Bundled workflows

Z.E.N. ships with six workflows. Three are general-purpose, three are coding-specific. The general-purpose ones lead the default surface; the coding ones live under the Advanced filter so non-developers don't have to wade through them.

General

zen-workflow-builder

The workflow that writes workflows. Describe what you want in English; the builder asks a few clarifying questions and writes the YAML file into .zen/workflows/. Use it for everything you don't want to write by hand.

zen workflow run zen-workflow-builder "summarize my Slack DMs since yesterday and post the result to #briefings"

The output is a workflow file you can edit, schedule, and rerun. This is the lowest-friction way to add a new routine to your collection.

zen-architect

Plans something before it gets built. Give it a goal and constraints; it produces an architecture sketch, a decision log, and a checklist. Use it for non-trivial work where you'd otherwise stare at a blank page.

zen workflow run zen-architect "design the information architecture for a new product docs site"

Tagged Knowledge in the UI.

zen-interactive-prd

Builds a product requirements doc through an iterative conversation. The workflow asks questions, captures answers, and produces a PRD you can hand to anyone (or to another workflow).

zen workflow run zen-interactive-prd "new onboarding flow for the daily-brief feature"

Tagged Knowledge.

Coding (Advanced)

zen-piv-loop

The plan / implement / validate loop. For a coding task: read the request, write a plan, implement it, run tests, fix what failed, loop until done. The closest thing Z.E.N. ships to an "agentic" coding workflow.

zen-ralph-dag

A multi-pass code review and refactor workflow. Reads a diff, surfaces issues, proposes fixes, applies them. Useful for sweeping changes across a codebase.

zen-remotion-generate

Generates a Remotion video composition from a script. Niche. Useful if you're producing short-form video and want a programmatic pipeline.

Where to find them

zen workflow list shows the bundled set in your terminal. In the Web UI, the Workflows tab has them grouped by category (Automation, Knowledge, Coding, Utilities). The All filter hides Coding by default; uncheck it to see the full set.

Writing your own is the point

The bundled set is a starting point, not a destination. Most people end up running their own collection within a week: a morning brief, a research routine, a content pipeline, a meeting capture flow. The bundled six exist so you have something to fire on day one and something to copy when you want to write your own.

See Author a workflow and Your first workflow.