Skills
Skills are task-specific instruction packages and scripts. They let AgentOS load relevant guidance only when a task needs it, instead of putting every possible instruction into every prompt.
Skills are separate from memory. Memory stores facts; skills describe repeatable ways to work.
What Skills Are For
Use skills for repeatable work patterns such as:
- deep research;
- summarization;
- GitHub and PR workflows;
- document generation;
- spreadsheet, slide, PDF, and DOCX work;
- web search;
- weather lookup;
- terminal or tmux monitoring;
- subagent delegation;
- skill creation and review.
Discover Installed Skills
List skills available in the current install:
agentos skills list
View one skill:
agentos skills view <skill-name>
Search community sources:
agentos skills search pdf
Some skills may be ineligible when optional dependencies are missing or when the
skill is intentionally demo-only. skills list is the source of truth for your
current install.
Install, Update, and Remove Skills
Install a managed skill:
agentos skills install <skill-name>
Update one skill or all managed skills:
agentos skills update <skill-name>
agentos skills update --all
Remove a managed skill:
agentos skills uninstall <skill-name>
Manage Skill Sources
Custom source repositories are called taps:
agentos skills tap list
agentos skills tap add <owner/repo>
agentos skills tap remove <owner/repo>
Use taps when your team maintains its own skill catalog.
Publish and Inspect
Publish a skill directory:
agentos skills publish <path-to-skill>
For ordinary skill content, use:
agentos skills view <skill-name>
How to Ask for a Skill
Ask for the outcome:
Create a PowerPoint deck summarizing this report.
Better than:
Load the pptx skill and run its script.
AgentOS can choose eligible skills from the current catalog when the task matches their description and triggers.
Bundled Skill Families
| Family | Examples |
|---|---|
| Research | deep research, multi-source search, summarization |
| Documents | DOCX, PPTX, XLSX, PDF, HTML-to-PDF |
| Operations | cron, GitHub, terminal monitoring, subagents |
| Memory | memory-oriented helpers and history exploration |
| Creation | skill review |
Troubleshooting
If a skill is not selected:
-
Confirm it appears in the installed catalog:
agentos skills list -
Inspect its description and eligibility:
agentos skills view <skill-name> -
Ask for the outcome in normal language. Skill names can help, but user intent should still be clear.
-
If optional dependencies are missing, install or update the skill and retry.