Skip to main content
Verdent Skills are reusable knowledge packs that extend the Agent’s expertise. Each Skill contains domain-specific prompts, scripts, references, and best practices. Simply invoke a Skill by name, and the Agent loads the corresponding context and follows the predefined workflow.

​
What Are Skills?

​
Core Concept

A Skill is a structured knowledge pack stored in a folder. Every Skill contains a SKILL.md file that defines its name, description, and detailed prompt. When you invoke a Skill in conversation, Verdent reads this file and injects its content into the Agent’s context.

​
How Skills Differ from Subagents and MCP

DimensionSkillsSubagentsMCP
TriggerManual invocation via @skill or mentionAuto-spawned by the main AgentAuto-invoked or explicitly called
ExecutionExpands the main conversation contextRuns as an independent sub-task with isolated contextCalls external tools via JSON-RPC 2.0
PurposeDomain guidance (e.g., “how to write tests”)Independent operations (e.g., “run code review”)External data/tool access (e.g., database queries)
LifecycleOne-time context injectionCompletes sub-task then returns resultsPersistent server process during session
ImplementationMarkdown files + optional scriptsBuilt-in Agent logicExecutable server processes
In short: Skills provide knowledge and workflow guidance, Subagents execute independent tasks, and MCP connects external tools and data sources.

​
How to Use Skills

​
Invoking a Skill

You can invoke a Skill in two ways: 1. Mention the Skill name in conversation 
Use the skill-creator skill to help me create a new Skill
2. Use the @ mention syntax 
@skill-creator help me create a Skill for API documentation generation
When a Skill is triggered:
  1. The Agent calls the skill tool to read the Skill’s SKILL.md file
  2. The file content is injected into the current conversation context
  3. The Agent continues working according to the Skill’s guidance

​
Browsing Available Skills

Access the Skills panel through Settings:
  1. Open the Settings menu
  2. Select the Skills tab
  3. Browse installed Skills and available Skills in the Skill Store
You can also type @ in the input box to trigger autocomplete and quickly select an available Skill.

​
Built-in Skills

Verdent ships with a set of built-in Skills covering common workflows:
SkillDescription
docxRead, create, or edit Word documents (.docx) with format-faithful visual checks
find-skillsDiscover and install Skills — use when asking “how do I do X?” or looking for new capabilities
frontend-designCreate distinctive, production-grade frontend interfaces with high design quality
pdfRead, create, or review PDF files with visual rendering and content extraction
pptxRead, create, or edit PowerPoint presentations (.pptx)
skill-creatorA guided workflow for creating and iterating on custom Skills
xlsxRead, analyze, visualize, and smart-edit Excel spreadsheets
More Skills are available in the Skill Store. Open Settings → Skills → Store to browse and install additional Skills.

​
Creating Custom Skills

You can create custom Skills to encapsulate your team’s domain expertise or project-specific workflows.

​
Skill Directory Structure

A standard Skill folder looks like this: 
my-custom-skill/
├── SKILL.md              # Required: Skill definition file
├── agents/
│   └── verdent.yaml      # Optional: UI configuration (icons, display name)
├── scripts/              # Optional: helper scripts
└── references/           # Optional: reference docs or examples

​
SKILL.md Format

SKILL.md is the core Skill file, containing YAML frontmatter and a Markdown body: 
---
name: my-custom-skill
description: A concise description shown in the Skill list
metadata:
  version: "1.0.0"
  author: "Your Name"
  license: "MIT"
---

# Detailed Instructions

This is the detailed prompt content the Agent reads.

## Workflow

1. Step one
2. Step two
3. ...

## Best Practices

- Practice suggestion 1
- Practice suggestion 2
Frontmatter field requirements:
  • name (required): Must match the folder name. Only lowercase letters, numbers, and hyphens (a-z0-9-) allowed. Length: 1–64 characters. No consecutive hyphens or leading/trailing hyphens.
  • description (required): A short description, max 1024 characters.
  • metadata (optional): Version, author, license, and other meta information.

​
Installing Custom Skills

Method 1: Import via Settings
  1. Open Settings → Skills
  2. Click Import Skill
  3. Select the Skill folder (or a .zip / .skill archive)
  4. Verdent validates SKILL.md and installs it to ~/.verdent/skills/
Method 2: Manual copy 
cp -r my-custom-skill ~/.verdent/skills/
The Skill becomes available after restarting Verdent or refreshing the Skills list. Method 3: Project-level Skill Place the Skill inside your project directory: 
cp -r my-custom-skill /path/to/your/project/.verdent/skills/
Project-level Skills are only visible within that project and take priority over global Skills with the same name.

​
Skill Scopes

Verdent supports three levels of Skill scoping:
LevelLocationVisibility
Global~/.verdent/skills/All projects and workspaces
Project<project>/.verdent/skills/Current project’s workspaces only
Priority rules: When Skills with the same name exist at multiple scopes:
  • Project overrides Global

​
Skill Store

Verdent provides a Skill Store for browsing and installing community and official Skills.

​
Browsing the Skill Store

  1. Open Settings → Skills
  2. Switch to the Store tab
  3. Browse available Skills or use the search box

​
Installing from the Store

  1. Find the desired Skill in the Store
  2. Click Install
  3. The Skill is automatically downloaded and installed to ~/.verdent/skills/
Security verification: Skills installed from the Store undergo SHA256 checksum verification to ensure file integrity and security.

​
Practical Examples

​
Example 1: Creating a New Skill with skill-creator

@skill-creator help me create a Skill for guiding the team on writing Go unit tests
The Agent will:
  1. Read the skill-creator Skill content
  2. Guide you through filling in the Skill name, description, and core prompt
  3. Generate a standard SKILL.md
  4. Suggest installation path and verification steps

​
Example 2: Analyzing Data with spreadsheet

@spreadsheet read sales-2025.xlsx from the project root, analyze Q1 sales trends, and generate a chart
The Agent will:
  1. Load the spreadsheet Skill
  2. Use pandas and openpyxl to read the Excel file
  3. Analyze the data and generate visualizations
  4. Save results or display them in the conversation

​
Example 3: Fixing CI with gh-fix-ci

@gh-fix-ci my PR #123 GitHub Actions tests are failing, help me debug
The Agent will:
  1. Use gh CLI to retrieve CI logs for PR #123
  2. Analyze the failure (e.g., test case errors, dependency issues)
  3. Propose a fix
  4. With your approval, modify the code and push the fix

​
FAQs

When a Skill is invoked, the Agent reads the SKILL.md file, which counts toward token usage and therefore consumes credits. However, the Skill itself does not make additional API calls.
Yes. Install the Skill to ~/.verdent/skills/ (global scope) and it will be available in all projects.
In Settings → Skills, right-click the Skill and select Delete. Built-in Skills marked as undeletable cannot be deleted and will be reinstalled on next startup.
Yes. Verdent automatically detects Skills in ~/.cursor/skills, ~/.claude/skills, and ~/.codex/skills, and prompts you to import them. Click Import from External Sources in Settings → Skills.
  • Project Rule: Always-active instructions automatically injected into every conversation
  • Skill: On-demand knowledge packs injected only when invoked
Use Rules for universal coding standards; use Skills for specific domain workflows.
Skills installed from the Skill Store are automatically checked for updates in the background. Manually installed Skills need to be re-imported (overwriting the old version) to update.

​
Advanced Usage

​
Embedding Scripts in Skills

Add a scripts/ directory to your Skill and reference the scripts in SKILL.md: 
## Data Processing Script

Run the following command to process data:

\`\`\`bash
python scripts/process_data.py --input data.csv --output results.json
\`\`\`
The Agent reads this instruction and executes the script as needed.

​
Referencing Documentation

Store API docs, specs, or sample code in a references/ directory and link them in SKILL.md: 
## Reference Documentation

See [references/api-spec.md](references/api-spec.md) for the detailed API specification.
The Agent can read these reference files based on the Skill’s instructions.

​
Best Practices

Keep Skills focused. Each Skill should target a single domain or workflow. Avoid creating “do-everything” Skills—split them into smaller, specialized ones instead.
Use clear naming. Skill names should be concise and descriptive, e.g., api-doc-generator rather than my-skill-1.
Provide examples and references. Include concrete examples and reference links in SKILL.md to help the Agent better understand the expected output.
Maintain version numbers. Use the metadata.version field to track updates and compatibility.
Test before sharing. Validate your Skill in a test project before rolling it out to the team or publishing to the Skill Store.

​
See Also

Subagent Management

How subagents work and how to manage them

MCP Integration

Connect external tools and services via MCP

Rules

Configure always-active Project and User Rules

Code Review

Review code changes with the built-in Reviewer