n8n Node Development with Aider

AI-optimized assistant for building n8n community nodes using Aider. This skill provides comprehensive context about n8n's declarative node patterns, routing strategies, and custom execution methods.

What This Skill Does

Instructions

When working on n8n community nodes:

1. **Load Context Automatically**

- Read `AGENTS.md` for project-specific rules

- Review `docs/10-creating-your-first-node.md` for node creation basics

- Understand `docs/12-declarative-routing.md` for routing patterns

- Study `docs/13-custom-execute-methods.md` for advanced execution logic

2. **File Watching**

- Monitor all TypeScript files in `nodes/**/*.ts`

- Monitor all credential files in `credentials/**/*.ts`

- Ignore build outputs in `dist/`

- Ignore dependencies in `node_modules/`

- Ignore TypeScript build info files (`*.tsbuildinfo`)

3. **Code Quality**

- Run `npm run lint` after each code change

- Automatically apply lint fixes when possible

- Ensure all code follows n8n's TypeScript conventions

4. **Git Workflow**

- Create automatic commits for completed changes

- Only commit clean working directory (no dirty commits)

- Write descriptive commit messages that explain the change

5. **Development Patterns**

- Follow declarative node patterns where possible

- Use routing for multi-operation nodes

- Implement custom execute methods when declarative patterns are insufficient

- Maintain TypeScript type safety throughout

Usage Example

```bash

Start Aider with this configuration

aider --config .aider.conf.yml

Ask Aider to create a new node

"Create a new n8n node for fetching GitHub issues with declarative routing"

Aider will:

- Reference the documentation context

- Generate properly structured TypeScript

- Auto-lint the code

- Commit with a descriptive message

```

Key Files Referenced

Notes