find-skills

Find Skills

This skill helps you discover and install skills from the open agent skills ecosystem.

When to Use This Skill

Use this skill when the user:

• Asks "how do I do X" where X might be a common task with an existing skill
• Says "find a skill for X" or "is there a skill for X"
• Asks "can you do X" where X is a specialized capability
• Expresses interest in extending agent capabilities
• Wants to search for tools, templates, or workflows
• Mentions they wish they had help with a specific domain (design, testing, deployment, etc.)

The skill tools

Cherry gives you two built-in tools for skills — use them, and do NOT shell out to npx skills, git, or any package manager:

• search_skills(query) — search the marketplace by keyword. Returns matches, each with an opaque install_source value.
• install_skill(install_source) — install ONE skill into Cherry's managed library and enable it for this agent. Cherry clones the repo, installs just that one skill, and registers it in a single deterministic step. Permission handling follows the active Claude permission mode (Step 6).

Browse skills at: https://skills.sh/

How to Help Users Find Skills

Step 1: Understand What They Need

When a user asks for help with something, identify:

1. The domain (e.g., React, testing, design, deployment)
2. The specific task (e.g., writing tests, creating animations, reviewing PRs)
3. Whether this is a common enough task that a skill likely exists

Step 2: Check the Leaderboard First

Before running a CLI search, check the skills.sh leaderboard to see if a well-known skill already exists for the domain. The leaderboard ranks skills by total installs, surfacing the most popular and battle-tested options.

For example, top skills for web development include:

• vercel-labs/agent-skills — React, Next.js, web design (100K+ installs each)
• anthropics/skills — Frontend design, document processing (100K+ installs)

Step 3: Search for Skills

If the leaderboard doesn't cover the user's need, call the search_skills tool:

• User asks "how do I make my React app faster?" → search_skills("react performance")
• User asks "can you help me with PR reviews?" → search_skills("pr review")
• User asks "I need to create a changelog" → search_skills("changelog")

Each result includes an opaque install_source, source registry, review URL, install count, and available star count. Pass the exact install_source value to install_skill.

Step 4: Verify Quality Before Recommending

Do not recommend a skill based solely on search results. Always verify:

1. Install count — Prefer skills with 1K+ installs. Be cautious with anything under 100.
2. Source reputation — Official sources (vercel-labs, anthropics, microsoft) are more trustworthy than unknown authors.
3. GitHub stars — Check the source repository. A skill from a repo with <100 stars should be treated with skepticism.

Step 5: Present Options to the User

When you find relevant skills, present them to the user with:

1. The skill name and what it does
2. The install count and source
3. That you can install it for them into Cherry
4. A link to learn more at skills.sh

Example response:

I found a skill that might help! The "react-best-practices" skill provides
React and Next.js performance optimization guidelines from Vercel Engineering.
(185K installs)

I can install it into Cherry's skill library for you — want me to go ahead?

Learn more: https://skills.sh/vercel-labs/agent-skills/react-best-practices

Step 6: Install (Uses the Active Permission Mode)

⚠️ Security: Skills are third-party code that runs with full agent permissions. A malicious skill could read, modify, or delete files on your system.

Before installing any skill:

1. Show a security warning — tell the user that the skill is third-party code and will run with full agent permissions.
2. Provide a review link — the skills.sh page (or source repository) so the user can review the skill's SKILL.md and any scripts it contains.
3. Require install intent — call install_skill only when the user asked to install the skill or accepted a presented option. A search-only request must not mutate the skill library.

Once the user has expressed install intent, call install_skill with the exact install_source from the search result. Do not add another model-level confirmation step: Claude's active permission mode is the authority. Default and accept-edits modes may prompt through the SDK; bypass-permissions mode runs directly.

• install_skill("claude-plugins:vercel-labs/agent-skills/skills/react-best-practices")

Do not run npx skills add, git clone, or any shell command to install — that would install the whole repo (dozens of skills), scatter symlinks across other tools, and land outside Cherry's library. install_skill installs only that one skill into Cherry's managed library in one deterministic step. The Claude Agent SDK applies the configured permission mode before it runs. Once done it is registered and listed in the app — nothing is left elsewhere.

Common Skill Categories

When searching, consider these common categories:

Category	Example Queries
Web Development	react, nextjs, typescript, css, tailwind
Testing	testing, jest, playwright, e2e
DevOps	deploy, docker, kubernetes, ci-cd
Documentation	docs, readme, changelog, api-docs
Code Quality	review, lint, refactor, best-practices
Design	ui, ux, design-system, accessibility
Productivity	workflow, automation, git

Tips for Effective Searches

1. Use specific keywords: "react testing" is better than just "testing"
2. Try alternative terms: If "deploy" doesn't work, try "deployment" or "ci-cd"
3. Check popular sources: Many skills come from vercel-labs/agent-skills or ComposioHQ/awesome-claude-skills

When No Skills Are Found

If no relevant skills exist:

1. Acknowledge that no existing skill was found
2. Offer to help with the task directly using your general capabilities
3. Offer to author a custom skill for the task (the skill-creator skill handles this)

Example:

I searched for skills related to "xyz" but didn't find any matches.
I can still help you with this task directly! Would you like me to proceed?

If this is something you do often, I can author a custom skill for you — just ask
me to "create a skill for <task>" and I'll write one into Cherry's skills directory.