What is evolve-install?

A setup workflow for installing, checking, or refreshing the claude-evolve plugin and its Python environment and MCP server.

It is for installing the plugin locally or globally, forcing a fresh setup, or verifying an existing installation.

It verifies dependencies and environment setup so the plugin can be used without an incomplete installation.

evolve-install — Skill for Claude Code by samuelzxu/claude-evolve

Install

Getting it into your agent

This one installs as part of its plugin. Adding the marketplace and installing the plugin brings it with everything else the plugin ships.

Claude Code

/plugin marketplace add samuelzxu/claude-evolve

Claude Code

/plugin install claude-evolve

Made for: Claude Code.

Or install claude-evolve, the plugin that ships this one along with the rest of its 4 skills, 1 MCP server.

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/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install/github.svg)](https://agentmods.dev/skills/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install)

Your own site

<a href="https://agentmods.dev/skills/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install/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/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install"><img src="https://agentmods.dev/badge/skills/samuelzxu/claude-evolve/evolve-install.svg" alt="Reviewed on agentmods" width="80" height="20"></a>

Per session 26 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.

When invoked 2,678 The whole file, excluding the scripts and references it only reads on demand.

Security scan B 2 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	$0.00026	$0.02678
Opus 5.5	$0.00010	$0.01071
Sonnet 5.5	$0.00005	$0.00536
Haiku 4.5	$0.00003	$0.00268

Measured 2mo ago against content hash 06c7ee544190, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-10-07, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade B, and why

evolve-install scanned grade B with 2 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.

Reads agent configuration directoriesmediumAgent snooping

.claude/, .codex/, .gemini/ hold keys, settings and other credentials a mod has no legitimate need for.

1. Read the current `statusLine.command` from `~/.claude/settings.json` (or `$CLAUDE_CONFIG_DIR/settings.json`).

Runs shell commandslowCapability

Expected in a hook, worth knowing in a rule or an instructions file.

Run the probe by inlining a short Python script that drives the MCP handshake. Use `Popen` + a deadline reader — do **not** use `subprocess.run(input=...)`, because closing stdin triggers FastMCP shutdown before the `too

skills/evolve-install/SKILL.md · 299 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 299 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

claude-evolve Install

This is the setup command for claude-evolve. Run it once after installing the plugin to verify Python dependencies, create a virtual environment if needed, and confirm the MCP server is registered.

When this skill is invoked, immediately execute the workflow below. Do not only restate or summarize these instructions back to the user.

Flag Parsing

Check for flags in the user's invocation:

--help → Show Help Text (below) and stop
--force → Skip Pre-Setup Check, run full setup from scratch
--verify → Only run the verification phase (Phase 4), skip install/env setup
--local → Install into a project-local .venv
--global → Use the system Python (no venv)
No flags → Auto-detect and run full setup if needed

Help Text

When user runs with --help, display this and stop:

claude-evolve Install - Set up evolutionary code discovery plugin

USAGE:
  /evolve-install              Install or verify (auto-detect)
  /evolve-install --local      Install into a project-local .venv
  /evolve-install --global     Use system Python (no venv)
  /evolve-install --verify     Only verify existing install
  /evolve-install --force      Force full reinstall
  /evolve-install --help       Show this help

PHASES:
  1. Python check       Verify Python >= 3.10 is available
  2. Environment setup  Create venv (if --local or auto) and install claude-evolve
  3. Claude CLI check   Verify `claude` is on PATH and authenticated
  4. MCP verification   Confirm claude-evolve MCP server registers and exposes tools
  5. Smoke test         Run a trivial claude call to confirm the bridge works

NEXT STEPS:
  After install completes, run `/evolve-interview` to define your first
  evolution task, or `/evolve` if you already have initial.py + evaluate.py.

Pre-Setup Check: Already Installed?

Before doing anything else, check if the plugin is already installed and working. Read the state file:

CLAUDE_EVOLVE_STATE="${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT:-.}/state/install-state.json"

Read the full file on GitHub · 299 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.

2mo ago First seen · 299 lines · 26 tokens per session scan B 06c7ee544190

Subscribe to this mod's changes

evolve-install is a skill published in the GitHub repository samuelzxu/claude-evolve (17 stars, last pushed 4mo ago), licensed MIT. It adds 26 tokens to every session and 2,678 once invoked, about $0.0001 per session on Opus 5.5. A static security scan graded it B with 2 findings (reads agent configuration directories, runs shell commands). No closer match exists in the catalogue, so it is treated as the original; first seen 2026-09-01.

Building agents DevOps and cloud

evolve-install next to 6 skills from other repositories
Mod	Type	Stars	Last push	Licence	Scan	Tokens	Works with
evolve-installsamuelzxu/claude-evolve	Skill	17	4mo ago	MIT	B	26	Claude Code
imagegenopenai/codex	Skill	133k	yesterday	Apache-2.0	A	113	Codex
playwright-climicrosoft/playwright	Skill	99k	yesterday	Apache-2.0	A	19	Claude Code
local-ai-agentsmicrosoft/ai-agents-for-beginners	Skill	79k	4d ago	MIT	A	200	Claude Code, Codex
systematic-debuggingobra/superpowers	Skill	313k	3d ago	MIT	A	21	Claude Code
next-cache-components-adoptionvercel/next.js	Skill	143k	yesterday	MIT	A	95	Claude Code
next-partial-prefetching-adoptionvercel/next.js	Skill	143k	yesterday	MIT	A	103	Claude Code

evolve-install