| name | skill-diet |
| description | Reduce an existing Codex skill to its minimum useful form, extract on-demand context into linked sibling files, or decide that the skill should be deleted. Use when the user asks to diet, slim, trim, simplify, minimize, reevaluate, or remove bloat from a skill while preserving its trigger behavior, tone, safety constraints, and practical usefulness. |
Skill Diet
Shrink a skill to durable behavior only. Cut aggressively — outcome parity is the safety net. Prefer deleting the skill when it only repeats general model ability, AGENTS.md, or non-actionable advice.
Loop
Repeat until the next cut would change behavior:
- Name the skill's real job in one sentence.
- Keep in
SKILL.md only: trigger wording, safety constraints, project-specific rules, resource routing, output contract, and one boundary example if needed.
- Delete the rest, or extract situational context behind a when-to-open link:
- Delete: history, rationale, duplicated/non-decisive examples, long reference summaries, generic or aspirational advice.
- Extract: long examples, pattern catalogs, deep references, edge-case tables.
- Re-read as a first-time reader. Linked files open only when their condition matches.
- Outcome parity: walk 1–3 typical invocations; confirm same decisions, constraints, routing, and output contract. If not, restore the missing rule or tighten a link. Prefer mental walkthroughs; revert any temporary side effects before finishing.
- Validate:
node scripts/validate-skill.js <skill_directory> when available. For repo changes, also run required format/lint.
Extract
When content helps only some invocations, move it beside the skill (rules/, examples/, references/, or a named .md). In SKILL.md, leave only a one-line conditional link — e.g. See ./rules/foo.md when …. Do not summarize the extracted body. Links stay one level deep from SKILL.md.
Delete the skill
Delete the whole skill folder (and state why) when all are true:
- No durable trigger needed
- No project-/domain-specific rule remains
- No reusable resource routing remains
- Remaining behavior is already covered by system, AGENTS.md, or normal model ability
Output
Report:
- decision: kept, reduced, or deleted
- before/after size
- what stayed, what was extracted (paths), and why
- outcome parity: invocations checked and pass/fail
- validation run
