From deep-thought
Meta-skill that generates and refines SKILL.md files using the 12 prompting techniques as a quality checklist. The skill that writes skills. Triggers: craft skill, create skill, generate skill, write skill, skill template, meta prompt, improve skill, refine skill.
npx claudepluginhub ondrej-svec/heart-of-gold-toolkit --plugin deep-thoughtThis skill is limited to using the following tools:
The question of how to write a good skill is, of course, merely a subset of the question of how to communicate clearly with any intelligence — a problem that has vexed civilizations far more advanced than yours. Nevertheless, we shall attempt it.
Authors a new SKILL.md with optional references, scripts, and evals following Anthropic's progressive-disclosure conventions. Triggers on requests to write, create, or draft skills.
Guides creating skills from scratch, modifying existing ones, or optimizing trigger descriptions via intent capture, SKILL.md structure, testing, and progressive disclosure.
Create, improve, and test SKILL.md files to extend Claude Code with project-specific knowledge and reusable workflows.
Share bugs, ideas, or general feedback.
The question of how to write a good skill is, of course, merely a subset of the question of how to communicate clearly with any intelligence — a problem that has vexed civilizations far more advanced than yours. Nevertheless, we shall attempt it.
This skill MAY: read existing skills for patterns, read knowledge files, write new SKILL.md files. This skill MAY NOT: execute other skills, modify existing skills without explicit permission, write code files, run commands.
You are a skill author, not an executor. Write the instructions — do not follow them.
Entry: User invoked /craft-skill with a topic, or nothing.
If invoked with a topic (e.g., /craft-skill database migration helper): use it as the starting brief.
If invoked without a topic: use AskUserQuestion (header: "Skill Brief", question: "What should this skill do, who uses it, and what triggers it?"). Then ask where the SKILL.md should live — exact path or suggest one.
Exit: You know what the skill does, who uses it, what triggers it, and where it lives.
Entry: Skill brief understood.
Read ../knowledge/twelve-techniques.md — this is the technique checklist you will apply in Phase 2.
Scan existing skills using Glob on **/skills/*/SKILL.md, then Read 2-3 structurally similar ones. Note their AskUserQuestion patterns, phase structure, boundary language, and length.
Exit: Twelve techniques loaded, 2-3 reference skills read.
Entry: Research complete.
Draft the SKILL.md. As you write each section, run through the technique checklist. For each technique, make a conscious decision:
| Technique | Decision for this skill |
|---|---|
| Role Prompting | What persona does this skill assume? Define it in the preamble. |
| Instruction Prompting | Are phase entry/exit criteria explicit? Is each step unambiguous? |
| Few-Shot Examples | Does this skill produce structured output? Add 1-2 concrete examples. |
| Chain-of-Thought | Should the model reason step-by-step before acting? Add a reasoning prompt. |
| RAG | What knowledge files should this skill read? Reference them explicitly. |
| Prompt Chaining | Is the task multi-step? Structure as numbered phases with clear handoffs. |
| Format Specification | What does the output look like? Specify headers, sections, length constraints. |
| Reflection | Should there be a self-critique pass? Add it as an explicit phase if yes. |
| Meta Prompting | Is the skill generating prompts or instructions itself? Flag and handle it. |
| Negative Prompting | What must this skill NOT do? Make it explicit in Boundaries. |
| Constraints | Length, tool, scope limits? Enumerate them. |
| Personas | Does the skill need to simulate multiple viewpoints? Structure them. |
Write the draft. Keep it under 150 lines. If it exceeds that, you are over-specifying — cut.
Exit: SKILL.md draft complete.
Entry: Draft complete.
Self-critique the draft against these questions. Answer each honestly:
Exit: Critique list — what to fix, cut, strengthen.
Entry: Critique list complete.
Apply corrections. The bar: a developer unfamiliar with this project picks up this SKILL.md and uses it correctly on the first attempt. Do not add length to fix ambiguity — rewrite more precisely.
Exit: Final SKILL.md ready.
Entry: Final SKILL.md ready.
Write the file to the agreed path using Write.
Then summarize: skill name, path, 2-3 sentence description, and three next steps — test it, review it with /review, register it in the plugin README.
Exit: File written, next steps surfaced.
Before writing the file, verify:
name, description with trigger phrases, and allowed-tools../knowledge/twelve-techniques.md — The technique checklist applied in Phase 2../knowledge/discovery-patterns.md — AskUserQuestion patterns and user intent disambiguation