Use Spec Kit, Kiro, BMAD or OpenSpec with Intent Architect

Already writing specs with Spec Kit, Kiro, BMAD or OpenSpec? Keep going. Bring the specs you have into Intent Architect, or run your framework's own commands from it, and see which code realizes each requirement.

This guide shows how to import your specs, keep driving your framework from the Specifications panel, trace requirements to code, and keep the two in step.

Import your specs in the Specifications panel

In the Solution Shell, open Specifications from the activity bar, click Import specs and choose:

  • Discover in this solution to find the spec folders in your solution: the ones under .kiro/specs, specs and openspec/changes, and BMAD's output folder.
  • Choose a folder… to import a spec folder from anywhere, such as one in another Git repository. Pick the spec's own folder.

The Import specs menu open in the Specifications panel The Import specs menu, with Spec Kit's constitution listed above the specs.

Everything found is imported at once, and the panel says how many folders it imported. Each spec becomes a card named after the spec, with a badge naming its framework, at the phase its documents have reached. A Spec Kit spec with a plan.md starts at design, for example.

Your requirements keep the ids your framework gave them, such as FR-001 and US1 in Spec Kit or R1 in Kiro, so links survive later imports. Intent Architect reads your framework's documents but never changes them, and keeps its own files under intent/.specs.

Note

OpenSpec doesn't number its requirements, so Intent Architect derives each id from the requirement's name. If you rename a requirement in OpenSpec, the renamed requirement starts with no links, unless you record the rename under OpenSpec's RENAMED heading.

If your framework has governance documents, such as Spec Kit's constitution, the panel lists them above your specs, and the agent runs it starts are told to honour them.

Keep driving your framework from the Specifications panel

Your framework owns each phase it has written a document for. For Spec Kit, spec.md is the requirements, plan.md the design, and tasks.md the tasks and the implementation. On a phase it owns, Review opens the framework's own document, and the card's buttons run your framework's own commands:

  • Request changes runs its command for the phase, such as /speckit-plan, to revise the document.
  • Its extra commands sit beside it, such as Spec Kit's Clarify and Checklist for the requirements, Analyze for the design and Converge for the implementation.
  • At the implementation phase, Implement runs /speckit-implement.

A spec card at the design phase, with the design owned by Spec Kit After a re-import, the design belongs to Spec Kit, and the card's buttons run Spec Kit's commands.

Each button opens a new chat in the AI Assistant with the command already typed, and waits for you to send it. Under the command, Intent Architect adds a line telling the agent to honour your governance documents. For the implementation, the line also asks it to record which model elements and files realize each requirement. For the other phases, it asks for a companion document with diagrams and links to your model, written beside the framework's document rather than in it.

The Implement button and the chat it fills with /speckit-implement Implement fills a new chat with Spec Kit's own command, followed by Intent Architect's line about the constitution and traceability.

For a phase your framework hasn't written yet, the card's button runs Intent Architect's own phase instead. To keep that phase in your framework, run the framework's command yourself, such as /speckit-plan in the AI Assistant, then re-import. This lets you mix the two: Spec Kit for the requirements and design, say, and Intent Architect for the tasks and implementation.

The panel only offers commands it finds installed in your workspace, the way your framework installs them, such as with Spec Kit's specify init. Spec Kit can drive every phase, and BMAD its PRD. The New spec (+) menu lists either one, so you can start a new spec with it. Kiro and OpenSpec have no commands to run from the panel, so keep using their own tools and re-import.

See which code realizes each requirement with traceability

When an agent implements the spec from the card's Implement button, it records links from each requirement to the model elements and files that realize it. Expand the card's Traceability section to see every requirement, with a check when it's traced and an empty circle when it isn't. Change Review shows the same links from the other side: the requirements each change realizes.

The Traceability section of a spec card Requirements the implementation has realized have a check. The ones it hasn't reached yet have an empty circle.

If the work happened outside the card, such as in your terminal or in a teammate's agent, nothing recorded the links. From the implementation phase on, while any requirement has none, the card offers Reconcile traceability. It opens a chat that works back from what your framework leaves behind, such as Spec Kit's ticked tasks, Kiro's _Requirements:_ lines or a BMAD story's Code Map. It records the links it can back up with evidence, and leaves the rest untraced.

Re-import when your framework's documents change, or un-adopt a spec

Change your requirements in your framework, not in Intent Architect. When its documents change, the card shows Source changed — re-import. Click it, or choose Re-import from the card's Spec options (⋯) menu. Intent Architect reads the documents again, keeps your links, and reports how many requirements were added, changed and removed, so you know which to check.

The Source changed — re-import pill on a spec card The card spots that Spec Kit's documents have changed since the last import.

To stop tracking a spec as imported, choose Un-adopt — clear imported requirements from the card's Reset menu. It clears the requirements and links Intent Architect built, keeps the card and its name, and leaves your framework's documents where they are. If you import the same folder again later, it becomes a second card.