Teach

/bedrock:teach — External Source Ingestion into the Second Brain

Plugin Paths

Entity definitions and templates are in the plugin directory, not at the vault root. Use the "Base directory for this skill" provided at invocation to resolve paths:

• Entity definitions: <base_dir>/../../entities/
• Templates: <base_dir>/../../templates/{type}/_template.md
• Plugin CLAUDE.md: <base_dir>/../../CLAUDE.md (already injected automatically into context)

Where <base_dir> is the path provided in "Base directory for this skill".

Vault Resolution

Resolve which vault to teach. This skill can be invoked from any directory.

Step 1 — Parse --vault flag: Check if the input arguments include --vault <name>. If found, extract the vault name and remove it from the arguments (the remaining text is the source URL/path).

Step 2 — Resolve vault path:

1. If --vault <name> was provided: Read the vault registry at <base_dir>/../../vaults.json. Find the entry matching the name. If not found: error — "Vault <name> is not registered. Run /bedrock:vaults to see available vaults." If found: set VAULT_PATH to the entry's path value. Store the resolved vault name as VAULT_NAME.

2. If no --vault flag — CWD detection: Read <base_dir>/../../vaults.json. Check if the current working directory is inside any registered vault path (CWD starts with a registered vault's absolute path). If multiple match, use the longest path (most specific). If found: set VAULT_PATH to the matching vault's path. Store its name as VAULT_NAME.

3. If CWD detection fails — default vault: From the registry, find the vault with "default": true. If found: set VAULT_PATH to the default vault's path. Store its name as VAULT_NAME.

4. If no resolution: Error — "No vault resolved. Available vaults:" followed by the registry listing. "Use --vault <name> to specify, or run /bedrock:setup to register a vault."

Step 3 — Validate vault path:

test -d "<VAULT_PATH>" && echo "exists" || echo "missing"

If missing: error — "Vault path <VAULT_PATH> does not exist on disk. Run /bedrock:setup to re-register."

Step 4 — Read vault config:

cat <VAULT_PATH>/.bedrock/config.json 2>/dev/null

Extract language and other relevant fields for use in later phases.

From this point forward, ALL vault file operations use <VAULT_PATH> as the root.

• Graphify output: <VAULT_PATH>/graphify-out/
• When delegating to /bedrock:preserve, pass --vault <VAULT_NAME>

Overview

This skill receives an external source (URL or local path), fetches its content to a temporary directory, converts non-markdown files to markdown via docling, runs the /graphify extraction pipeline on the tmp content, and delegates entity persistence (plus graphify-output merge) to /bedrock:preserve.

You are a fetcher and orchestrator agent. Your job is to:

1. Ensure docling is installed (auto-install if missing)
2. Classify the input and fetch content to /tmp
3. Convert fetched files to markdown via docling (when applicable)
4. Invoke /graphify to extract a knowledge graph into a per-run temp directory
5. Delegate graph merge and entity writes to /bedrock:preserve
6. Clean up temporary files

You do NOT classify entities, create vault files, write to the vault directly, or merge graph state. All extraction is done by /graphify. All writes (including the graphify-output merge into the vault's cumulative graphify-out/) are done by /bedrock:preserve.

Follow the phases below in order, without skipping steps.

Phase 0 — Ensure docling is installed

Before any fetch or conversion, verify that the docling CLI is available. If missing, install it silently using the same fallback chain /bedrock:setup uses for graphify, emitting a single status line before proceeding.

if command -v docling >/dev/null 2>&1; then
  echo "Phase 0: docling already installed — proceeding."
else
  echo "Phase 0: docling not found — installing silently (one-time setup, may take a few minutes for model download)."
  # Step 1 — pipx (preferred, isolated)
  if command -v pipx >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    pipx install docling >/dev/null 2>&1 || true
  fi
  # Step 2 — pip (fallback if pipx unavailable or failed)
  if ! command -v docling >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    if command -v pip3 >/dev/null 2>&1; then
      pip3 install --user docling >/dev/null 2>&1 || true
    elif command -v pip >/dev/null 2>&1; then
      pip install --user docling >/dev/null 2>&1 || true
    fi
  fi
  # Final re-probe
  if ! command -v docling >/dev/null 2>&1; then
    echo "ERROR: docling install failed. Run /bedrock:setup to install it, or install manually: pipx install docling"
    exit 1
  fi
  echo "Phase 0: docling installed."
fi

Failure mode: If install fails (no pipx/pip, network outage, permission denied), abort the skill with the error above. Do NOT fetch or mutate anything. Direct the user to /bedrock:setup.

No user prompt: this step is silent — one status line on success, one error line on failure.

Phase 1 — Fetch

1.1 Classify the input

The user provides an argument. Classify it in the following priority order. URL-type routing is unchanged; local files no longer have an extension allowlist — any existing file is accepted, and Phase 1.5 decides whether to run docling on it.

If no argument was provided: ask the user "What source do you want to ingest? Provide a URL (Confluence, Google Docs, GitHub, or any HTTP(S) URL) or a local file path (any file type — docling will convert it to markdown if supported)."

1.2 Create temporary directory

All content is fetched to a temporary directory. This is the single input path for /graphify.

TEACH_TMP="/tmp/bedrock-teach-$(date +%s)"
mkdir -p "$TEACH_TMP"
echo "Temporary directory: $TEACH_TMP"

Store the path for use in subsequent phases.

1.3 Fetch content

Execute the fetch strategy for the detected type. All content lands in $TEACH_TMP/.

1.3.1 GitHub repository

For GitHub URLs (e.g.: https://github.com/acme-corp/billing-api):

1. Extract owner/repo and repo-name from the URL
2. Clone the repository (shallow):

   git clone --depth 1 <url> "$TEACH_TMP/<repo-name>"
   

3. GitHub MCP enrichment — call directly in main context (NOT via subagent — MCP permissions are not inherited):
   • mcp__plugin_github_github__get_file_contents → read the repo's README.md
   • mcp__plugin_github_github__list_commits → last 10 commits
   • mcp__plugin_github_github__list_pull_requests → last 5 PRs (state=all, sort=updated)
4. Compile MCP results into a single markdown file and save as $TEACH_TMP/<repo-name>/_github_metadata.md

Best-effort: If any MCP call fails, continue with what was obtained. Do NOT block ingestion.

1.3.2 Confluence

For Confluence URLs:

1. Read the internal skill at <base_dir>/../confluence-to-markdown/SKILL.md
2. Follow its instructions to parse the URL, choose layer (MCP → API → browser), and extract content
3. Save the returned Markdown content to $TEACH_TMP/<slug>.md
   • <slug> is derived from the page title or URL path (kebab-case, lowercase)

If all three layers (MCP, API, browser) are unavailable: warn the user with the guidance message from the fetcher module and abort this source type.

1.3.3 Google Docs / Sheets

For Google Docs or Sheets URLs:

1. Read the internal skill at <base_dir>/../gdoc-to-markdown/SKILL.md
2. Follow its instructions to parse the URL, detect document type (Doc vs Sheet), choose layer (MCP → API/public export → browser), and extract content
3. The fetcher saves output to /tmp/gdoc_{docId}.md or /tmp/gsheet_{docId}.md
4. Copy the output file to $TEACH_TMP/<slug>.md
   • <slug> is derived from the document title or URL path (kebab-case, lowercase)

If all three layers (MCP, API/public export, browser) are unavailable: warn the user with the guidance message from the fetcher module and abort this source type.

1.3.4 Remote URL (generic)

For any other HTTP/HTTPS URL, download the raw bytes so docling can operate on binary formats (PDF, DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, images, etc.) that WebFetch cannot return faithfully as text:

1. Try curl first for true binary fidelity:

   curl -fsSL -o "$TEACH_TMP/<filename-derived-from-url>" "<url>"
   

   • <filename-derived-from-url> preserves the URL's basename (including extension) when available; fall back to <slug>.bin if no extension is present.
2. If curl is unavailable or the URL returns an HTML page (by Content-Type), fall back to WebFetch and save the response text as $TEACH_TMP/<slug>.md.

If both attempts fail: warn "Could not fetch URL. Check if the URL is accessible." and abort.

Phase 1.5 decides whether the downloaded file goes through docling, based on the file extension.

1.3.5 Local file (any format)

For local files:

1. Verify the file exists using Read (or test -f).
2. Copy to tmp preserving the filename:

   cp "<local-path>" "$TEACH_TMP/"
   

No extension-based filtering — any existing file is accepted. Phase 1.5 decides conversion.

1.3.6 Local directory

For local directories:

1. Verify the directory exists
2. Copy to tmp (excluding heavy directories):

   rsync -a --exclude='.git' --exclude='node_modules' --exclude='bin' --exclude='obj' \
     --exclude='.vs' --exclude='TestResults' --exclude='packages' \
     "<local-dir>/" "$TEACH_TMP/$(basename <local-dir>)/"
   

1.4 Phase 1 result

At the end of this phase, you should have:

• $TEACH_TMP: directory with all fetched content (local path for graphify)
• source_url: original URL or file path provided by the user
• source_type: confluence, gdoc, github-repo, remote-binary, local-file, local-dir, or manual

Report: "Phase 1 complete: Content fetched to $TEACH_TMP. Source type: <source_type>."

Phase 1.5 — Docling Conversion

For every fetched file in $TEACH_TMP that is not a GitHub repo and is not already markdown output from Confluence/GDoc fetchers, check whether docling supports the file type and, if so, convert it to markdown in place. GitHub repos (source_type == "github-repo") skip this phase entirely and flow straight to graphify.

1.5.1 Docling-supported extensions

Docling supports conversion for the following file types (as of the version installed by Phase 0 / /bedrock:setup). Compare by lowercase file extension:

.pdf .docx .pptx .xlsx
.html .htm
.md .adoc
.png .jpg .jpeg .tiff .bmp
.epub

• .md is listed here because docling passes markdown through largely unchanged. In practice, running docling on .md is a no-op we skip to save time — treat .md as already-markdown.
• .txt and .csv are NOT in docling's supported list (they are plain-text already); skip docling and pass through raw.

1.5.2 Routing and failure rules

For each file under $TEACH_TMP (excluding files inside <repo-name>/ subdirectories of a github-repo source — skip those entirely):

1. Skip by type — already markdown or plain text: if extension is .md, .txt, or .csv, leave the file untouched and record status passed-through for the report. Graphify handles these natively.

2. Skip by routing — not docling-supported: if the extension is not in the supported list above AND is not .md/.txt/.csv, leave the file untouched and record status passed-through with a note (type not supported by docling). Graphify decides what to do with the raw file.

3. Run docling: otherwise, invoke docling and replace the source file with the converted markdown. Docling writes to the working directory by default; use --to md and --output to target a predictable path:

   cd "$TEACH_TMP"
   docling --from <auto> --to md --output "$TEACH_TMP" "<relative-file-path>"
   

   Docling produces <stem>.md alongside the source. After a successful run:

   • Remove the original binary: rm "<relative-file-path>".
   • Record status converted for the report with the new markdown filename.

4. Failure fallback: if docling exits non-zero for a file:

   • If the source file's extension is .md, .txt, or .csv (already handled by rule 1, so this branch is defensive): leave the original file in place, record status failed-fallback (raw passthrough), and continue with other files.
   • Otherwise (binary format like .docx, .pdf, etc.): abort the entire skill. Clean up $TEACH_TMP (rm -rf "$TEACH_TMP") and emit a clear error: ERROR: docling failed to convert <file>. Aborting ingestion. Temp directory cleaned up. Do NOT proceed to graphify or preserve.

1.5.3 Phase 1.5 result

At the end of Phase 1.5:

• $TEACH_TMP contains markdown files (either originals or docling-converted).
• You have a per-file status map to surface in Phase 4's report:
  • converted: ran docling successfully
  • passed-through: skipped docling (markdown/plain text or unsupported type)
  • failed-fallback: docling failed but file was text-native; continued with raw file

Report: "Phase 1.5 complete: N converted, M passed-through, P failed-fallback."

Phase 2 — Extract

2.1 Invoke /graphify into a per-run temp directory

Use the Skill tool to invoke /graphify, directing its output to a per-run temp directory (not the vault). The vault's cumulative graphify-out/ is updated by /bedrock:preserve's Phase 0 merge step, not by this skill.

/graphify $TEACH_TMP --mode deep --obsidian --obsidian-dir $TEACH_TMP

The convention used here: passing --obsidian-dir $TEACH_TMP makes graphify write its graphify-out/ tree under $TEACH_TMP/graphify-out/. Store that path as:

GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW="$TEACH_TMP/graphify-out"

IMPORTANT:

• Invoke via the Skill tool — never call graphify Python API directly.
• /graphify runs its full pipeline: detect → extract (AST + semantic) → build → cluster → analyze → obsidian export.
• Output lands in $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW, which is inside the temp directory. The vault's <VAULT_PATH>/graphify-out/ is NOT touched by this skill — /bedrock:preserve owns that write.

2.2 Verify output

After /graphify completes, verify the output in the temp location:

if [ -f "$GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW/graph.json" ] && [ -s "$GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW/graph.json" ]; then
    echo "graphify output verified: graph.json exists and is non-empty"
else
    echo "ERROR: $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW/graph.json is missing or empty"
fi

If graph.json is missing or empty:

• Warn the user: "graphify extraction failed — no graph produced. Check the content and try again."
• Clean up tmp: rm -rf "$TEACH_TMP"
• Abort gracefully

2.3 Phase 2 result

The following files should exist in $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW:

• graph.json — knowledge graph (nodes, edges, communities)
• GRAPH_REPORT.md — audit report with god nodes, surprising connections
• obsidian/*.md — one markdown file per node
• .graphify_analysis.json — communities, cohesion scores, god nodes

Report: "Phase 2 complete: graphify extraction finished in $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW. Graph: N nodes, M edges. Will be merged into the vault by /bedrock:preserve."

Phase 3 — Delegate to /bedrock:preserve

3.1 Compile input for /preserve

Pass the temp graphify output path and provenance metadata to /bedrock:preserve. The skill's Phase 0.2 merges this temp output into the vault's cumulative graphify-out/:

graphify_output_path: $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW       # = $TEACH_TMP/graphify-out/
source_url: <source_url from Phase 1>
source_type: <source_type from Phase 1>

IMPORTANT:

• /teach does NOT classify graphify nodes into entity types. Entity classification, filtering, matching, and user confirmation are all /bedrock:preserve's responsibility (Phase 1.3).
• /teach does NOT merge the graph into the vault. That is /bedrock:preserve's responsibility (Phase 0.2). We pass the per-run temp path; preserve merges and then reads from the merged <VAULT_PATH>/graphify-out/.

3.2 Invoke /preserve

Use the Skill tool to invoke /bedrock:preserve --vault <VAULT_NAME> passing the graphify output reference (pointing at $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW) and provenance metadata as the argument. The --vault <VAULT_NAME> flag ensures preserve writes to the same vault.

3.3 Receive result

/bedrock:preserve returns:

• List of entities created/updated
• Commit hash (if there was a commit)
• graphify_merge block: {nodes_added, nodes_merged, edges_added, stale_flag_set} from preserve's Phase 0.2 merge
• Any errors or warnings

Record the result for use in the report (Phase 4).

Phase 4 — Cleanup and Report

4.1 Cleanup temporary directory

After /bedrock:preserve confirms completion, remove the temporary directory:

rm -rf "$TEACH_TMP"
echo "Temporary directory cleaned up: $TEACH_TMP"

IMPORTANT: Clean up AFTER /preserve confirms, not after graphify finishes. The graphify output in graphify-out/ is NOT cleaned up — it lives in the vault and is used by /bedrock:ask for graph traversal.

4.2 Report

Present to the user:

## /bedrock:teach — Report

### Ingested source
- **Type:** <source_type>
- **URL/Path:** <source_url>

### Docling conversion (Phase 1.5)
| File | Status | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| report.docx | converted | output: report.md |
| notes.txt | passed-through | text-native |
| diagram.svg | passed-through | type not supported by docling |

Summary: N converted, M passed-through, P failed-fallback.
(Omit this block entirely for `source_type == "github-repo"` where docling is bypassed.)

### Extraction (via /graphify)
- **Graph:** N nodes, M edges, P communities (fresh run into $TEACH_TMP)
- **Report:** $GRAPHIFY_OUT_NEW/GRAPH_REPORT.md (before merge)

### Graphify merge (via /bedrock:preserve Phase 0.2)
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Nodes added | N |
| Nodes merged | M |
| Edges added | P |
| Analysis marked stale | true / false |

(Pulled verbatim from `/bedrock:preserve`'s `graphify_merge` return block.)

### Entities processed (via /bedrock:preserve)
| Type | Name | Action |
|---|---|---|
| actor | billing-api | update |
| topic | 2026-04-migration-payments | create |
| code | process-transaction | create |

### Provenance
Each entity above received in the `sources` frontmatter field:
- url: <source_url>
- type: <source_type>
- synced_at: <today's date>

### Git
- Commit: <hash from /bedrock:preserve or "no entities">
- Push: success / failed (reason)

### Suggestions
- [list of entities mentioned in the content but not created, if any]
- [recommendations for future re-ingestion, if applicable]

Critical Rules