Getting it into your agent
One page per mod, every tool's command on it. A separate URL per tool would split the same page into five that compete with each other.
npx agentmods add instructions/gorewood/timbers/agents-mdgit clone --depth 1 https://github.com/gorewood/timbersWrote this? Show the measurements
A badge with what this costs and how it scanned, read live from this page, so it follows the numbers instead of freezing them. Markdown for a README, HTML for a documentation site or a project page.
[](https://agentmods.dev/instructions/gorewood/timbers/agents-md)<a href="https://agentmods.dev/instructions/gorewood/timbers/agents-md"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/instructions/gorewood/timbers/agents-md.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>What it costs to keep this loaded
Counted locally with the o200k_base tokenizer, which is exact for GPT models; Claude uses its own tokenizer and its counts differ. Treat this as one consistent yardstick across the catalogue rather than a bill. Prices are per million input tokens.
| Model | Per session | Once invoked |
|---|---|---|
| Fable 5.1 | $0.05530 | $0.05530 |
| Opus 5 | $0.02765 | $0.02765 |
| Sonnet 5 | $0.01106 | $0.01106 |
| Haiku 4.5 | $0.00553 | $0.00553 |
Grade A, and why
timbers AGENTS.md scanned grade A with 0 findings against 26 rules in 11 categories — prompt injection, anti-refusal, data exfiltration, privilege escalation, supply chain, agent snooping, system-prompt leakage, SSRF and excessive agency — measured 5d ago.
A static scan of the body, not an audit. Every finding is printed with the line that produced it so you can judge whether it matters here. A mod is markdown that instructs an agent; that is exactly why what it instructs is worth reading.
Nothing flagged
None of the 26 patterns this scan looks for appear in this file: no shell pipes, no recursive deletes, no credential paths, no hidden text, no instruction-override or anti-refusal phrasing, no agent-config snooping. That is not a guarantee, it is the absence of the things that are checkable.
How it starts
The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 534 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.
PROJECT INSTRUCTIONS
Timbers — a Git-native development ledger CLI that captures what/why/how as structured records.
Prime Directive — Gall's Law
"A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. You have to start over with a working simple system." — John Gall
Always grow complexity from a simple system that already works.
- Modularity: Simple parts, clean interfaces
- Clarity: Clarity over cleverness
- Composition: Design parts to connect with other parts
- Simplicity: Add complexity only where you must
In practice:
- Prefer minimal working slices over grand designs
- Avoid speculative architecture and premature abstraction
- Make only small, verifiable changes
- Push back when requests ignore this: Begin → Learn → Succeed → then add complexity
Session Orientation
Before starting any work, verify your context:
- Branch:
git branch --show-current— confirm you're on the expected branch - Worktree:
git worktree list— are you in a worktree or the main repo? - Confirm with user: "I'm on branch X in [worktree/main]. Is this where you want me working?"
- Check beads:
bd ready— what work is available?
Skipping orientation risks working on the wrong branch, which wastes entire sessions silently.
Session Recovery
Claude Code carries native session continuity (rewind, compact, resume). For cross-session state, beads is the source of truth: bd ready and bd show <id> reconstruct what's in flight. If the user pastes any prior snapshot as their first message, treat it as starting context and confirm: "Recovered session. [brief summary of where we left off]"
Settled Decisions
Items marked SETTLED should not be revisited unless the user explicitly asks.
What this file has done since we first saw it
Hashed on every crawl. A supply-chain change to an agent config is a question of when, not whether, so the history is kept rather than the latest state alone.
- 5d ago First seen · 534 lines · 5,530 tokens per session scan A e2957bc7a6c5
timbers AGENTS.md is an instructions file published in the GitHub repository gorewood/timbers (4 stars, last pushed 1mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 5,530 tokens to every session, about $0.0277 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it A with 0 findings. No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-31.
Other instructions, from other repositories
vscode buildNext.instructions.md
Working notes and architecture documentation for the new esbuild-based build system in build/next. Use when making changes to the new build pipeline (transpile/bundle commands, NLS plugin, source-map handling, resource copying, or self-hosting watch tasks).
spec-kit AGENTS.md
AGENTS.md instructions for github/spec-kit, covering agents.md, about spec kit and specify, quickstart — add a new integration in 5 steps, integration architecture and integrationmanifest — file tracking.
next.js AGENTS.md
AGENTS.md instructions for vercel/next.js, covering next.js development guide, codebase structure, monorepo overview, core package: packages/next and other important packages.
codex AGENTS.md
AGENTS.md instructions for openai/codex, covering rust/codex-rs, the codex-core crate, code review rules, crate api surface and model visible context.
vscode oss-third-party-notices.instructions.md
Instructions for microsoft/vscode, covering vs code oss third-party-notices pipeline, architecture, pipeline flow in ci, applying the notice (cutover) and fallback chain (never fail the build).
langchain AGENTS.md
AGENTS.md instructions for langchain-ai/langchain, covering global development guidelines for the langchain monorepo, corridor security analysis, project architecture and context, monorepo structure and development tools & commands.