exploratory-testing

exploratory-testing is a skill for Claude Code, Codex from mattwynne/yaks. It costs 37 tokens per session (1,726 once invoked), scanned A, original, MIT.

A hands-on testing method in which an agent explores a working command-line feature like a curious, methodical user. It tries normal cases, edge cases, errors, and output variations that automated tests may miss.

In plain words
What is it for?
Use it after adding a feature, fixing a bug, or preparing a release. The work begins with a focused target and testing charter, such as checking a command or complete workflow.
Why use it?
It helps find bugs, usability problems, and surprising behaviour after implementation or before release. It is not a replacement for repeatable automated test coverage.

Skill for Claude CodeCodex

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/mattwynne/yaks/exploratory-testing
Any agent
npx skills add mattwynne/yaks --skill exploratory-testing
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/mattwynne/yaks

Made for: Claude Code, 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.

agentmods badge for exploratory-testing

README.md
[![agentmods](https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/mattwynne/yaks/exploratory-testing.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/mattwynne/yaks/exploratory-testing)
Your own site
<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/mattwynne/yaks/exploratory-testing"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/mattwynne/yaks/exploratory-testing.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>
Per session 37 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,726 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 $0.00037 $0.01726
Opus 5 $0.00018 $0.00863
Sonnet 5 $0.00007 $0.00345
Haiku 4.5 $0.00004 $0.00173

Measured 5d ago against content hash f7923599ead2, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

exploratory-testing 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 5d 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/exploratory-testing/SKILL.md · 210 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 210 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Exploratory Testing

Overview

Exploratory testing discovers what automated tests miss. The agent acts as a curious, methodical user - running yx commands in a sandbox, observing output, trying edge cases, and logging findings. Each session is guided by a charter that focuses exploration on a specific area with specific heuristics.

When to Use

  • After implementing a new feature or fixing a bug
  • Before a release, to shake out edge cases
  • When a command's behaviour feels under-tested
  • When you want to stress-test error handling or output formatting
  • Periodically, to discover regressions or UX papercuts

Don't use when:

  • You need deterministic, repeatable test coverage (write Cucumber scenarios)
  • The area has no working implementation yet

Phase 1: Charter

Agree on a Target

The user provides (or the agent suggests) a target area to explore. Good targets are specific commands, workflows, or quality attributes:

  • "the yx add command"
  • "yak hierarchy and the --under flag"
  • "output formatting across --format options"
  • "error messages when things go wrong"
  • "a full workflow: add, organise, work, complete, prune"

Select Heuristics

Pick 2-4 heuristics from the menu below that suit the target:

Heuristic CLI Application
CRUD Add, list, show, update, remove yaks through full lifecycle
Zero, One, Many Empty state, single yak, many yaks, deep nesting
Boundary Values Long names, special chars, spaces, empty strings, unicode
Never and Always Invariants (done yaks always show done, removed yaks never listed)
Follow the Data Add -> list -> modify -> list -> verify consistency
Some, None, All Filters with matching/non-matching/all items
Starve Missing .yaks directory, non-existent directories, no permissions
Interrupt Broken pipes (yx ls | head -1), partial stdin, Ctrl-C
Configuration Tour --format options, --only filters, env vars
Claims Tour Does --help text match actual behaviour?
Sequence Variation Unusual command orders (done before add, prune with no done)
User Tour Common real-world workflows end-to-end

Read the full file on GitHub · 210 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. 5d ago First seen · 210 lines · 37 tokens per session scan A f7923599ead2

Subscribe to this mod's changes

exploratory-testing is a skill published in the GitHub repository mattwynne/yaks (58 stars, last pushed 24d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 37 tokens to every session and 1,726 once invoked, about $0.0002 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 2026-08-30.

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