Explain something to someone who knows nothing about it.
Collected from public GitHub. Every version is saved exactly as it was and never changes. Install it at an exact version with the mdr tool, and every file is checked before it reaches your agent. The main file is checked against the SHA-256 fingerprint recorded here, and the others against the fingerprints GitHub keeps for its source commit. The automatic checks below grade the latest version, and the same checks always give the same file the same grade.
What the file says
# ELI5
The user has no foothold. `/understand` questions them about a model they already
hold; here there is no model to question, and asking produces a guess you then have to
correct. So read the thing, then explain it — plainly, concretely, once.
Two ways this fails. You explain it in the vocabulary of the thing itself ("the
reconciler converges the cluster toward desired state"), which only reads to someone
who already understands it. Or you reach for concreteness and invent it: a config
value that isn't in the file, a sample record nobody has. The invented one is worse,
because it's memorable, wrong, and this reader has nothing to catch it with.
## 1. Find the thing
The target is `$ARGUMENTS`, or ask. It arrives as a path, a name they keep seeing
(`sidekiq`, `helm`, `useEffect`), a word off a ticket (`chargeback`, `dunning`), a
link, or pasted text.
A path is the thing. A name or a word gets looked for in this repo first — manifests,
config, `grep -ri` — since the version this codebase uses beats the general one, which
covers ten features they'll never touch. Not here at all? Say so in one line, explain
…
The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20261106.ce8ab68, which is what most people want. This one pins the sha256 fingerprint of the contents instead, so it survives a label being moved. Either way the exact version is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install downloads and checks those contents again, so it installs them exactly or stops with an error.
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_dgiprxvib6oi6x6u
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=thoughtbot/rails-consultant/eli5
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/2dc092f90e4c09e2bc01dc19bc5296b4a5a5b75afe16512c35d8f385d7494f97
Your AI assistant does the legwork. You hear about the deals worth your word. Hand yours the standing instructions at modelranch.com and it joins the network that reads files like this one.
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/ask-claude/SKILL.md · Recommend the best way to have Claude do something, checked against Anthropic's current docs, then write the prompt and…
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/commit/SKILL.md · Commit the current changes as atomic commits, recording risks, tradeoffs, and alternatives considered.
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/diff-explainer/SKILL.md · Builds a shareable HTML walkthrough of the current changes, highlighting risks, tradeoffs, and alternatives considered.
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/multi-lens-review/SKILL.md · Review a change for defects, then against its spec, its codebase's conventions, the domains trying to emerge from it…
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/pr/SKILL.md · Open a pull request whose description you write yourself, with a suggested title and a light proofread.
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/preparatory-refactor/SKILL.md · Identify opportunities to introduce a refactor that would make a feature easy to implement.
thoughtbot/rails-consultant · skills/risk-score/SKILL.md · Score how risky a pull request or branch is with fixed rules, and reply with the result as JSON. Use when asked how…
coldteadotai/pr-lens · skills/eli5/SKILL.md · WHAT: Explains a codebase, a folder, a feature, a command or a pull request to someone who knows nothing about it, as a…
dzhng/skills · skills/engineering/eli5/SKILL.md · Explain a technical spec or proposed change in plain language: what problem it solves, how the solution works, and…
dcouple/pane · main/src/services/paneChatBundle/skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Teach an unfamiliar topic from first principles with a picture-first HTML explanation, published to the workspace's…
greenfield-inc/pane · main/src/services/paneChatBundle/skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Teach an unfamiliar topic from first principles with a picture-first HTML explanation, published to the workspace's…
mblode/agent-skills · skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Picks the form that explains best and applies the house explanation style: plain prose, controlled English modelled on…
agentbull/ankole · app/library/agent-plugins/methodology/skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Explain a certain topic in an easy-to-understand way. Use when the user asks for a dead-simple picture explainer of how…
doodledood/manifest-dev · claude-plugins/manifest-dev-tools/skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Explain a topic like I'm a 5 year old. Use when the user types /eli5 <topic> or asks for a dead-simple picture…
naveedharri/benai-skills · plugins/all-skills/skills/eli5/SKILL.md · Explain a topic like I'm a 5 year old. Use when the user types /eli5 [topic] or asks for a dead-simple picture…
