Skill Creator

Skill Authoring Procedure

Create professional-grade skills with lean context, deterministic structure, and validation.

When to Use This Skill

• User wants to create a new skill directory
• User wants to improve a skill's discoverability or metadata
• User wants to split large instructions into references or scripts
• User wants to add or update skillgrade validation

Procedures

Step 1: Validate the Skill Metadata

Check that the frontmatter uses a unique lowercase name, a specific description, and clear negative triggers.

Keep the description short enough to fit within the agent router's metadata budget.

Step 2: Keep the Main Skill Lean

Write the main SKILL.md as a high-level workflow.

Move dense rules, large schemas, and reusable templates into references/ or assets/.

Use scripts/ only for fragile or repetitive logic that should not be re-authored by the agent.

Step 3: Match Command Context

Keep command examples aligned with how the skill will be consumed.

• Use standard npm and npx examples in skill prose, public docs, and marketing copy unless the skill is specifically about Bun.
• Use npx ...@latest for Capacitor and Capgo CLI examples so consumers get the expected package version.
• Use bun, bun run, and bunx only for this repository's development commands, CI commands, or Bun-specific skills.
• When a skill tells an agent to edit a target repository, tell it to read that repository's instructions and follow that repository's package-manager policy before executing commands.

Step 4: Use Progressive Disclosure

Command the agent to read supporting files only when the current step needs them.

Prefer one-level-deep support files with explicit relative paths.

When a skill depends on repository state that will differ at invocation time, prefer a guarded inline shell snapshot such as !`node -e "..."` instead of baking the current state into prose.

Only do this when the command materially improves the invoked prompt, and keep the output short and deterministic.

If a skill uses inline commands, declare the minimum required allowed-tools entries in frontmatter and keep them read-only.

Step 5: Add Validation

Create a skillgrade eval when the skill needs regression testing.

Use a deterministic grader for structural checks and an LLM rubric only when qualitative judgment is necessary.

Step 6: Review for Hallucination Gaps

Inspect the skill for any step where the agent is forced to guess.

Replace ambiguous prose with concrete commands, file names, or output expectations.

Step 7: Preserve Sensitive Values

When a skill edits user files, instruct the agent not to replace user-provided tokens, keys, certificates, passwords, or other secrets with placeholders unless the user explicitly asks.

Use placeholders for new generic examples only. Do not tell users to rotate secrets unless they explicitly ask for rotation guidance.

Error Handling

• If a skill cannot be validated, reduce scope until the missing behavior becomes testable.
• If the description is too broad, tighten the trigger text before adding more instructions.
• If the supporting material grows too large, extract it into a separate file and point the agent to it explicitly.
• If an inline command would require broad shell access or produce noisy output, keep the skill static and tell the agent to inspect the files explicitly instead.