Skills
A Skill is a reusable bundle of know-how you give the model — a set of instructions (and optionally scripts and reference files) for doing a particular kind of task your way. Once a Skill exists, the model can open it by name when a task calls for it.
Why Skills
Section titled “Why Skills”Pasting the same instructions into chat every time is tedious, and stuffing everything into one giant prompt makes the model slower and more expensive. Skills solve both: the model always sees a short list of what Skills exist (just their name and a one-line description), and pulls in a Skill’s full instructions only when it actually uses it. You get reusable, on-demand expertise without paying for it on every message.
Where Skills live
Section titled “Where Skills live”Lattis loads Skills from two places:
| Location | Scope |
|---|---|
The skills/ folder in your Lattis data directory | Available everywhere. |
A .lattis/skills/ folder in a project | Available in that project. |
Writing a Skill
Section titled “Writing a Skill”A Skill is a folder containing a SKILL.md file. The file has a short YAML header
and then the instructions:
---name: pdf-formsdescription: Fill, flatten, and extract fields from PDF forms.---
When asked to work with a PDF form:
1. Use `scripts/inspect.py` to list the form fields.2. ...- name — lowercase letters, digits, and dashes (up to 64 characters), matching the folder name.
- description — one line (up to ~1,000 characters) telling the model when to reach for this Skill. This is the part that’s always visible, so make it clear.
You can include supporting files alongside SKILL.md:
scripts/— helper programs the Skill can run (executed directly, never loaded into the conversation).references/— longer documents the model reads only when needed.assets/— static files the Skill uses.
Add the folder, and the Skill is available next time the model needs it.
- Tools, MCP & Approvals — the tools a Skill’s steps can call, and how you approve sensitive ones.