Expert coding assistant for Catalyst by Zoho — Zoho's full-stack serverless cloud platform. Use for any question about Catalyst services, CLI, SDKs, architecture, pricing, or Zoho MCP tool-based infrastructure management.
Catalyst AppSail — persistent backend PaaS with managed runtimes (Node.js, Java, Python) and custom Docker containers. Trigger on 'AppSail', 'persistent server', 'Docker on Catalyst', 'X_ZOHO_CATALYST_LISTEN_PORT', or 'long-running process on Catalyst'. Do NOT use for stateless request/response handlers, event-driven functions, or scheduled jobs — use catalyst-functions instead.
Catalyst Authentication — user login/signup, ZAID, Web SDK auth flows, and OAuth token management via Connections. Trigger on 'authentication', 'login', 'signup', 'getCurrentUser', 'ZAID', 'isUserAuthenticated', 'signOut', 'Connections', or 'getAccessToken'. You MUST load this skill whenever implementing user login or protecting data — ZAID differs between Development and Production and is the #1 cause of auth failures after environment promotion. For Security Rules (function invocation control), route to catalyst-functions.
Core Catalyst project setup — directory structure, environments, CLI commands, and all Catalyst IDs (Project ID, ZAID, Table ID, Segment ID, Org ID). Trigger on 'start a Catalyst project', 'what is .catalystrc', 'where do I find my Table ID', 'difference between Development and Production', or any Catalyst ID or CLI question.
Catalyst Data Store — relational cloud database with ZCQL, CRUD operations, table permissions, and result pagination. Requires MCP connection — check for CatalystbyZoho_* tools before any operation. Trigger on 'Data Store', 'ZCQL', 'create table', 'executeZCQLQuery', 'table permissions', 'ROWID', 'boolean column', 'boolean always true', 'truthy string', 'boolean stored as string', or 'DataStore data types'. You MUST load this skill whenever writing code that reads or writes Data Store data — ZCQL result wrapping, boolean-as-string behavior, and App User permissions are non-obvious and cause silent bugs if skipped.
Catalyst serverless functions — all 7 types (Basic I/O, Advanced I/O, Event, Cron, Job, Integration, Browser Logic), handler signatures, catalyst-config.json, Security Rules, API Gateway routing, file uploads, busboy, Express middleware, environment variables, function URL, and function testing. Requires MCP connection — check for CatalystbyZoho_* tools before any operation. Trigger on 'write a function', 'catalyst function', 'API Gateway', 'Security Rules', 'function not found', 'function returns 401', 'busboy', 'middleware', 'function URL', 'environment variable in function', 'duplicate CORS headers', 'CORS error in browser', 'Access-Control-Allow-Origin multiple values', 'function URL 404', 'execute suffix', 'function timeout', 'function hangs', or any function type question. Do NOT use for persistent servers, long-running processes, or Docker deployments — use catalyst-appsail instead.
Catalyst pricing — free tier limits, pay-as-you-go rates, GB-seconds calculation, and cost estimation for functions, storage, and other services. Trigger on 'pricing', 'cost', 'free tier', 'how much does Catalyst cost', 'GB-seconds', 'billing', or 'will this be free'.
Catalyst SDKs — initialization patterns, service access, and method reference for Node.js, Web (browser), Python, Java, Android, iOS, and Flutter. Trigger on 'SDK', 'zcatalyst-sdk-node', 'Node.js SDK', 'Web SDK', 'Python SDK', 'Java SDK', 'Android SDK', 'iOS SDK', 'Flutter SDK', or 'initialize SDK'.