Visual Studio Code is a code editor that supports editing, navigating, understanding, debugging, and extending software projects. Developers use it for the edit-build-debug cycle, and the catalogue add-ons provide skills, instructions, and agents for working within the editor.
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 microsoft/vscode --skill initgit clone --depth 1 https://github.com/microsoft/vscodeWrote 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/microsoft/vscode/init)<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/microsoft/vscode/init"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/microsoft/vscode/init.svg" alt="Measured on agentmods" height="20"></a>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 | $0.00012 | $0.00820 |
| Opus 5 | $0.00006 | $0.00410 |
| Sonnet 5 | $0.00002 | $0.00164 |
| Haiku 4.5 | $0.00001 | $0.00082 |
Grade A, and why
init 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.
What it actually says
The purpose of this command is to create or update chat customization files
- the agent instructions file (
.github/copilot-instructions.mdorAGENTS.md) to help AI coding agents understand the codebase and be immediately productive - skills and custom agents to automate common tasks or enforce conventions in the codebase
The user can optionally call this command with an argument. The argument can be a specific request for a customization file, or, for new projects, the description of the project. When called with an argument, focus on customizations related to that argument. Only create or modify chat customization files. Never start working on a task in the argument.
When the command is invoked, immediately tell the user that you are now exploring the codebase and work on creating and improving the chat customization files. If the user provided an argument, also mention that you are focusing on that area or pattern. Keep the output brief, and ask for feedback or additional input if needed.
Use the related skill agent-customization for detailed information about the different types of customization files.
Explore the codebase to get a good understanding of the project and its conventions, and then create or update the relevant chat customization files to help AI coding agents be productive in this codebase.
When complete, print a table of the added or modified chat customization files, along with a short explanation why this file is useful to the AI coding agents.
Workflow
-
Discover existing conventions Search:
**/{.github/copilot-instructions.md,AGENT.md,AGENTS.md,CLAUDE.md,.cursorrules,.windsurfrules,.clinerules,.cursor/rules/**,.windsurf/rules/**,.clinerules/**,README.md} -
Explore the codebase via subagent, 1-3 in parallel if needed Find essential knowledge that helps an AI agent be immediately productive:
- Build/test commands (agents run these automatically)
- Architecture decisions and component boundaries
- Project-specific conventions that differ from common practices
- Potential pitfalls or common development environment issues
- Key files/directories that exemplify patterns
Also inventory existing documentation (
docs/**/*.md,CONTRIBUTING.md,ARCHITECTURE.md, etc.) to identify topics that should be linked, not duplicated. -
Generate or merge
- New file: Prefer AGENTS.md over
.github/copilot-instructions.md. If the user already has one of these files, update it instead of creating a new one. - Existing file: Preserve valuable content, update outdated sections, remove duplication
- Follow the guidelines in the
agent-customizationskill:- Link, don't embed principle. Do not copy existing documentation that exists in the workspace, link to them with a Markdown link instead.
- Minimal by default: Only what's relevant and cannot be easily discovered by an agent should be included. Link to other documentation for details.
- Concise and actionable: Every line should guide behavior
- New file: Prefer AGENTS.md over
-
Iterate
- Ask for feedback on unclear or incomplete sections
- If the workspace is complex, suggest creating separate instructions files or skills for specific areas (e.g., frontend, backend, tests)
Once finalized, propose related agent-customizations to create next (/create-(agent|hook|instruction|prompt|skill) …), explaining the customization and how it would be used in practice.
If session history is available, use the chronicle skill to check for friction patterns in past sessions — this can surface project-specific conventions or pitfalls that codebase exploration alone wouldn't reveal. Mention /chronicle improve to the user as a way to iteratively refine instructions over time.
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.
- 3d ago First seen · 51 lines · 12 tokens per session scan A 9c40db1c3fec
init is a skill published in the GitHub repository microsoft/vscode (190,932 stars, last pushed today), licensed MIT. It adds 12 tokens to every session and 820 once invoked, about $0.0001 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 2026-09-03.
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cyrene-plugin-dev
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cyrene-work-hygiene
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cyrene-obsidian-workspace
A set of rules for an agent working with an Obsidian vault, a folder of linked Markdown notes. It defines where materials, notes, exercises, templates, and progress files belong and how they may be edited.
cyrene-learn-tutor
A Chinese-language tutoring process for helping users understand study materials, practise concepts, and track learning progress.
cyrene-original-voice
A writing-style calibration that changes responses to match the voice of the character 昔涟 when certain conversation situations are detected. It supplies tone rules and example responses.