readme-maintenance

A rule for keeping README files—the main documentation files in a software project—up to date when the project changes significantly.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to decide when to update README sections covering endpoints, interfaces, services, dependencies, configuration, exports, builds, and tests.
Why use it?
It reduces the gap between the code and its documentation after API, architecture, feature, package, or testing changes.

Cursor rule

Install

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.

agentmods
npx agentmods add rules/charlee-x/effect-cursor-rules/readme-maintenance
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/CharLEE-X/effect-cursor-rules
Per session 0 Nothing until a file matches its globs; then the whole rule loads.
When invoked 1,222 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. Scan, not verified.
Origin original No closer match found in the catalogue.
Token cost

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.

ModelPer sessionOnce invoked
Fable 5 $0.00000 $0.01222
Opus 5 $0.00000 $0.00611
Sonnet 5 $0.00000 $0.00244
Haiku 4.5 $0.00000 $0.00122

Measured 2d ago against content hash 159858e084c1, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

readme-maintenance 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 2d 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.

rules/readme-maintenance.mdc · 181 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 181 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

README Maintenance Rule

AI Assistant Authority

As the AI assistant, I have the authority and responsibility to automatically update README files when I detect significant changes to package content that would make the documentation outdated or incomplete.

When to Update README Files

Automatic Updates Should Occur When:

  1. New API Endpoints Added

    • New lambda handlers in blog-api
    • New client methods in blog-api-client
    • New public interfaces or services
  2. API Changes

    • Method signatures changed
    • New parameters added or removed
    • Response types modified
    • Error handling patterns updated
  3. Architecture Changes

    • New stores, services, or usecases added
    • Directory structure changes
    • New dependencies or integrations
    • Technology stack updates
  4. Feature Additions

    • New functionality or capabilities
    • New data models or schemas
    • New configuration options
    • New environment variables
  5. Package Structure Changes

    • New exports in index.ts
    • New modules or sub-packages
    • Build or deployment changes
    • Testing strategy updates

README Update Guidelines

For blog-api Package

Sections to Maintain:

  • API Endpoints: Keep endpoint list current with actual handlers
  • Data Models: Update when BlogPost/BlogPostProfile schemas change
  • Environment Variables: Sync with config.ts changes
  • Technology Stack: Update when new dependencies added
  • Architecture Overview: Reflect actual directory structure

Update Triggers:

  • New lambda handler added → Update API Endpoints section
  • New store/service created → Update Architecture Overview
  • New environment variable in config.ts → Update Environment Variables
  • New integration added → Update Key Integrations section

For blog-api-client Package

Sections to Maintain:

  • API Reference: Keep method examples current with actual client
  • Data Models: Sync with domain types and response formats
  • AI Tool Integration: Update when toolkit changes
  • Configuration: Reflect actual config options
  • Error Handling: Update when new error types added

Read the full file on GitHub · 181 lines

Changes

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.

  1. 2d ago First seen · 181 lines · 0 tokens per session scan A 159858e084c1

Subscribe to this mod's changes

readme-maintenance is a cursor rule published in the GitHub repository CharLEE-X/effect-cursor-rules (6 stars, last pushed 1y ago), licensed MIT. It costs nothing until one of its globs matches a file; then it loads 1,222 tokens. 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.