writing-documents

writing-documents is a skill for Claude Code, Codex from Avinava/document-design-system. It costs 164 tokens per session (2,426 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A guide for creating self-contained SVG diagrams that explain system layouts, flows, sequences, state changes, data models, timelines, and comparisons.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it to design architecture maps, process flows, sequence diagrams, state machines, database models, timelines, layer stacks, and system comparisons.
Why use it?
It helps decide when a diagram clarifies relationships better than prose and keeps diagrams focused on the information that matters.

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 document-design-system plugin — 6 skills, 18 commands 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/avinava/document-design-system/writing-documents
Any agent
npx skills add Avinava/document-design-system --skill writing-documents
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/Avinava/document-design-system

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Or install document-design-system, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 6 skills, 18 commands.

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 writing-documents

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/avinava/document-design-system/writing-documents.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/avinava/document-design-system/writing-documents)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/avinava/document-design-system/writing-documents"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/avinava/document-design-system/writing-documents.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 164 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 2,426 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 $0.00164 $0.02426
Opus 5 $0.00082 $0.01213
Sonnet 5 $0.00033 $0.00485
Haiku 4.5 $0.00016 $0.00243

Measured 3d ago against content hash 942bdc3022cf, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

writing-documents 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 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.

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/writing-documents/SKILL.md · 180 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 180 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Writing Documents

A technical document exists to get a reader to a decision, or to a working understanding, without them having to reconstruct the author's thinking.

The failure mode is not ugliness. It is a document that is complete, accurate, and unreadable — where the reader cannot find the decision, cannot tell what is settled versus proposed, and cannot see what changed since they last read it.

This skill is two layers. Do not glue them together.

  1. Writing (default) — pick the type, load its shape, write from evidence. Output is Markdown in the user's tree.
  2. Design system (opt-in) — tokens, themes, print, self-contained HTML. Load core/ only when the user asked for HTML, PDF, print, a designed page, or "use the design system".

Format first

format = markdown, unless the user asked for html, pdf, print, designed, themed, or "use the design system".

Format Load Do not load
markdown this file, the type file, references/writing.md, references/evidence.md core/, themes, templates/longform.html, print.css, build_document.py
html / pdf the above plus references/output.md and core/
both Markdown first (canonical in-repo), then HTML from that source

Full dial, conventional paths, and HTML assembly: references/output.md.

On the Markdown path, leave Mermaid as fenced blocks. Prerender to themed SVG only on the HTML path.

State the assumption in one line. Do not quiz.

Writing docs/adr/adr-014.md as type adr (markdown). Designed HTML on request.

Ask only when the slug is actually ambiguous, the request conflicts with another skill, or they asked for HTML and no theme is set (field-notes is the default).

Never offer a designed HTML version unprompted.

Pick the type

Load references/type-index.md if the slug is unclear. Then load one references/type-<slug>.md before writing.

Slug Reader's question Shape
design-doc Should we do this, and is the approach sound? Context → Problem → Goals / non-goals → Design → Alternatives → Cross-cutting → Risks → Rollout → Open questions
adr Why is it like this? Status → Context → Decision → Consequences. One decision, immutable once accepted
spec What exactly must I build, and how do I know I am done? Scope → Definitions → Normative requirements → Examples → Compliance
api-contract How do I call this correctly, and what happens when I do it wrong? Companion to OAS/RAML, not a second copy of the spec
architecture How is it arranged today? Living current-state (C4 context/container), not a change proposal
handoff What do I run, change, and not break after you leave? Status, how to run, in-flight work, tripwires
design-handoff What do I build, in every state? Screens, states, components, acceptance criteria
discovery What did we learn, and should we proceed? Evidence, opportunities, go / stop / reframe
test-report Can we ship, on this build? Verdict first; counts with denominators
postmortem What happened, why, and what stops it recurring? Summary → Impact → Timeline → Root cause → Action items. Blameless
proposal Should I approve this? The ask → Rationale → Cost → Alternatives → Decision needed
runbook What do I do right now? Preconditions → Steps → Verification → Rollback → Escalation
onboarding How do I get it running and prove it works? Prerequisites, commands from CI, one validation
tutorial Can I learn this by doing it once? Diátaxis lesson — one successful path
how-to How do I get this job done? Diátaxis recipe for a competent user
reference What is the exact fact? Diátaxis lookup — mirrors the product
explanation Why is it like this? Diátaxis study — context, not a procedure
mulesoft What does this Mule app do? Suite: README, architecture, and conditional extras

Read the full file on GitHub · 180 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. 3d ago First seen · 180 lines · 164 tokens per session scan A 942bdc3022cf

Subscribe to this mod's changes

writing-documents is a skill published in the GitHub repository Avinava/document-design-system (2 stars, last pushed 8d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 164 tokens to every session and 2,426 once invoked, about $0.0008 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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