setup

setup is a skill for Claude Code, Codex from ai-screams/Howl. It costs 53 tokens per session (635 once invoked), scanned B, original, MIT.

A setup procedure for installing and configuring the Howl statusline HUD for Claude Code. A statusline is the information line shown in a command-line interface, and a HUD is an on-screen heads-up display.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it when installing Howl, enabling the HUD, configuring the statusline, or updating the installed binary after plugin changes. It installs the binary, edits the settings file, verifies the output, and asks you to restart Claude Code.
Why use it?
It removes the manual work of downloading the Howl program, placing it in the expected folder, and updating Claude Code’s settings. It also describes checks to perform if the installed program does not run.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Installs and runs on its own, but its text points at files inside its plugin — anything it tells you to read at a ${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT} path is only there once the plugin is installed. Installing the plugin gets both.

Part of the howl plugin — 4 skills, 1 hook shipped together

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 skills/ai-screams/howl/setup
Any agent
npx skills add ai-screams/Howl --skill setup
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/ai-screams/Howl

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Or install howl, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 4 skills, 1 hook.

Wrote 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.

agentmods badge for setup

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/ai-screams/howl/setup.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/ai-screams/howl/setup)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/ai-screams/howl/setup"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/ai-screams/howl/setup.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 53 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 635 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan B 2 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 $0.00053 $0.00635
Opus 5 $0.00026 $0.00318
Sonnet 5 $0.00011 $0.00127
Haiku 4.5 $0.00005 $0.00064

Measured 3d ago against content hash 3280a513930c, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade B, and why

setup scanned grade B with 2 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 3d 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.

Reads agent configuration directoriesmediumAgent snooping

.claude/, .codex/, .gemini/ hold keys, settings and other credentials a mod has no legitimate need for.

3. Configure `~/.claude/settings.json` to use Howl as the statusline

Makes network callslowCapability

Not a fault in itself. Listed so you know the mod talks to something, and to what.

- Verify `curl` is available
skills/setup/SKILL.md · 81 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 81 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Howl Setup

Install and configure the Howl statusline HUD for Claude Code.

What This Does

  1. Download the latest Howl binary from GitHub Releases
  2. Install it to ~/.claude/hud/howl
  3. Configure ~/.claude/settings.json to use Howl as the statusline
  4. Prompt the user to restart Claude Code

Installation

Run the install script:

bash "${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/install.sh"

Verify Installation

After the script completes, verify the binary works:

echo '{}' | ~/.claude/hud/howl

The output should show a statusline with default values. If the binary is not found or fails, check:

  • ~/.claude/hud/howl exists and is executable
  • Run chmod +x ~/.claude/hud/howl if needed

Post-Install

Inform the user:

  • Binary installed to ~/.claude/hud/howl
  • Statusline configured in ~/.claude/settings.json
  • Restart Claude Code to activate the statusline

Auto-Update

Once installed, the binary keeps itself current automatically:

  • Claude Code auto-updates the plugin content (skills, scripts) from the marketplace.
  • The plugin's SessionStart hook (scripts/sync-binary.sh) then detects a plugin version change and re-downloads the matching binary in the background — so the binary never drifts from the plugin. It is a no-op (no network) when already in sync, and only updates an existing install (it never installs unprompted).

To receive updates, ensure marketplace auto-update is enabled for the Howl marketplace (third-party marketplaces are not auto-updated by default):

# Refresh the marketplace and update installed plugins
claude plugin marketplace update ai-screams-howl

To force a binary update immediately, just re-run this setup (/howl:setup) or bash "${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/install.sh".

Troubleshooting

If the install fails:

Read the full file on GitHub · 81 lines

Files

What ships with it

1 file beside SKILL.md in the same directory: the scripts, references and assets a skill reads on demand. Not counted in the per-session cost; read them before you install if any of them is executable.

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. 3d ago First seen · 81 lines · 53 tokens per session scan B 3280a513930c

Subscribe to this mod's changes

setup is a skill published in the GitHub repository ai-screams/Howl (5 stars, last pushed 1mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 53 tokens to every session and 635 once invoked, about $0.0003 per session on Opus 5. A static security scan graded it B with 2 findings (reads agent configuration directories, makes network calls). No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-08-31.

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