plugin-generator

name	plugin-generator
description	Scaffold new plugins for Copilot and Claude Code marketplaces. Use when the user wants to "create a plugin", "scaffold a plugin", "generate a new plugin", "start a new marketplace plugin", "build a copilot plugin", "make a claude plugin", or needs help structuring a plugin with skills, commands, agents, hooks, or MCP servers.

Plugin Generator

Scaffold complete, well-structured plugins for Copilot CLI and Claude Code marketplaces.

Workflow

Step 1: Gather Requirements

Ask the user:

1. Plugin name — lowercase with hyphens (e.g., my-awesome-plugin)
2. Description — what does this plugin do?
3. Target engines — copilot, claude, or both?
4. Components needed — which of: skills, commands, agents, hooks, MCP servers?
5. Category — one of: productivity, development, devops, debugging, code-review, security, testing, design, database, learning, other

Step 2: Determine Context

Check if scaffolding inside an existing marketplace or as a standalone plugin:

Inside a marketplace (a parent .claude-plugin/marketplace.json exists):

• Create the plugin directory under plugins/
• Register the plugin in the parent marketplace.json

Standalone plugin (no parent marketplace):

• Create a self-contained plugin with its own .claude-plugin/ directory
• Generate both marketplace.json and plugin.json

Step 3: Generate the Plugin Structure

Create the full directory structure based on requirements.

Base structure (always created):

plugin-name/
├── .claude-plugin/
│   └── plugin.json
├── agency.json
├── README.md
└── skills/
    └── [skill-name]/
        └── SKILL.md

Additional directories based on components:

• Commands: commands/command-name.md
• Agents: agents/agent-name.md
• Hooks: hooks/hooks.json + hooks/hook-script.py
• MCP servers: .mcp.json at plugin root

Step 4: Generate Config Files

plugin.json

{
  "name": "plugin-name",
  "description": "Plugin description",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "author": {
    "name": "Author Name",
    "email": "[e-mail]"
  },
  "keywords": ["relevant", "keywords"],
  "license": "MIT"
}

agency.json

{
  "engines": ["copilot", "claude"],
  "category": "productivity"
}

marketplace.json (if standalone)

{
  "name": "marketplace-name",
  "metadata": {
    "description": "Marketplace description",
    "version": "1.0.0"
  },
  "owner": {
    "name": "Owner Name",
    "email": "[e-mail]"
  },
  "plugins": [
    {
      "name": "plugin-name",
      "source": "./",
      "description": "Plugin description",
      "version": "1.0.0",
      "author": { "name": "Author Name" },
      "keywords": ["..."],
      "category": "productivity"
    }
  ]
}

Step 5: Generate Component Templates

For each requested component, generate the appropriate files using the patterns described in the reference files:

• Skills: See references/skill-patterns.md
• Commands: See references/command-patterns.md
• Agents, Hooks, MCP: See references/advanced-patterns.md

Step 6: Register in Marketplace

If inside a marketplace, add the plugin entry to the parent marketplace.json:

{
  "name": "plugin-name",
  "source": "./plugins/plugin-name",
  "description": "...",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "author": { "name": "..." },
  "keywords": ["..."],
  "category": "..."
}

Include "strict": true if the plugin should be strictly validated.

Step 7: Verify

After scaffolding:

1. Confirm all JSON files are valid
2. Confirm all SKILL.md files have proper YAML frontmatter with name and description
3. Confirm directory structure matches the expected pattern
4. List created files for user review