Ponytail is a set of instructions and extensions that guides AI coding agents toward smaller, simpler code changes while retaining safety checks. It is intended for developers using agents such as Claude Code, and the catalogue entries are its skills, instructions, plugin, and rule.
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 skills add DietrichGebert/ponytail --skill ponytail-helpgit clone --depth 1 https://github.com/DietrichGebert/ponytailWrote 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/skills/dietrichgebert/ponytail/ponytail-help)<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/dietrichgebert/ponytail/ponytail-help"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/dietrichgebert/ponytail/ponytail-help/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.
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/dietrichgebert/ponytail/ponytail-help"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/dietrichgebert/ponytail/ponytail-help.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>- Socket pass
- Snyk pass
- NVIDIA SkillSpector pass
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 | $0.00022 | $0.00828 |
| Opus 5.5 | $0.00009 | $0.00331 |
| Sonnet 5.5 | $0.00004 | $0.00166 |
| Haiku 4.5 | $0.00002 | $0.00083 |
Grade A, and why
ponytail-help 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 7d 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.
Copies of this mod
8 near-identical copies found in the catalogue:
- ponytail-help — 100% identical, 26 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 33 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 32 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 33 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 27 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 33 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 33 lines differ
- ponytail-help — 91% identical, 33 lines differ
How it starts
The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 77 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.
Ponytail Help
Display this reference card when invoked. One-shot, do NOT change mode, write flag files, or persist anything.
Levels
| Level | Trigger | What change |
|---|---|---|
| Lite | /ponytail lite |
Build what was asked, name the smaller option in one line. |
| Full | /ponytail |
The smallest complete change, a check where the logic needs one, and a reply that names what was skipped and any risk. Default. |
| Ultra | /ponytail ultra |
Also questions the request and pushes back before building. |
Level sticks until changed or session end.
Skills
| Skill | Trigger | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| ponytail | /ponytail |
Lazy mode itself: least new code, clear replies that name skipped work and risks. |
| ponytail-review | /ponytail-review |
Quality review of a diff: bugs, security, load, missing tests, speed, what to cut. Each finding says what goes wrong and how to fix it. |
| ponytail-audit | /ponytail-audit |
The same quality review for the whole repo, ranked. |
| ponytail-debt | /ponytail-debt |
Harvest shortcut: comments into a tracked ledger. |
| ponytail-gain | /ponytail-gain |
Measured-impact scoreboard: less code, less cost, more speed. |
| ponytail-help | /ponytail-help |
This card. |
In Codex CLI and the IDE extension, invoke skills with $ponytail:ponytail,
$ponytail:ponytail-review, or $ponytail:ponytail-help. Claude Code and OpenCode use the
slash-command forms above (OpenCode ships all six as slash commands).
Deactivate
Say "stop ponytail" or "normal mode". Resume anytime with /ponytail.
/ponytail off also works.
Band (Claude Code)
/ponytail band hides the band above the prompt, the same command brings it back.
/ponytail band on and /ponytail band off set it directly. The level stays.
/ponytail band import adds your past Claude Code sessions (cost, agent time, tokens) to the board.
Configure Default Mode
Default mode = full, auto-active every session. Change it:
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.
- 7d ago Changed · +6 lines 3a267f1c7105
- 15d ago Changed a40197337100
- 18d ago Changed c7beea20eb76
- 20d ago Changed fbafefaed072
- 1mo ago First seen · 71 lines · 22 tokens per session scan A be2bab79e073
ponytail-help is a skill published in the GitHub repository DietrichGebert/ponytail (174,793 stars, last pushed 6d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 22 tokens to every session and 828 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5.5. 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 2026-08-30.
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