cstm-changeset

A wrapper around the changesets CLI that adds structured business context prompts to the add command — because changelogs should tell the why, not just the what.

Why?

Changesets is a fantastic tool for managing versioning and changelogs. But out of the box, it only captures what changed. When a teammate (or future you) looks back at the changelog, questions like these often go unanswered:

• What business value did this change bring?
• Did this affect clients? How?
• Was it tested? How thoroughly?

cstm-changeset fixes that by adding a quick interactive prompt after changeset add, appending structured context directly to your changeset file.

Installation

npm install -D cstm-changeset

Note: Requires Node.js 24+ and @changesets/cli as a peer dependency.

Usage

Use cstm-changeset as a drop-in replacement for changeset:

npx cstm-changeset [command] [options]

Commands

Command	Description
add	Create a changeset with business context prompts (default)
status	Show changeset status
version	Apply changesets and update package versions
publish	Publish packages to npm
init	Initialize changesets in your project
pre <enter|exit>	Enter or exit prerelease mode
tag	Create git tags for published packages

All commands (except add) pass through directly to the underlying changeset CLI.

Options

Option	Description
-h, --help	Show help message
-v, --version	Show version number

Examples

# Create a changeset with business context prompts
npx cstm-changeset
npx cstm-changeset add

# Check changeset status
npx cstm-changeset status

# Apply changesets and bump versions
npx cstm-changeset version

# Publish to npm
npx cstm-changeset publish

# Initialize changesets in a new project
npx cstm-changeset init

The Add Flow

When you run npx cstm-changeset (or npx cstm-changeset add), the CLI will:

1. Run the standard changeset add flow (package selection, bump type, summary)
2. Prompt you with follow-up questions about business context
3. Append the answers to the newly created changeset file

Business Context Questions

1. What value does this change bring to the business?
2. Does this carry client impact? (if yes, describe it)
3. Has this been tested? (if yes, describe how)

Example Output

Here's what gets appended to your changeset:

## Business Context

**Business value:** Improves checkout conversion by reducing page load time

**Client impact:** Yes — Clients using the legacy API will need to migrate

**Tested:** Yes — Ran load tests simulating 10k concurrent users

Requirements

• Node.js 24+
• @changesets/cli 2+ (peer dependency)

License

MIT