| name | discovery-catalog |
| description | Inventory the contents of this Discovery catalog repo. Lists publishers, agents, starter-kits, and the tools shipped under each agent. Use this skill whenever the user asks what's in the catalog, who publishes what, what agents/tools/starter-kits exist, lists or counts of any of those, "show me the catalog", "do we have an agent for X", "what starter kits do we have", "list the publishers", "list tools per agent", or any inventory/discovery question about repo-resident assets — even if the user doesn't explicitly say the word "list". |
| allowed-tools | shell |
Discovery Catalog
Compatibility
This skill is read-only and runs on Windows, macOS, and Linux through PowerShell. PowerShell 7+ (pwsh) is recommended for consistent table rendering, though the dispatcher also works in Windows PowerShell 5.1 with less polished wrapping.
Overview
Read-only inventory of the Discovery catalog repo. One dispatcher script (scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1) supports list and item-inspection invocations:
| Invocation | What it lists |
|---|
discovery-catalog publishers | Every publisher across agents/ and starter-kits/, with per-publisher agent and starter-kit counts |
discovery-catalog agents | Every agent in the catalog (one row per agent folder name) |
discovery-catalog agents list-tools | Every agent plus the tools shipped under each agent's tools/ folder |
discovery-catalog starter-kits | Every starter kit (one row per kit folder name) |
discovery-catalog <agent-name> describe | One agent with Name, Publisher, Version, HasTool, Description |
discovery-catalog <starterkit-name> describe | One starter kit with Name, Publisher, Version, Category, AgentCount, Description |
discovery-catalog <agent-name> list-tools | One agent with Agent, Publisher, Version, ToolCount, Tools, Description |
Repo layout the script handles
The catalog uses a flat layout — one folder per agent or starter kit directly under the parent directory:
| Asset | Path pattern | Display |
|---|
| Agent | agents/<agent-name>/ | <agent-name> |
| Starter kit | starter-kits/<kit-name>/ | <kit-name> |
| Tool under an agent | agents/<agent>/tools/<tool-name>/ | <tool-name> |
Inclusion rules:
- An "agent" is any folder containing an
agent.yaml.
- A "starter kit" is any folder containing a
kit.json.
- Folders without those files (shared helpers, README-only directories) are silently skipped.
- The
agents/tmp/ scratch directory used by the deployer skills is always skipped.
Publisher and party come from the asset's metadata, not from the folder location:
- For an agent:
metadata.yaml → publisher.name (publisher) and publisher.party (1p / 3p).
- For a starter kit:
kit.json → author.name (publisher) and the top-level party field.
If publisher.name / author.name is missing, the publisher is reported as (unspecified).
When to Use
Use this skill whenever the user wants to know what is in the catalog. Trigger phrases include but are not limited to:
- "What agents are in this repo?" / "List the agents" / "Show me the catalog"
- "Who are the publishers?" / "Which partners have agents?"
- "What starter kits do we have?" / "List the starter-kits"
- "Show me agents with their tools" / "List tools per agent"
- "Do we have an agent for retrosynthesis?" (use
-Tag retrosynthesis)
- "Which agents are missing a tool?" (use
-WithoutToolsOnly)
- Before invoking
discovery-services-agent-deployer, when the user isn't sure of the exact agent folder name
Inputs
The skill is fully read-only and needs no Azure config. All inputs are positional or named parameters on scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1.
| Parameter | Position | Description | Default |
|---|
Command | 0 (mandatory) | publishers, agents, starter-kits, or an agent/starter-kit name | — |
SubCommand | 1 (optional) | list-tools (with agents or <agent-name>) or describe (with <agent-name> / <starterkit-name>) | empty |
-Format | named | Table, Markdown, Json, or Plain | Table |
-Publisher | named | Filter by publisher name (case-insensitive). Applies to agents and starter-kits | all |
-Tag | named | Filter agents whose metadata.yaml includes this tag (agents only) | all |
-WithToolsOnly | named | Only show agents that ship a tools/ folder (agents only) | off |
-WithoutToolsOnly | named | Only show agents missing a tools/ folder (agents only) | off |
Invalid combinations exit with a non-zero code and a friendly message (e.g. agents foo, publishers list-tools).
Process
Mapping /discovery-catalog ... requests to invocations
When the user types a slash-style invocation like /discovery-catalog publishers, run the dispatcher with the matching arguments:
| User says | Run |
|---|
/discovery-catalog publishers | pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 publishers |
/discovery-catalog agents | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 agents |
/discovery-catalog agents list-tools | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 agents list-tools |
/discovery-catalog starter-kits | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 starter-kits |
/discovery-catalog <agent-name> describe | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 <agent-name> describe |
/discovery-catalog <starterkit-name> describe | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 <starterkit-name> describe |
/discovery-catalog <agent-name> list-tools | ... discovery-catalog.ps1 <agent-name> list-tools |
Use -Format Table for all catalog responses. Only add -Format Markdown if the user explicitly asks for a paste-ready markdown table.
When the dispatcher output is long, gather the full result before replying; never mention internal transport details, truncation, temp files, or resource files to the user.
Always return the complete table for the requested command; do not shorten it to a partial list or a narrative summary.
In chat responses, present tabular results as Markdown tables for readability, while keeping the count anchor line (*_COUNT=) above the table.
How the dispatcher works (internal — for skill maintainers)
- Resolve repo root via
git rev-parse --show-toplevel.
- Walk
agents/ and/or starter-kits/ one level deep, skipping tmp/.
- Inclusion: agent folders need
agent.yaml; starter-kit folders need kit.json.
- For each entry, parse the appropriate metadata file:
- Agent:
metadata.yaml for name, version, description, tags, plus the nested publisher.name and publisher.party.
- Starter kit:
kit.json for name, version, description, category, party, author.name, plus top-level agentRefs; treat the role: primary entry as the launch agent.
- Tool (when
agents list-tools): tool.yaml for name; folder name as fallback.
- Apply filters:
-Publisher, -Tag, -WithToolsOnly, -WithoutToolsOnly.
- Sort by name (and publisher where applicable).
- Render in the requested format.
The first line of Table and Markdown output is a deterministic count anchor (AGENT_COUNT=, PUBLISHER_COUNT=, STARTER_KIT_COUNT=) so callers can grep for it.
Output Format
discovery-catalog publishers
PUBLISHER_COUNT=2
Publisher Party AgentCount StarterKits
--------- ----- ---------- -----------
Contoso Legal Tech 3p 1 0
Microsoft 1p 41 2
discovery-catalog agents
AGENT_COUNT=41
Agent Publisher Party
---- --------- -----
aizynthfinder Microsoft 1p
online-researcher Microsoft 1p
...
discovery-catalog agents list-tools
AGENT_COUNT=41
Agent Publisher Tools
---- --------- -----
aizynthfinder Microsoft tools/aizynthfinder
bookshelf-researcher Microsoft (no tools)
...
discovery-catalog starter-kits
STARTER_KIT_COUNT=2
Starter-Kit Publisher Category
---- --------- --------
drug-discovery Microsoft Chemistry
protein-structure-analysis Microsoft Biology
discovery-catalog <agent-name> describe
Name Publisher Version HasTool Description
---- --------- ------- ------- -----------
aizynthfinder Microsoft 1.0.0 True Expert agent for retrosynthetic route planning using AiZynthFinder...
discovery-catalog <starterkit-name> describe
Name Publisher Version Category AgentCount Description
---- --------- ------- -------- ---------- -----------
drug-discovery Microsoft 1.0.0 Chemistry 5 Accelerate small-molecule drug discovery...
discovery-catalog <agent-name> list-tools
Agent Publisher Version ToolCount Tools Description
----- --------- ------- --------- ----- -----------
aizynthfinder Microsoft 1.0.0 1 aizynthFinder Expert agent for retrosynthetic route planning using AiZynthFinder...
Examples
Example 1: List publishers
User: "Who publishes agents in this repo?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 publishers
Example 2: List all agents
User: "What agents do we have?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 agents
Example 3: List agents with their tools
User: "Show me each agent and the tools it ships."
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 agents list-tools
Example 4: List starter kits
User: "What starter kits are available?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 starter-kits
Example 5: Describe a specific item
User: "Describe the drug-discovery starter kit"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 drug-discovery describe
User: "Describe aizynthfinder"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 aizynthfinder describe
Example 6: Show tools for one agent
User: "List tools for aizynthfinder"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 aizynthfinder list-tools
Example 7: Filtered queries
User: "Which agents have a retrosynthesis tag?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 agents -Tag retrosynthesis
User: "Which agents don't have a tool yet?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 agents -WithoutToolsOnly
User: "Which agents are published by Microsoft?"
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 agents -Publisher Microsoft
Example 8: Markdown for a doc
User: "Give me a markdown table of all starter kits I can paste into a README."
pwsh -NoProfile -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File .github/skills/discovery-catalog/scripts/discovery-catalog.ps1 starter-kits -Format Markdown
Guidelines
- Read-only: never writes to the repo or to Azure. Safe to run repeatedly.
- Display name is the folder name — agents and starter kits are shown by their flat-layout folder name; publisher is rendered as a separate column populated from
metadata.yaml/kit.json.
- Folder names are globally unique in the flat layout, so
<agent-name> alone is enough to disambiguate.
- Command examples use PowerShell 7+ (
pwsh) and work on Windows, macOS, and Linux when PowerShell is installed.
- Always include the count anchor (
PUBLISHER_COUNT=, AGENT_COUNT=, STARTER_KIT_COUNT=) in Table/Markdown output so downstream automation has a deterministic anchor.
- Prefer tabular output for every catalog query; do not use
Json or Plain for normal discovery responses.
- Return the full table for the requested command; never replace rows with a summary, excerpt, or placeholder text.
- Render user-facing tables in Markdown so columns remain aligned in chat.
- Never narrate internal handling such as reading from a resource file or hitting a terminal output limit.
- Don't crash on missing metadata — entries with missing
metadata.yaml or unparseable kit.json are silently skipped (kits) or shown with empty fields (agents). Missing publisher.name is rendered as (unspecified).
- Don't list
agents/tmp/ — it's the scratch tree used by other skills (discovery-services-agent-deployer) and is gitignored.
- PS 7+ recommended so
Format-Table -AutoSize -Wrap renders long descriptions cleanly. The script works in Windows PowerShell 5.1 too but wrapping is uglier.
- Invalid subcommands exit with non-zero code and a friendly message — the dispatcher rejects e.g.
agents foo or publishers list-tools.
