What is readme-first-builder?

A one-time project setup for README First, a way to keep a project's instructions, decisions, and change notes in files that agents can read.

Starting or upgrading a repository with AGENTS.md, README.md, and an .ai folder for project rules, changes, and decisions.

It gives coding agents a shared project context and records why changes were made.

readme-first-builder — Skill for Codex by endearqb/endearqb-skills

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 endearqb/endearqb-skills --skill readme-first-builder

Clone the repo

git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/endearqb/endearqb-skills

Made for: Codex.

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.

README.md

[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder)

Your own site

<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder/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.

Your own site · 80×15

<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/endearqb/endearqb-skills/readme-first-builder.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>

Per session 93 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.

When invoked 623 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.

Model	Per session	Once invoked
Fable 5.1	$0.00093	$0.00623
Opus 5.5	$0.00037	$0.00249
Sonnet 5.5	$0.00019	$0.00125
Haiku 4.5	$0.00009	$0.00062

Measured 2mo ago against content hash bf2387c3fd96, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-10-07, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

readme-first-builder 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 2mo 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/readme-first-builder/SKILL.md · 42 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 42 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

README First Builder

Purpose

Use this skill as a one-time initializer or upgrader for a project-level README First architecture. Do not use it as the default way to write every README after a project already has AGENTS.md; once initialized, the target project's own AGENTS.md becomes the operating protocol.

Canonical Source

Read references/readmefirst-source.md for the upstream repository and file roles. The canonical project is endearqb/ReadmeFirst:

README.md: principle and architecture explanation.
AGENTS.md: executable agent protocol.

When network access is available, inspect the latest upstream files before initializing. If network is unavailable, explain that the initialization is based on the locally known structure and recommend a later sync.

Initialization Workflow

Inspect the target project root and confirm whether AGENTS.md, README.md, and .ai/ already exist.
If AGENTS.md is missing, create it from the upstream ReadmeFirst AGENTS.md content, then adapt only project-specific placeholders if necessary.
If AGENTS.md already exists, merge the README First protocol into it without overwriting local rules. Keep stricter or project-specific local rules.
Ensure the root README.md acts as the project map: purpose, setup, commands, top-level directory responsibilities, and links to important directory READMEs.
Create .ai/changes/ and .ai/decisions/ if missing. Add lightweight starter templates only when useful.
Add or update directory-level README.md files only for key long-lived directories. Do not cover generated, dependency, cache, build, log, or temporary directories.
Record the initialization in .ai/changes/YYYY-MM-DD.md.
Verify paths and commands mentioned in the generated docs.

Existing File Rules

Never overwrite an existing AGENTS.md or README.md blindly.
Treat existing project rules as local authority unless they conflict with safety or the user's explicit request.
Preserve user-authored prose and append or merge README First sections.
If the upstream AGENTS.md conflicts with existing project instructions, report the conflict and choose the least destructive merge.

Read the full file on GitHub · 42 lines

Files

What ships with it

2 files 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.

2mo ago First seen · 42 lines · 93 tokens per session scan A bf2387c3fd96

Subscribe to this mod's changes

readme-first-builder is a skill published in the GitHub repository endearqb/endearqb-skills (19 stars, last pushed 2mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 93 tokens to every session and 623 once invoked, about $0.0004 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.

Planning Writing and docs ai automation codex developer-tools skills

readme-first-builder next to 6 skills from other repositories
Mod	Type	Stars	Last push	Licence	Scan	Tokens	Works with
readme-first-builderendearqb/endearqb-skills	Skill	19	2mo ago	MIT	A	93	Codex
claude-md-improveranthropics/claude-plugins-official	Skill	46k	today	Apache-2.0	A	82	Claude Code
agent-platform-model-registrygoogle/skills	Skill	23k	today	Apache-2.0	A	60	Claude Code, Codex
gke-reliabilitygoogle/skills	Skill	23k	today	Apache-2.0	A	85	Claude Code, Codex
gke-workload-securitygoogle/skills	Skill	23k	today	Apache-2.0	A	171	Claude Code, Codex
google-cloud-solution-agentic-analytics-spark-knowledge-cataloggoogle/skills	Skill	23k	today	Apache-2.0	A	132	Claude Code, Codex
glance-canonical-layoutsandroid/skills	Skill	10k	2d ago	Apache-2.0	A	56	Claude Code