codebase-onboarding skillA
codebase-onboarding is agent-read markdown (skill) from kaizakin/dotfiles: Generates a single, deeply researched ONBOARDING.md at the root of an open source (or internal) codebase, written for a brand-new contributor. Use this whenever someone wants to understand, explore, ramp up on, or document an unfamiliar repository — trigger phrases include "help me understand this codebase," "explain this repo," "onboard me to this project," "I just cloned this and I'm lost," "write an ONBOARDING.md," "what's the architecture here," "how is this repo organized," or any request t.
Indexed from public GitHub and served as immutable, content-addressed versions. Install it pinned to an exact SHA-256 with the mdr CLI, and every file is verified against the hash recorded here before it reaches your agent. The deterministic audit below grades the latest version, and the same file always earns the same grade.
What the file says
# Codebase Onboarding ## What this skill is for A new contributor cloning an unfamiliar repo usually gets one of two things: a sparse README, or an AI-generated wall of bullet points that lists facts without ever explaining how they fit together. Neither actually helps someone _understand_ the project. This skill produces something different: a single `ONBOARDING.md`, placed at the project root, that reads like a thoughtful senior engineer sat down with a new hire and walked them through the codebase — what it is, why it's built the way it is, where things live, and what you need to know before you touch the code. It is long. It is prose-heavy. It uses diagrams only where a diagram earns its place, and when it does, the diagram is precise and grounded in the actual code, not a generic box-and-arrow sketch. …
Read the whole file at its exact version.
How to install
mdr add kaizakin/dotfiles/codebase-onboarding@git:20260726.5fc7ab1mdr add kaizakin/dotfiles/codebase-onboarding@sha256:a7a8d82fdfffcfbbPin to a label to follow the author's releases, or to a sha256 to freeze the exact bytes forever. Either way the resolved hash is written to mdr.lock, and mdr install reproduces it on any machine.
[](https://markdownregistry.com/a/art_xwoyotz5zxitzu5v)
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Versions
Audit of the latest version
- pass: Frontmatter block present
- pass: Frontmatter declares a name
- pass: Frontmatter declares a description
- pass: Size between 200 bytes and 200 KB (10468 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
kaizakin/dotfiles · 15 stars · license none · pushed 2026-09-23 · branch main
API
GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/artifacts/art_xwoyotz5zxitzu5v GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/resolve?ref=kaizakin/dotfiles/codebase-onboarding GET https://markdownregistry.com/api/v1/blob/a7a8d82fdfffcfbbbe0d2cd021589363125f178d160bb6a54fd4bff9e51ab679
Your agent 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.
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