| name | officecli-commonly-templates |
| description | Use this skill when producing a polished, Commonly-branded deliverable (.docx brief / memo, .xlsx data matrix, .pptx deck) and you do not have specific brand guidance from the user. Trigger on: 'write me a brief', 'one-pager', 'memo', 'data sheet', 'status matrix', 'short deck', 'summary deck', 'closing slide', 'final deliverable'. Routes to `officecli merge` with one of three pre-built starter templates that already carry the Commonly palette, fonts, and structure — so you populate content with one merge call instead of 30 individual `officecli set` commands. DO NOT use for fundraising decks (use `officecli-pitch-deck`), academic papers (use `officecli-academic-paper`), or financial models (use `officecli-financial-model`). |
OfficeCLI Commonly Templates
A skill that does NOT teach you officecli syntax — it teaches you officecli merge. Three pre-built starter files at /opt/commonly-bundled-skills/officecli/templates/ carry the Commonly palette, font choices, and basic structure for the three deliverable shapes you most commonly produce. You substitute content via --data JSON; the styling is inherited.
When to use this vs. the base officecli-{docx,xlsx,pptx} skills
| Use this skill | Use base officecli sub-skill |
|---|
| Generic brief, memo, status update, executive summary | Custom layout the templates don't cover |
| Data status matrix (≤ ~50 rows, 5 columns) | Multi-sheet workbook, formulas, charts |
| Short summary deck (3 slides) | 10+ slide deck, custom slide masters |
| You don't have specific brand guidance from the user | User specified palette / fonts / layout |
Speed matters — one merge call vs. 30 set calls | You need fine-grained control |
If the user asked for a fundraising deck (Series A/B/C, seed round, VC), route to officecli-pitch-deck. If they asked for an academic paper, officecli-academic-paper. If a financial model, officecli-financial-model. This skill is for everyday Commonly-branded business deliverables.
The three templates
All under /opt/commonly-bundled-skills/officecli/templates/:
commonly-brief.docx — title + 3 sections + footer
Placeholder keys (pass via --data):
title — H1, accent-blue, top of page
subtitle — italic gray, just below title
context — body paragraph under "Context" heading
finding_1 — bullet under "Findings" heading
finding_2 — bullet
finding_3 — bullet
recommendation — body paragraph under "Recommendation" heading
footer — small gray text, right-aligned (e.g. "Lily · 2026-05-06")
commonly-data.xlsx — 5-column status matrix with frozen header
Header row is pre-styled (white text on accent-strong blue, frozen). Row 2 has placeholders for one sample row; for additional rows, use officecli add after the merge to append.
Placeholder keys for row 2:
sample_item, sample_status, sample_owner, sample_notes, sample_updated
For multi-row data, use the docx or pptx template instead — XLSX merge only works for fixed cells. If you genuinely need a styled multi-row sheet, this template's value is the header styling and freeze pane; produce the data via merge for row 2 then officecli add the rest.
commonly-deck.pptx — 3-slide branded deck
Slide 1 (cover): accent bar + big title + subtitle + footer.
Slide 2 (content): thin accent bar + heading + 3 bulleted body paragraphs + page number.
Slide 3 (closing): full-bleed accent panel left + closing heading on it + body + meta-line on right.
Placeholder keys:
title, subtitle — slide 1
slide2_heading, slide2_p1, slide2_p2, slide2_p3 — slide 2
closing_heading, closing_body, closing_meta — slide 3
The flow
TEMPLATE="/opt/commonly-bundled-skills/officecli/templates/commonly-deck.pptx"
OUT="/workspace/$(basename "$PWD")/out/q4-strategy-deck.pptx"
cat > /tmp/data.json <<'EOF'
{
"title": "Q4 Strategy",
"subtitle": "Engineering priorities · 2026-Q4",
"slide2_heading": "What ships this quarter",
"slide2_p1": "Marketplace frontend reaching demo-quality",
"slide2_p2": "Theo + Nova heartbeat reliability above 99%",
"slide2_p3": "Mobile responsive Phase 2 (drawer pods, slide-over inspector)",
"closing_heading": "Decision needed",
"closing_body": "Approve the marketplace-frontend resourcing for Nov / Dec.",
"closing_meta": "Lily · 2026-11-06 · #strategy"
}
EOF
officecli merge "$TEMPLATE" "$OUT" --data /tmp/data.json
officecli view "$OUT" text | head -30
Verifying the output
The empty-office-stub guard at the upload route will reject a deliverable with no actual content — but a successful merge always produces non-empty files because every placeholder gets substituted (or stays as {{key}} literal text if the data file omits the key, which is itself non-empty content).
For peace of mind:
officecli view "$OUT" text | grep -E '\{\{[a-z_]+\}\}'
Reverse handoff
If the user asks for something the templates don't cover:
- More than 3 slides → fall through to base
officecli-pptx. Use the merge output as your starting point if it speeds you up; otherwise officecli create + add.
- Multi-section docx with custom heading hierarchy → fall through to
officecli-docx.
- Anything fundraising-stage-specific →
officecli-pitch-deck.
- User-supplied palette / brand guide → fall through to base sub-skill and follow their guide. The Commonly palette is a default, not a constraint.
Why this exists
Without templates, every deliverable started from officecli create (blank canvas) and required the agent to type out 30+ officecli set commands to produce styled output. Most attempts came back as plain default-styling files — the model couldn't reliably reproduce the Commonly palette / font / layout from memory each time. These templates encode that judgment once.
Building blocks: python-docx, openpyxl, and python-pptx were used to author the source templates; the .docx / .xlsx / .pptx files in this directory are the build output. To regenerate or rebrand, see backend/commonly-bundled-skills/officecli/templates/build_templates.py in the commonly repo.
