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aks-cost-optimization

Analyze advanced AKS cost efficiency. WHEN: "AKS NAP readiness", "AKS bin packing", "AKS node scaling bottleneck", "AKS blocked scale-down", "AKS storage cost". DO NOT USE AS DIRECT ENTRY FOR: overall AKS cost assessments or rightsizing/VPA/CAS/Spot (azure-kubernetes); spend/anomalies/commitments (cost-analysis/cost-optimization); incidents (aks-troubleshooting).

Quality

82%

Does it follow best practices?

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Adds up to 20 points to the overall score

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SecuritybySnyk

Low

Low-risk findings worth noting

The canonical home for this skill is aks-cost-optimization in microsoft/GitHub-Copilot-for-Azure

SKILL.md
Quality
Evals
Security

Quality

Content

82%Weight 40%Scale 1-5

Reviews the quality of instructions and guidance provided to agents. Good implementation is clear, handles edge cases, and produces reliable results.

A tight, well-structured router skill: token-efficient body, concrete constraints, and clean delegation to a real reference bundle. The gaps are modest — no executable examples or validation loops in the body, and a reference tree that nests one level deeper than ideal.

Suggestions

Name the specific Azure MCP read tools (or one example invocation) in the MCP Tools section so 'Prefer fitting Azure MCP reads' becomes directly executable.

Flatten the deepest reference chains (e.g., surface nap-enablement-and-rollback.md and nap-evidence-collection.md from aks-nap.md directly, or from the body's routing list) to keep navigation one level deep.

Add a brief output-validation checkpoint to the workflow, such as confirming collected evidence satisfies the referenced decision criteria before returning findings.

DimensionReasoningScore

Conciseness

The ~30-line body is lean with zero concept explanations, zero padding, and every sentence carrying routing, constraint, or error-handling information (e.g., 'Keep reads non-mutating; require approval for every change'). It fully assumes Claude's competence, matching the 'every token earns its place' anchor.

5 / 5

Actionability

Guidance is concrete for an instruction-only skill: numbered steps, named artifacts ('Bind the subscription, cluster, resource group, and kube context'; routing to five named reference files; the commitment-demand handoff with 'return demand evidence without benefit analysis'). It stops short of 5 because no example MCP tool invocations or commands are given and phrases like 'Prefer fitting Azure MCP reads' leave execution details to be inferred.

4 / 5

Workflow Clarity

A clear 4-step sequence (bind targets → route to analysis → commitment handoff → non-mutating reads with approval) plus an Error Handling section covering missing-capability and evidence-conflict failure modes. It lacks the explicit validate-fix-retry checkpoint loop of the anchor-5 example, though its read-only workflow does not trigger the destructive/batch cap.

4 / 5

Progressive Disclosure

The body is a clean overview routing to five real, clearly signaled top-level reference files, each holding substantive content. Against the actual bundle structure it falls short of 5 because navigation reaches two levels deep (e.g., aks-nap.md → nap-decisions.md → nap-enablement-and-rollback.md), exceeding the one-level-deep ideal, though links are well signaled and each node contains real content rather than pointer chains.

4 / 5

Total

17

/

20

Passed

Description

73%Weight 40%Scale 1-5

Based on the skill's description, can an agent find and select it at the right time? Clear, specific descriptions lead to better discovery.

A well-bounded, routing-aware description with explicit when-triggers and unusually strong disambiguation against sibling skills. Its main weakness is a thin what-statement: a single generic verb leaves the concrete analysis capabilities implied by the trigger list rather than stated.

Suggestions

Expand the opening sentence to name the concrete analyses performed, e.g., 'Assess NAP readiness, bin-packing efficiency, node scale-down blockers, and storage cost mapping for existing AKS clusters.'

Add a few natural trigger synonyms users might phrase differently, such as 'node autoscaling', 'pod consolidation', or 'scale-down stuck', to broaden trigger matching.

Drop the qualifier 'advanced' or replace it with the specific criteria (scheduling, placement, verified storage mapping) that distinguish this skill from general AKS cost assessment.

DimensionReasoningScore

Specificity

The only action statement is "Analyze advanced AKS cost efficiency" — one verb plus domain, matching the anchor for 1-2 concrete actions without comprehensive coverage. The specific sub-capabilities (NAP readiness, bin packing, node scaling bottleneck, storage cost) appear only as WHEN triggers, not as stated actions, so it does not reach the 'several specific actions' anchor of 4.

3 / 5

Completeness

Both parts are explicit: the what ("Analyze advanced AKS cost efficiency") and a WHEN clause with concrete trigger phrases, plus a DO NOT USE routing list. It is not 5 because the what-side is broad ('advanced... cost efficiency') and relies on the trigger list to imply the concrete capabilities, unlike the anchor-5 example that enumerates actions alongside an explicit when.

4 / 5

Trigger Term Quality

"AKS NAP readiness", "AKS bin packing", "AKS node scaling bottleneck", "AKS blocked scale-down", "AKS storage cost" are natural phrases a user would say when needing this skill, giving good keyword coverage. It falls short of 5 because common synonyms and variations (e.g., node autoscaling, pod consolidation, Karpenter, downscale) are missing.

4 / 5

Distinctiveness Conflict Risk

The description carves out a clear niche (advanced scheduling/placement/storage analysis on existing AKS clusters) and explicitly fences off "overall AKS cost assessments or rightsizing/VPA/CAS/Spot (azure-kubernetes); spend/anomalies/commitments (cost-analysis/cost-optimization); incidents (aks-troubleshooting)" — minimal conflict risk with named sibling skills.

5 / 5

Total

16

/

20

Passed

Validation

100%

Checks the skill against the spec for correct structure and formatting. All validation checks must pass before discovery and implementation can be scored.

Validation — 16 / 16 Passed

Validation for skill structure

No warnings or errors.

Repository

microsoft/azure-skills

Path

.github/plugins/aks-skills/skills/aks-cost-optimization/SKILL.md

Reviewed

Table of Contents

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