testing-tiers

testing-tiers is a skill for Claude Code, Codex from arch3rPro/dsh-skills. It costs 106 tokens per session (1,129 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A method for choosing among test levels: unit tests for one module, integration tests for cooperating modules, real-entry-path tests for shipped entry points, end-to-end tests for the assembled system, and snapshot tests for visual output. It says tests should follow the real way the product runs and verify actual results.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to decide which tests a code change needs, test loaders, binaries, servers, or workers through their real entry points, and keep the test suite meaningful.
Why use it?
It reduces false confidence from tests that only check mocks or a component's own report. It helps match the test effort to the kind of change and regression involved.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

Written for Claude Code and Codex: shipped in a Claude Code plugin, but also agents/openai.yaml present.

Part of the dsh-skills plugin — 15 skills shipped together

Good fit Use it to decide which tests a code change needs, test loaders, binaries, servers, or workers through their real entry points, and keep the test suite meaningful.

Compare 6 skills from other repositories ↓
Install with agentmods
npx agentmods add skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers
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.

Any agent
npx skills add arch3rPro/dsh-skills --skill testing-tiers
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/arch3rPro/dsh-skills

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Or install dsh-skills, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 15 skills.

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 testing-tiers

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers/github.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>

Or the 80×15 button, for a site that already has a row of RSS and ATOM ones. Only the verdict fits; the numbers stay here.

agentmods 80×15 button for testing-tiers

Your own site · 80×15
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/arch3rpro/dsh-skills/testing-tiers.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>
Per session 106 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,129 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.
Security scan A 0 findings. A grade says what 26 rules found in the file — not that it is safe.
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 5.1 $0.00106 $0.01129
Opus 5 $0.00053 $0.00564
Sonnet 5 $0.00021 $0.00226
Haiku 4.5 $0.00011 $0.00113

Measured 9d ago against content hash 69de6622e8c5, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-09-09, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

testing-tiers 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 9d 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.

skills/testing/testing-tiers/SKILL.md · 64 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 64 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Testing Tiers

A decision discipline for keeping a test suite green and meaningful. A green suite that proves nothing is worse than a failing one you trust — this skill keeps the two apart. It applies to any project with tests; the tier names below generalize across frameworks (the concrete names like "vitest" or "jest" are placeholders for whatever the project uses).

The defining constraint: tests must exercise the real entry path and verify the world, not the component's self-report. A mock-heavy unit suite can be 100% green while the shipped behavior is broken — the failure mode this skill exists to prevent.

The tiers, and when each applies

Pick the shallowest tier that would actually fail for the change's regression:

Tier What it proves Applies when
Unit A function/class behaves per its contract The behavior is confined to one module
Integration Several modules cooperate A shared contract or wiring changes
Real entry path The shipped entry (loader, binary, server, worker) actually works A product-visible plugin, entrypoint, or composition changes
End-to-end The assembled system works against a real external boundary The change touches provider, network, or cross-system behavior
Snapshot External contract / presentation output stays stable Model-, protocol-, or human-visible output changes

Match evidence to the surface: focused unit tests for behavior, snapshots for model or user-visible output, real-entry-path tests for shipped entrypoints, and e2e for provider behavior. Never default to the full suite for a narrow change — run the smallest set that covers the diff, and let CI own exhaustive coverage.

Test the real entry path

A product-visible change requires a non-unit, real-composition test — boot the actual loader / binary / server / worker through its real entry point. A hand-built harness that calls the component directly proves plumbing, not that the shipped entry works. Two traps:

Read the full file on GitHub · 64 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. 9d ago First seen · 64 lines · 106 tokens per session scan A 69de6622e8c5

Subscribe to this mod's changes

testing-tiers is a skill published in the GitHub repository arch3rPro/dsh-skills (4 stars, last pushed 21d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 106 tokens to every session and 1,129 once invoked, about $0.0005 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.

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