Quick Start

This walkthrough creates a skill and installs it to a platform in under a minute.

1. Initialize the Skill Registry

skern init

This creates a .skern/skills/ directory in your project for project-scoped skills. It is idempotent — safe to re-run.

To also drop a skern usage snippet into your agent's instruction file (AGENTS.md, CLAUDE.md, or .claude/CLAUDE.md) so the agent uses skern for skill management:

skern init --instructions

Add --tool-forming-loop to include the search-before-create workflow section. The snippet is wrapped in <!-- skern:instructions:start --> / <!-- skern:instructions:end --> markers, so re-running updates the block in place. See skern init for all flags.

2. Create a Skill

skern skill create code-review --description "Use when reviewing pull requests for style and correctness"

This scaffolds a SKILL.md file in the registry with the given name and description. Overlap detection runs automatically — see Overlap Detection.

3. Install to a Platform

Install to Claude Code:

skern skill install code-review --platform claude-code

Each invocation targets exactly one platform — --platform all is not accepted. To deploy across multiple platforms, loop the call:

for p in claude-code codex-cli opencode cursor gemini-cli; do
  skern skill install code-review --platform "$p"
done

Multiple skill names can be installed in a single call:

skern skill install code-review test-runner deploy-checker --platform claude-code

The response includes a capacity block reporting the installed-skill count, threshold, and remaining headroom for the platform. Pass --enforce-budget to refuse the install when the count would exceed the threshold.

4. List Installed Skills

skern skill list

Add --with-platforms to surface per-skill installation state across detected platforms:

skern skill list --with-platforms

5. Search Before Creating

Avoid duplicates by searching first:

skern skill search "review"
skern skill recommend "review pull requests"   # decides reuse vs. extend vs. create

6. Diff Before Editing

Compare a registry skill against its installed copy on a platform, or two registry skills:

skern skill diff code-review --platform claude-code
skern skill diff code-review code-review-strict

What's Next?

• Agent Setup — enable agents to manage skills automatically
• CLI Reference — full command documentation
• Skill Format — understand the SKILL.md structure
• Writing Skills — write skills agents can find and reuse