Skills

A skill is a packaged set of instructions an agent follows for one kind of task, such as matching invoices or writing variance commentary, with any scripts and reference files it needs.

Open Agents > Skills in the sidebar.

The Skills page Library tab with Variance Commentary as an individual skill and the Accounts Payable Toolkit set holding Invoice Matching Rules and Expense Policy Check

How an agent uses a skill

Skills cost little until they are needed:

An agent always knows the name and description of every skill it has, and uses them to decide when a skill applies.
When a task matches, the agent reads the skill's instructions, its SKILL.md.
The agent opens the skill's other files, such as a script or a reference table, only when the instructions point to them.

So the description matters most: write it to say when the skill should be used, in a sentence or two.

Give an agent skills

For good: in the agent editor, open Skills and select the skills or skill sets the agent should have. See Configure an agent.
For one chat: type / in the composer, or select + > Skills, and pick a skill. See Mentions and commands.

The Skills pane of the Invoice Checker editor with Invoice Matching Rules selected among the workspace's and the built-in skills

Built-in skills and your own

	Built-in skills	Your skills
Made by	Alomana	Members of your workspace, or installed from the marketplace
Seen in	Every workspace	This workspace only
Change it	Fork to customize copies it into your workspace, where you can edit the copy	Edit, replace with a ZIP, download or delete
Shown with	A globe icon and the Platform label	A lock icon while you are the workspace's only member

The buttons above the list switch between them:

Filter	Shows
Space	Skills made or installed in this workspace.
Alo	Built-in skills of Alomana's own agents, such as Agent Builder and App Builder.
Platform	Every built-in skill.

The Source column says where a skill came from: custom (made or uploaded here), marketplace or seeded (built in).

Skills and agent changes

An agent keeps the skills it was published with, content included:

When you edit a skill, every agent that uses it shows Update available and takes the change when it is next published. The skill editor shows how many agents that is: Used by n agents.
When you delete a skill, it is taken off every agent's draft. Agents keep using the copy in their published version, and show Update available, until they are published again.

See Test and publish an agent.

Next steps

Create a skill, or import one as a SKILL.md or ZIP.
Group skills into skill sets.
Install a skill from the marketplace.

To manage skills with an API key, see Create and configure an agent in the API documentation.