Skills
Skills are procedural instructions that can be loaded into Arcen for repeatable workflows. Built-in skills live in skills, while heavier or niche official skills live in optional-skills.
Built-in and optional skills
| Directory | Behavior |
|---|---|
skills/ | Built-in skills bundled and loadable by default. |
optional-skills/ | Official skills installed explicitly with arcen skills install official/<category>/<skill>. |
Skill commands
Skill slash commands are handled by agent/skill_commands.py. They are injected as user messages rather than system prompts so prompt caching stays effective.
Authoring standards
New or modernized skills should include:
- Concise frontmatter with a description no longer than 60 characters.
- A modern body order: intro, When to Use, Prerequisites, How to Run, Quick Reference, Procedure, Pitfalls, Verification.
- Scripts in
scripts/, references inreferences/, and templates intemplates/. - Tests under
tests/skills/test_<skill>_skill.py. - No live network calls in tests.
Optional skill installation
arcen skills install official/productivity/example-skill
arcen skills list