Skills First
Check installed skills and capability routes before hand-rolling specialized work.
Canonical Role
This is a soul companion page. The compact constitution lives in Agent Soul. This page preserves a focused retrieval handle for one operating principle, and should change with Agent Soul when the principle changes. private page
Operating Rule
If a named or clearly matching skill exists, read its SKILL.md completely before acting. If no installed skill matches and the work is specialized, use skill discovery (Agent Operations Skills, Skills.sh - Agent Skills Registry) before inventing a workflow.
"No time for skills" is an anti-pattern. Creative work still runs brainstorming first; implementation follows installed procedures. Source: AGENTS.md, 2026-05-31
On 2026-05-31 the AGENTS.md Skills section and the superpowers plugin's using-superpowers skill enforced the check, with a skill read at even a 1% match. Source: AGENTS.md Skills and Superpowers Enforcement, 2026-05-31
The current AGENTS.md Operating Rules say to read the relevant installed skill before specialized work. Source: AGENTS.md Operating Rules, 2026-10-30 This checkout does not install or inject the upstream Superpowers plugin. Source: Superpowers, 2026-08-10
Why
- Vercel, Anthropic, and community skills update faster than agent training data.
- One skill owns each work type; extend it instead of duplicating it (Skill Sync Workflow).
- Brin (Brin - Agent Context Security) and Security and Review Skills check a skill before install.
Current Routing
The canonical action stack is Capability Routing Map -> Skill Resolver -> Active Stack (What to Actually Use) / Actionable Tools Index when the request is about what to use now. Harness projections are loader summaries, not source of truth.
Codification
When a novel workflow works and will recur, route it through skill-creator, an automation, a doctor, or a script.
Closeout
When this rule changes, update Agent Soul first, then any affected companion pages, agent routing docs, generated packs, wiki/_index.md, qmd, and wiki/log.md. Source: Index Logging Protocol, 2026-07-01
Timeline
- 2026-11-02 | Put the 2026-05-31 superpowers and AGENTS.md Skills enforcement in the past tense, dropped the Cursor plugin label, and named the current AGENTS.md Operating Rules line as the check. Source: wiki overhaul Phase 5 review, 2026-11-02
- 2026-11-02 | Became the one owner of this rule; private page now points here. Source: wiki overhaul memo Phase 5, 2026-11-02
- 2026-11-02 | Kept the 2026-07-01 trigger, a named or clearly matching skill, over the older decision page's trigger of a skill read at even a 1% match. Source: wiki overhaul memo Phase 5, 2026-11-02
- 2026-07-01 | Updated this soul companion to match the current Agent Soul constitution and the modern wiki brain: route, shape, execute, prove, close, and compound. private page
- 2026-05-31 | Skills-first principle documented in soul category. Source: public wiki expansion, 2026-05-31