Before doing anything

1. Confirm the CLI is available: command -v skills-manager-cli. If it's not on PATH, this skill doesn't apply — fall back to find-skills (or tell the user to install skills-manager).
2. Always pass --json when you parse output yourself. Pretty-printed output is for the user; JSON is for you. Errors include ok=false, a stable code, and message on stderr with a non-zero exit code.

skills-manager-cli --json skills list

Mental model

There's one central library at ~/.skills-manager/skills/ that all agents share. Each skill has source metadata, preset membership, tags, and zero or more real deployments in agent directories. A preset is a reusable group; several presets may be deployed at the same time.

Keep these three states separate:

• Library: install/remove controls whether Skills Manager owns the skill.
• Preset membership: presets add-skill/remove-skill organizes the library only.
• Deployment: skills deploy/undeploy and presets deploy/undeploy control what an agent can actually see.

Internally, presets are still stored as scenarios for backward-compatible Git Backup. The CLI and UI call them presets.

Install

# From skills.sh marketplace
skills-manager-cli skills install vercel-labs/agent-skills@react-best-practices

# Any git URL (use /tree/branch/subpath form when the skill lives in a sub-directory)
skills-manager-cli skills install https://github.com/anthropics/skills.git
skills-manager-cli skills install https://github.com/foo/bar/tree/main/skills/baz

# Local folder
skills-manager-cli skills install ./my-skill

# Force a source type when the ref is ambiguous
skills-manager-cli skills install foo/bar --skillssh
skills-manager-cli skills install ./looks-like/owner-repo --local

Default is library-only — the skill enters the DB but doesn't appear in any agent yet. Prefer an explicit follow-up deployment so scope is unambiguous:

skills-manager-cli skills deploy <skill> --agent claude_code --agent codex

--sync and --sync-preset remain legacy shortcuts for the exclusive active-preset workflow.

Ref resolution is deterministic, no path-existence guessing:

1. Starts with ./, ../, /, or ~/ → local path
2. Contains ://, ends in .git, or starts with git@ → git URL
3. Matches owner/repo, owner/repo/skill, or owner/repo@skill → skillssh
4. Otherwise → error; pass --local / --git / --skillssh to disambiguate

Always verify after install with skills list or skills show <name> so you can confirm the skill landed and report the preset / sync state back to the user.

Search

skills-manager-cli --json skills search "react performance" --limit 5

Each result has install_ref (paste straight into skills install), installs (popularity proxy), and skills_sh_url. Show the top 1–3 with install counts before installing — anything with 10K+ installs is battle-tested; anything under 100 needs a careful look at the source repo.

Update / Check

# Re-fetch one skill (git/skillssh re-clones, local/import re-imports source dir)
skills-manager-cli skills update <skill-name-or-id>

# Re-fetch all eligible skills
skills-manager-cli skills update --all

# Just probe remote revisions, don't touch files
skills-manager-cli skills check --all

check is the dry-run partner of update. Local-only skills (no git source) are reported as skipped: true.

An update replaces the skill's directory wholesale, so anything written inside it that the new version does not have would be destroyed. When the CLI detects that, it applies nothing and reports the paths instead:

{ "name": "ppt-master", "refreshed": false,
  "held_back_removals": ["library: templates/mine.pptx"] }

The field is omitted entirely when nothing is held back, so test for its presence rather than for an empty array. refreshed: false with held_back_removals is not a failure and not something to retry — the skill is untouched and still on its old version. Show the user the listed paths and ask. There is no CLI flag to override this; only the desktop app can confirm and proceed, because only a person can say those files are expendable. The paths are prefixed with where they live (library, or an agent key for a deployed copy).

Note what this does not cover: a file the user edited that the new version also ships is reported as surviving, because its path survives — the update overwrites their edits silently. Warn anyone keeping local modifications inside a skill folder.

Remove

# Always preview first when removing more than one
skills-manager-cli skills remove <skill> --dry-run

# --yes is required for the actual delete; --json mode does NOT auto-confirm
skills-manager-cli skills remove <skill> --yes

Remove deletes the central-library copy, all synced targets across agents, and the DB row. It's not reversible without re-installing.

Deploy / Undeploy

skills-manager-cli skills deploy <skill> --agent claude_code
skills-manager-cli skills undeploy <skill> --agent codex
skills-manager-cli skills deploy <skill-a> <skill-b> --agent codex --dry-run
skills-manager-cli skills deploy <skill> --agent claude_code --agent codex
skills-manager-cli --json skills status <skill>

These commands change real managed deployments without deleting the central-library copy or changing preset membership. skills enable/disable are deprecated compatibility commands and do not change deployment; never use them.

skills deploy and skills undeploy always require at least one explicit --agent, whether the command names one skill or several. skills status also reports target rows left by a custom agent that is no longer registered, so stale deployments stay visible and can be cleaned with an explicit undeploy while the row exists.

Legacy exclusive sync

# Sync current active preset to all enabled agents
skills-manager-cli skills sync

# Preview the target list — safe, no writes
skills-manager-cli skills sync --dry-run

# Switch the one legacy active preset, then sync
skills-manager-cli skills sync --preset "Web Dev"

# Only sync to a single agent (useful when one agent's directory got out of sync)
skills-manager-cli skills sync --tool claude_code

Adopt skills installed elsewhere

When skills already live in an agent's directory (e.g. installed via npx skills add or manual git clone) but aren't in the central library, pull them in:

# Dry-run scan first — lists candidates without writing
skills-manager-cli skills adopt ~/.claude/skills --dry-run

# Adopt everything found — each becomes source_type=local (can't auto-update from git)
skills-manager-cli skills adopt ~/.claude/skills

# Adopt a single skill and pin it to a git source so `update` works later
skills-manager-cli skills adopt ~/.claude/skills/react-best-practices \
  --git-url https://github.com/vercel-labs/agent-skills/tree/main/react-best-practices

# Or pass --git-subpath explicitly when the URL is just the repo root
skills-manager-cli skills adopt ~/.claude/skills/react-best-practices \
  --git-url https://github.com/vercel-labs/agent-skills \
  --git-subpath react-best-practices

# Skill lives at the repo root? Pass an empty subpath
skills-manager-cli skills adopt ~/.claude/skills/my-skill \
  --git-url https://github.com/me/my-skill --git-subpath ""

adopt auto-excludes anything already in the DB or already a sync target, so it's safe to re-run. --git-url requires either a URL with a subpath (/tree/branch/path) or an explicit --git-subpath — without that, future update would re-clone the wrong directory, so the CLI refuses to guess.

Tag

skills-manager-cli skills tag add <skill> web frontend
skills-manager-cli skills tag remove <skill> frontend
skills-manager-cli skills tag set <skill> web frontend
skills-manager-cli skills tag rename frontend web
skills-manager-cli skills tag delete obsolete --dry-run
skills-manager-cli skills tag delete obsolete --yes
skills-manager-cli skills tag list <skill>   # tags on one skill
skills-manager-cli skills tag list           # all distinct tags

Useful organization queries:

skills-manager-cli --json skills list --untagged
skills-manager-cli --json skills list --no-preset
skills-manager-cli --json skills list --tag frontend
skills-manager-cli --json skills list --preset "Web Dev"
skills-manager-cli --json skills list --deployed-to codex

Presets

skills-manager-cli presets list
skills-manager-cli presets current
skills-manager-cli presets show "Web Dev"
skills-manager-cli presets create "Web Dev" --description "Frontend work"
skills-manager-cli presets update "Web Dev" --name "Frontend"
skills-manager-cli presets delete "Old" --dry-run
skills-manager-cli presets delete "Old" --yes

skills-manager-cli presets add-skill <preset> <skill>...
skills-manager-cli presets remove-skill <preset> <skill>...

skills-manager-cli presets deploy <preset>                  # all enabled coding agents
skills-manager-cli presets deploy <preset> --agent codex
skills-manager-cli presets undeploy <preset> --agent claude_code
skills-manager-cli presets undeploy <preset>                # every agent with target rows for this preset
skills-manager-cli --json presets status <preset>

deploy/undeploy are additive and match the app's Preset pills. Explicit presets apply/deactivate commands remain for the legacy exclusive active-preset model; do not use them for normal "turn this preset on/off" requests.

The no---agent defaults intentionally differ: deploy targets all installed, enabled coding agents; undeploy discovers the preset's actual target rows and removes them even when an agent is now disabled, uninstalled, or no longer registered. Use the no-agent undeploy for "turn this preset off everywhere."

Preset create/update/delete and add-skill/remove-skill are organization-only CLI operations. They never deploy or undeploy agent files implicitly.

Health check

When sync misbehaves or a command errors in a confusing way:

skills-manager-cli --json repo status   # base dir, skill / preset counts, active preset
skills-manager-cli --json agents list  # detected agents and their target paths
skills-manager-cli agents enable codex
skills-manager-cli agents disable claude_code

repo status and agents list are read-only and are the first checks for "why isn't this skill showing up in Cursor" questions. agents disable is a real mutation: it removes every managed deployment for that agent. agents enable makes the agent globally available again and re-syncs the legacy active preset, if one exists; use explicit skill or preset deployment afterward when the requested state is additive.

Use agents disable <agent> when the user wants the whole Agent integration turned off or wants every managed skill removed from it. If they only want one skill or preset removed while keeping the Agent available for future deployments, use skills undeploy or presets undeploy instead.

Typical workflows

"Find me a skill for X" / "Install a skill that does X"

1. skills search "X" --limit 5 — show the top 1–3 hits with install counts and source.
2. If a clear winner: skills install <install_ref>.
3. If ambiguous: ask the user to pick.
4. Deploy it to the agent(s) the user requested with skills deploy.
5. skills status <name> to confirm the library and deployment state.

"What skills do I have?"

skills-manager-cli --json skills list

The preset_ids, presets, deployed_to, tags, and source_type fields are usually the most informative. The legacy enabled field is not deployment state.

"Pull in the skills already installed in my agent directories"

1. skills adopt ~/.claude/skills --dry-run (and any other agent dirs the user mentions) — show the candidate list.
2. After user confirms: skills adopt ~/.claude/skills.
3. For any adopted skill where the user knows the original repo, follow up with skills adopt ... --git-url ... --git-subpath ... to restore the update link.

"Update everything"

skills-manager-cli skills check --all     # see what has upstream changes
skills-manager-cli skills update --all    # apply

Report which skills actually refreshed (refreshed: true in the JSON) vs which were already up-to-date.

Pitfalls

• Install succeeded but skill doesn't appear in the agent → install defaults to library-only. Use skills deploy <skill> --agent <key>.
• Preset membership changed but agent files did not → membership is organization only. Follow with presets deploy or skills deploy when the user also asked to make it visible.
• No active preset only affects legacy skills sync / presets apply; additive deploy commands do not require one.
• Adopted skills can't be updated from git → npx skills add and manual git clone don't leave source metadata, so adopt has to treat them as local. Fix per-skill with adopt ... --git-url ... --git-subpath ..., or just skills remove + skills install <git-ref> to start clean with a real source.
• Use --dry-run before bulk remove, tag delete, preset delete, deploy, or undeploy operations. Use check before update.