)
• [ ] Completed factory init to initialize project
• [ ] Configured Claude Code permissions (refer to Claude Code Integration Guide)
• [ ] Network connection normal (needs access to GitHub plugin marketplace)

Core Concepts

Plugin installation follows a check → add marketplace → install → verify four-step process:

1. Check: View if plugins are already installed
2. Add marketplace: Add plugin repository to Claude Code plugin marketplace
3. Install: Execute installation command
4. Verify: Confirm plugin is enabled

Factory's automatic installation script (cli/scripts/check-and-install-*.js) will automatically execute these steps, but you need to understand the manual method to handle failure situations.

Follow Along

Step 1: Check Plugin Status

Why First confirm if already installed, avoid duplicate operations.

Open terminal and execute in project root directory:

claude plugin list

You should see: List of installed plugins. If it contains the following, it means installed:

✅ superpowers (enabled)
✅ ui-ux-pro-max (enabled)

If you don't see these two plugins, or they show disabled, continue with the following steps.

Automatic installation by factory init

The factory init command automatically executes plugin installation check (line 360-392 of init.js). If successful, you will see:

📦 Installing superpowers plugin... ✓
📦 Installing ui-ux-pro-max-skill plugin... ✓
✅ Plugins installed!

Step 2: Install superpowers Plugin

Why Bootstrap stage needs to use superpowers:brainstorm skill for brainstorming.

Add to Plugin Marketplace

claude plugin marketplace add obra/superpowers-marketplace

You should see:

✅ Plugin marketplace added successfully

Marketplace addition failed

If prompted "plugin marketplace already exists", you can ignore and continue with installation steps.

Install Plugin

claude plugin install superpowers@superpowers-marketplace

You should see:

✅ Plugin installed successfully

Verify Installation

claude plugin list

You should see: List contains superpowers (enabled).

Step 3: Install ui-ux-pro-max Plugin

Why UI stage needs to use ui-ux-pro-max skill to generate design system.

Add to Plugin Marketplace

claude plugin marketplace add nextlevelbuilder/ui-ux-pro-max-skill

You should see:

✅ Plugin marketplace added successfully

Install Plugin

claude plugin install ui-ux-pro-max@ui-ux-pro-max-skill

You should see:

✅ Plugin installed successfully

Verify Installation

claude plugin list

You should see: List contains ui-ux-pro-max (enabled).

Step 4: Verify Both Plugins Work Normally

Why Ensure the pipeline can normally call the skills of these two plugins.

Verify superpowers

Execute in Claude Code:

Please use superpowers:brainstorm skill to help me analyze the following product idea: [your idea]

You should see: Claude starts using brainstorm skill, systematically analyzes problem, users, value, and assumptions.

Verify ui-ux-pro-max

Execute in Claude Code:

Please use ui-ux-pro-max skill to design a color scheme for my application

You should see: Claude returns a professional color recommendation with multiple design options.

Checkpoint ✅

After completing the above steps, confirm the following:

• [ ] Execute claude plugin list and see both plugins marked as enabled
• [ ] Can call superpowers:brainstorm skill in Claude Code
• [ ] Can call ui-ux-pro-max skill in Claude Code
• [ ] Execute factory run without prompting missing plugins

Troubleshooting

❌ Plugin installed but not enabled

Symptom: claude plugin list shows plugin exists but no enabled marker.

Solution: Re-execute installation command:

claude plugin install <plugin ID>

❌ Permission blocked

Symptom: Prompted "Permission denied: Skill(superpowers:brainstorming)"

Cause: Claude Code's permission configuration doesn't include Skill permission.

Solution: Check if .claude/settings.local.json contains:

{
  "permissions": [
    "Skill(superpowers:brainstorming)",
    "Skill(ui-ux-pro-max)"
  ]
}

Complete permission configuration

This is a minimal permission configuration example. Factory's init command will automatically generate a complete permission configuration file (including Skill(superpowers:brainstorm) and other necessary permissions), usually no manual editing required.

If you need to regenerate permission configuration, execute in project root:

factory init --force-permissions

Refer to Claude Code Integration Guide to regenerate permission configuration.

❌ Marketplace addition failed

Symptom: claude plugin marketplace add fails, prompting "not found" or network error.

Solution:

1. Check network connection
2. Confirm Claude CLI version is latest: npm update -g @anthropic-ai/claude-code
3. Try direct installation: Skip marketplace addition, directly execute claude plugin install <plugin ID>

❌ Plugin version conflict

Symptom: A plugin with the same name is installed, but the wrong version causes pipeline failure.

Solution:

# Uninstall old version
claude plugin uninstall <plugin name>

# Reinstall
claude plugin install <plugin ID>

❌ Windows path issues

Symptom: Prompted "command not found" when executing scripts on Windows.

Solution:

Use Node.js to directly run installation scripts:

node cli/scripts/check-and-install-superpowers.js
node cli/scripts/check-and-install-ui-skill.js

Handling Automatic Installation Failures

If automatic installation during factory init fails, you can:

1. View error message: Terminal will display specific failure reason
2. Manual installation: Manually install both plugins according to the above steps
3. Re-run: factory run will detect plugin status, if installed continue pipeline

Doesn't affect pipeline startup

Even if plugin installation fails, factory init will still complete initialization. You can manually install plugins later without affecting subsequent operations.

Role of Plugins in the Pipeline

Bootstrap Stage (requires superpowers)

• Skill call: superpowers:brainstorm
• Output: input/idea.md - Structured product idea document
• Verification point: Check if Agent explicitly states using this skill (orchestrator.checkpoint.md:60-70)

UI Stage (requires ui-ux-pro-max)

• Skill call: ui-ux-pro-max
• Output: artifacts/ui/ui.schema.yaml - UI Schema containing design system
• Verification point: Check if design system configuration comes from this skill (orchestrator.checkpoint.md:72-84)

Summary

• Factory depends on two required plugins: superpowers and ui-ux-pro-max
• factory init will automatically try to install, but needs manual handling if it fails
• Plugin installation process: check → add marketplace → install → verify
• Ensure both plugins are in enabled state, and permission configuration is correct
• Pipeline's Bootstrap and UI stages will enforce checking usage of these two plugins

Next Up

In the next lesson, we'll learn 7-Stage Pipeline Overview.

You will learn:

• Complete execution flow of the pipeline
• Input, output, and responsibilities of each stage
• How checkpoint mechanism ensures quality
• How to recover from a failed stage

---

Appendix: Source Code Reference

Click to expand source code locations

Last updated: 2026-01-29

Function	File Path	Lines
Superpowers plugin check script	cli/scripts/check-and-install-superpowers.js	1-208
UI/UX Pro Max plugin check script	cli/scripts/check-and-install-ui-skill.js	1-209
Automatic plugin installation logic	cli/commands/init.js	360-392
Bootstrap stage skill verification	agents/orchestrator.checkpoint.md	60-70
UI stage skill verification	agents/orchestrator.checkpoint.md	72-84

Key constants:

• PLUGIN_NAME = 'superpowers': superpowers plugin name
• PLUGIN_ID = 'superpowers@superpowers-marketplace': superpowers full ID
• PLUGIN_MARKETPLACE = 'obra/superpowers-marketplace': plugin marketplace repository
• UI_PLUGIN_NAME = 'ui-ux-pro-max': UI plugin name
• UI_PLUGIN_ID = 'ui-ux-pro-max@ui-ux-pro-max-skill': UI plugin full ID
• UI_PLUGIN_MARKETPLACE = 'nextlevelbuilder/ui-ux-pro-max-skill': UI plugin marketplace repository

Key functions:

• isPluginInstalled(): Check if plugin is installed (via claude plugin list output)
• addToMarketplace(): Add plugin to marketplace (claude plugin marketplace add)
• installPlugin(): Install plugin (claude plugin install)
• verifyPlugin(): Verify plugin is installed and enabled
• main(): Main function, executes complete check→add→install→verify process