How do I install the Kill Servers skill?

Run npx skillmds@latest add matthewharwood/kill-servers in your terminal (requires Node.js), paste this page's agent-chat prompt into Claude, Cursor, or any MCP-connected agent, or download the SKILL.md file and copy it into your agent's skills directory.

Is Kill Servers safe to use?

This skill has not completed SkillMD's automated safety review yet. SkillMD never runs a skill's scripts for you; review the SKILL.md before installing.

Which AI agents work with Kill Servers?

This skill is tagged as working with Claude Code, Claude.ai, OpenAI Codex. SKILL.md is an open format, so most agents that read a skills directory can load it too.

Is Kill Servers free to use?

Yes. Installing skills from SkillMD is free, and the skill stays under its author's original license.

Who published Kill Servers?

matthewharwood (@matthewharwood) published this skill. Their other Agent Skills are listed on their SkillMD profile.

Kill Servers by matthewharwood — Agent Skill

Name: Kill Servers
Author: matthewharwood

Kill Servers

Use when asked to kill stale dean-stack dev, preview, or Storybook server processes and free ports before `bun run check`, Playwright, or the five-phase-pass skill. Recreates the old /kill-servers command as a Codex skill.

File contents

# 1. Kill known dean-stack server processes by command-line pattern.
pkill -f "storybook dev"      || true
pkill -f "vite preview"       || true
pkill -f "vite dev"           || true
pkill -f "biome.*watch"       || true
pkill -f "stylelint.*watch"   || true

# 2. Let the OS reclaim TCP sockets out of TIME_WAIT.
sleep 2

# 3. Verify the gate-relevant ports are free.
#    3000 = vite preview (app, app-offline Playwright projects).
#    5173 = vite dev (Vite default).
#    6006 = storybook dev (storybook Playwright project).
lsof -i :3000 -i :5173 -i :6006 2>/dev/null | grep LISTEN || echo "all clear"

# 4. If anything is STILL listening (rare — usually a child process whose parent
#    was already killed), escalate with port-targeted SIGKILL.
lsof -ti :3000,:5173,:6006 2>/dev/null | xargs kill -9 2>/dev/null || true

---name: kill-serversdescription: Use when asked to kill stale dean-stack dev, preview, or Storybook server processes and free ports before `bun run check`, Playwright, or the five-phase-pass skill. Recreates the old /kill-servers command as a Codex skill.---<objective>Stop every local dean-stack dev/preview/storybook server from prior runs and confirm their TCP ports are free. Idempotent and safe to run any time. Use as a pre-step before any gate or test run.</objective><why>Playwright's `webServer` config launches `bun run storybook` and `bun run preview` as child processes. If a previous run left a process holding port 6006 or 3000 (a backgrounded `bun run dev`, an aborted gate, an unkilled child of a previous test run), the new Playwright run can race against the zombie — Storybook reports "ready" briefly, the first parallel worker connects, the zombie gets reaped or the port-bind contention surfaces, and subsequent workers hit `ERR_CONNECTION_REFUSED`. This is *not* a timeout — it's a process-management race. Pre-killing eliminates it.</why><steps>Run these in order. Each is safe — `pkill` exits 0 even when nothing matches, and `lsof` exits 1 cleanly when nothing's listening.```bash# 1. Kill known dean-stack server processes by command-line pattern.pkill -f "storybook dev" || truepkill -f "vite preview" || truepkill -f "vite dev" || truepkill -f "biome.*watch" || truepkill -f "stylelint.*watch" || true# 2. Let the OS reclaim TCP sockets out of TIME_WAIT.sleep 2# 3. Verify the gate-relevant ports are free.# 3000 = vite preview (app, app-offline Playwright projects).# 5173 = vite dev (Vite default).# 6006 = storybook dev (storybook Playwright project).lsof -i :3000 -i :5173 -i :6006 2>/dev/null | grep LISTEN || echo "all clear"# 4. If anything is STILL listening (rare — usually a child process whose parent# was already killed), escalate with port-targeted SIGKILL.lsof -ti :3000,:5173,:6006 2>/dev/null | xargs kill -9 2>/dev/null || true```</steps><caveats>- `pkill -f "storybook dev"` matches **any** storybook dev process on the machine, not just dean-stack's. If you're running another Storybook project simultaneously, this will kill it too. For multi-project safety, use the port-targeted form: `lsof -ti :6006 | xargs kill`. Same caveat for `vite dev` / `vite preview`.- This does NOT clear caches (Storybook prebundle, Turbo task cache). For that, separately: `rm -rf apps/*/node_modules/.cache/storybook .turbo`.- This does NOT touch IDB, the SW, or any browser state. It only kills server processes.</caveats><output>A one-line status: either "all clear" (no listeners on 3000/5173/6006) or the lsof line showing what's still bound after the escalation step.</output>

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