---
name: create-verification-skill
description: >-
  Create or maintain a repository-local skill for repeatedly verifying real project
  behavior through its supported browser/app, HTTP/service/API, or CLI/process
  surfaces. Use when the user explicitly asks for a project verification skill,
  verification capability, reusable verification journeys, or maintenance of an
  existing repo-local verification skill. Do not use for ordinary test writing,
  one-off app runs, or automatically scaffolding a harness because coverage is absent.
---

# Create a Project Verification Skill

Produce a reusable project-owned verification skill, not generic test advice. The result is an
actual `SKILL.md` plus only the approved helpers required to operate it. Prefer the project's
existing commands and harnesses over a new control layer.

## Workflow

### 1. Establish the owner

Inspect the repository before proposing files. Read `references/discovery-and-safety.md` and
complete its discovery pass.

Find the owning package, repository instructions, installed versions and tools, command help,
test support, existing local skills, and any established skill location. Reuse or deliberately
update an existing verification skill or harness rather than creating a parallel one.

If the repository has no established location, propose
`.agents/skills/<unique-project-verification-name>/SKILL.md`. Use a portable project-local path;
do not impose a host-specific directory.

**Complete when:** the project owner, skill owner/location, current verification assets, exact
working directories, and relevant commands are evidenced from the repository.

### 2. Define the recurring job

Name the precise job the generated skill will repeat. Select only the applicable product surfaces:

- browser or app interaction;
- HTTP, service, or API behavior;
- CLI, TUI, or process behavior.

Define named journey contracts with preconditions, public actions, observable completion, and any
externally visible persisted effect. Read `references/generated-skill-contract.md` and apply its
complete execution-budget, cancellation, cleanup, port-selection, and blocked-status contract
before designing the artifact. A parser or unit-only claim stays at its programmatic boundary; do
not manufacture a browser journey for it.

**Complete when:** every proposed journey states what real behavior it proves, at which boundary,
and what remains unsupported.

### 3. Present a bounded proposal

Before any durable write, package/config change, stateful journey, or unsafe action, show the user:

- the exact write set and owner of every artifact;
- substantive generated sections and exact repository commands;
- setup, start, doctor, actions, observations, evidence, and cleanup;
- how the proposal satisfies the complete operational contract in
  `references/generated-skill-contract.md`, including every discovered enforcement mechanism and
  blocker;
- explicit isolated-port selection and how target identity and ownership will be verified;
- behavior claims each journey can and cannot prove;
- any new dependency, fixture, credential mechanism, process, port, data, or external side effect;
- which actions are safe to generate versus separately gated to execute.

Ask for explicit approval of that bounded proposal. Generator invocation is permission to inspect
and propose, not blanket permission to modify the target project or drive it.

**Complete when:** the user has approved the exact durable writes and any separately scoped
execution. Stop if a required file or action lies outside that approval.

### 4. Generate the smallest durable capability

Create or update the project-local `SKILL.md` and only necessary approved helpers. Use existing
scripts, runners, fixtures, and tools where possible. Give tool-neutral roles alongside actual
commands supported by the host and repository; never invent an interface or require one browser
library everywhere.

Resolve helper paths from the generated skill directory. State the correct repository or monorepo
working directory for every command. Apply `references/generated-skill-contract.md` as the source
of truth for every operational requirement and blocker. Keep the artifact instructional: no new
daemon, workflow database, control plane, or mandatory index.

Use `references/examples.md` only when a concrete browser, API, CLI, or blocked-case pattern would
help shape the project-specific result.

**Complete when:** every approved file exists, the skill has one clear invocation/job, each journey
has an observable completion contract, and every applicable operational step has an explicit
finite budget enforced by a verified capability or is marked blocked.

### 5. Check the artifact

Run the repository's focused formatting, skill syntax, reference, or registration checks. Inspect
the diff for unrelated changes and secrets. Check the artifact against the complete operational
contract in `references/generated-skill-contract.md`. These checks prove that the artifact was
generated and registered correctly; they do not prove a user journey.

Classify the result as:

- **proposed** — described but not written;
- **generated** — written and structurally checked;
- **exercised** — run against the authorized target with the required observations;
- **blocked** — a named requirement could not be proved, with the missing capability recorded.

**Complete when:** structural checks pass or their exact failures are reported, and the status does
not overstate operational proof.

### 6. Exercise only authorized safe journeys

When the user separately approved execution, establish target identity and readiness before
driving. Execute the generated skill under the complete operational contract in
`references/generated-skill-contract.md`. Exercise the workflow on the real authorized surface and
capture action plus resulting state plus required persisted effect. Use the generated contract's
port-selection and owned-process receipt rules; store actual ephemeral runtime values only in the
run receipt.

If authentication, a browser, infrastructure, target identity, or another required capability is
unavailable, report **blocked**. Do not install replacements, weaken acceptance, or label the
artifact tested. Preserve sanitized evidence after cleanup.

**Complete when:** an exercised claim has real observations at the named boundary and all bounded
cleanup completed, or the precise timeout, cancellation, cleanup, capability, or other blocker and
unverified claims are explicit.

### 7. Report

Return the generated paths, owner, journeys and supported surfaces, structural commands/results,
exercise status, evidence locations, cleanup result, omissions, source provenance, and version
uncertainty.

**Complete when:** another agent can distinguish what was proposed, generated, exercised, and
blocked without inference.

## Operational contract source

`references/generated-skill-contract.md` is the single source of truth for the complete generated
artifact and execution contract. Apply it before proposing, generating, checking, exercising, or
reporting operational instructions. When the target repository or host cannot satisfy one of its
requirements, preserve the missing prerequisite and report execution as **blocked**.

## Reference routing

| Priority | Load when | Reference |
|---|---|---|
| 1 — Required | Inspecting a target repository, choosing ownership/location, proposing writes, or preparing execution | `references/discovery-and-safety.md` |
| 1 — Required | Designing, generating, checking, or reporting the project-local verification artifact | `references/generated-skill-contract.md` |
| 2 — Conditional | A small browser, API, CLI, or safe-failure pattern would clarify the project-specific design | `references/examples.md` |

## Boundaries

`test` owns ordinary test creation, regression coverage, TDD, and executable test evidence.
Browser or runner specialists own one-off interaction and tool syntax. This skill owns the distinct
recurring job of creating or maintaining a repository-local verification skill and its approved
helpers. Missing tests alone do not trigger this skill.