| name | cmd_skill_stocktake |
| description | Audit all installed OpenClaw skills for quality: content overlap, freshness, and uniqueness. Supports Quick Scan (changed only) and Full Stocktake modes. |
| user-invocable | true |
| origin | openclaw-mas |
| argument-hint | <project-path> [--full] |
Project Path
The first argument is the project path. Before doing anything else:
- Extract the project path from the first argument
- Verify the path exists
- Work within that directory for all file operations and shell commands
Skill Stocktake
Audit all installed OpenClaw skills using a quality checklist and AI holistic judgment.
Supports two modes: Quick Scan for recently changed skills, and Full Stocktake
for a complete review.
Usage
/skill cmd_skill_stocktake <project-path> # Quick Scan (default if results exist)
/skill cmd_skill_stocktake <project-path> --full # Force Full Stocktake
Scope
Scans two locations:
| Path | Description |
|---|
~/.openclaw/skills/ | Global installed skills |
<project-path>/skills/ | Project-local skills (if the directory exists) |
At the start of Phase 1, explicitly list which paths were found and scanned.
Modes
| Mode | Trigger | Duration |
|---|
| Quick Scan | Results file exists and --full not passed | 5–10 min |
| Full Stocktake | Results file absent, or --full passed | 20–30 min |
Results cache: <project-path>/skill-stocktake-results.json
Quick Scan Flow
Re-evaluate only skills that changed since the last run.
- Read
<project-path>/skill-stocktake-results.json
- Find changed skills by comparing current mtimes to cached mtimes:
find ~/.openclaw/skills/ <project-path>/skills/ -name "SKILL.md" 2>/dev/null \
| while read f; do echo "$(stat -f '%m' "$f" 2>/dev/null || stat -c '%Y' "$f") $f"; done
- If no files changed since
evaluated_at: report "No changes since last run." and stop.
- Re-evaluate only changed skills using the same Phase 2 criteria.
- Carry forward unchanged skills from previous results.
- Output only the diff table.
- Update
<project-path>/skill-stocktake-results.json with new results.
Full Stocktake Flow
Phase 1 — Inventory
Enumerate all skill files and extract frontmatter:
find ~/.openclaw/skills/ <project-path>/skills/ -name "SKILL.md" 2>/dev/null
For each SKILL.md, extract:
name (from frontmatter)description (from frontmatter)origin (from frontmatter)- Last modified time:
stat -f '%Sm' -t '%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ' <file> (macOS) or stat -c '%y' <file> (Linux)
- Line count:
wc -l < <file>
Present the scan summary:
Skill Stocktake — Phase 1: Inventory
──────────────────────────────────────────────────────
Scanning:
✓ ~/.openclaw/skills/ (<N> files)
✓ <project-path>/skills/ (<M> files)
Total: <N+M> skills
Build the inventory table:
| Skill | Origin | Lines | Last Modified | Description |
|---|
Phase 2 — Quality Evaluation
Launch an Agent tool subagent (general-purpose) with the full inventory and checklist.
Process ~20 skills per subagent invocation to keep context manageable.
For each batch, the subagent evaluates each skill against this checklist:
- [ ] Content overlap with other skills checked
- [ ] Overlap with MEMORY.md / CLAUDE.md checked
- [ ] Freshness of technical references verified (use WebSearch if tool names / CLI flags / APIs are present)
- [ ] Usage frequency considered (infer from recency of last modification)
The subagent returns per-skill JSON:
{ "verdict": "Keep|Improve|Update|Retire|Merge into [X]", "reason": "..." }
Verdict criteria:
| Verdict | Meaning |
|---|
| Keep | Useful and current |
| Improve | Worth keeping, but specific improvements needed |
| Update | Referenced technology is outdated (verify with WebSearch) |
| Retire | Low quality, stale, or cost-asymmetric |
| Merge into [X] | Substantial overlap with another skill; name the merge target |
Evaluation is holistic AI judgment — not a numeric rubric. Guiding dimensions:
- Actionability: code examples, commands, or steps that let you act immediately
- Scope fit: name, trigger, and content are aligned; not too broad or narrow
- Uniqueness: value not replaceable by MEMORY.md / CLAUDE.md / another skill
- Currency: technical references work in the current environment
Reason quality requirements — the reason field must be self-contained:
- For Retire: state (1) what specific defect was found, (2) what covers the same need instead
- For Merge: name the target and describe what content to integrate
- For Improve: describe the specific change needed (what section, what action)
- For Keep (Quick Scan mtime-only change): restate the original verdict rationale
Save intermediate results to <project-path>/skill-stocktake-results.json with
"status": "in_progress" after each chunk.
Resume detection: If status: "in_progress" is found on startup, resume from
the first unevaluated skill.
After all skills are evaluated: set status: "completed", proceed to Phase 3.
Phase 3 — Summary Table
| Skill | Origin | Verdict | Reason |
|-------|--------|---------|--------|
Phase 4 — Consolidation
- Retire / Merge: present detailed justification per file before confirming with user:
- What specific problem was found (overlap, staleness, broken references, etc.)
- What alternative covers the same functionality
- Impact of removal (any dependent skills, MEMORY.md references, or workflows affected)
- Improve: present specific improvement suggestions with rationale
- Update: present updated content with sources checked
- Check
~/.openclaw/workspace-main/MEMORY.md line count; propose compression if >100 lines
Never retire or merge skills without explicit user confirmation.
Results File Schema
<project-path>/skill-stocktake-results.json:
{
"evaluated_at": "2026-02-21T10:00:00Z",
"mode": "full",
"batch_progress": {
"total": 80,
"evaluated": 80,
"status": "completed"
},
"skills": {
"skill-name": {
"path": "~/.openclaw/skills/skill-name/SKILL.md",
"verdict": "Keep",
"reason": "Concrete, actionable, unique value for X workflow",
"mtime": "2026-01-15T08:30:00Z"
}
}
}
Get the current UTC timestamp for evaluated_at:
date -u +%Y-%m-%dT%H:%M:%SZ
Notes
- Evaluation is blind: the same checklist applies to all skills regardless of origin
- Archive / delete operations always require explicit user confirmation
- No verdict branching by skill origin (ECC, openclaw-mas, community all treated equally)
