how SKILL.md skillA

how from bastani-inc/atomic is an agent skill: a SKILL.md folder an AI agent loads when a task calls for it.

Install it, pinned

mdr add bastani-inc/atomic/how@git:20260823.166e8d7

Pins git:20260823.166e8d7 in mdr.lock. Pin the fingerprint instead.

Audit grade: A, 17 of 17 checks passed
Kind: SKILL.md skill
Repository: bastani-inc/atomic
Path: packages/workflows/skills/how/SKILL.md
Versions recorded: 2
Latest version: git:20260823.166e8d7, committed Aug 23, 2026
First version recorded: Aug 23, 2026
Size: 9,334 bytes
Repository stars: 874
License: a license file GitHub does not identify

Use for "how does X work", code walkthroughs before changing something, and placement / ownership / layering questions ("where should this live", "which package owns this", "is this the right layer"). Explains subsystem architecture, runtime flow, onboarding mental models. Can critique architecture. Use why for motivation.

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

# How

Explore the codebase to answer "how does X work?" questions. Produce clear architectural explanations at the level of a senior engineer onboarding onto a subsystem. Enough to build a working mental model, not annotated source code.

Two modes:

1. **Explain** (default). Explore the codebase and produce a clear explanation
2. **Critique.** Explain first, then run several fresh-context Atomic specialists to identify architectural issues independently

## Explain Mode

### Step 1. Understand the Question and Assess Complexity

Parse what the user is asking about:

- "How does the rate limiter work?", a subsystem
- "How do we handle billing for on-demand usage?", a feature flow
- "How is the auth service structured?", an architectural overview
- "Walk me through what happens when a user submits a form", a runtime trace

Identify the scope. If ambiguous, state your best-guess interpretation before exploring. Don't ask. Let the user redirect if you're off.

**Assess complexity to decide the approach:**
…

Read the whole file at its exact version.

How to install

The exact contents, by fingerprint

mdr add bastani-inc/atomic/how@sha256:77cb33cb3de83484

The line at the top of this page pins the label git:20260823.166e8d7, 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.

Badge

[![mdr](https://markdownregistry.com/badge/art_wj6wvnrtclf22fay.svg)](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_wj6wvnrtclf22fay)

3 badge image fetches in 30 days. What the badge shows.

Versions

The registry has recorded 2 versions of this file, all committed on Aug 23, 2026.

version	committed	commit	size	audit
git:20260823.166e8d7 latest	2026-08-23	166e8d7	9,334 B	A	view · diff
git:20260823.cc40f7f	2026-08-23	cc40f7f	7,543 B	A	view

Audit of the latest version

A 17 of 17 checks passed. Fixed automatic checks with no AI involved, so the same checks give the same answer every run.

pass: Frontmatter block present
pass: Frontmatter declares a name
pass: Frontmatter declares a description
pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (9334 bytes)
pass: No zero-width or bidi control characters
pass: No instruction hidden inside an HTML comment
pass: No link to an exfiltration or paste host
pass: No credential-shaped string
pass: No instruction to send local credentials anywhere
pass: No text hidden with inline styles
pass: No prompt-injection phrasing
pass: No curl or wget piped into a shell
pass: No recursive delete of root, home or parent
pass: No instruction to read or print local credentials
pass: No base64 blob over 200 characters
pass: No link to a raw IP address
pass: No script tag

Source

GitHub

bastani-inc/atomic · 874 stars · license a license file GitHub does not identify · pushed 2026-11-03 · branch main

API

GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_wj6wvnrtclf22fay
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=bastani-inc/atomic/how
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/77cb33cb3de83484d910c0d0174041167ccba78437d00d4618292e48f90ac799

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.

Guides: the SKILL.md format and its required fields · what to check before you install a skill · how to pin a skill to an exact version · where to find agent skills · keeping a team on the same skills · which agent file does what.

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