plugin-builder

A working guide for an agent that builds and maintains coding-agent plugins. It explains where different kinds of content belong, how to make changes, test them, package them, and prepare a pull request.

In plain words
What is it for?
It is for planning plugin changes, choosing the correct file type, checking regressions, packaging updates, and preparing code contributions.
Why use it?
It prevents rules, procedures, personal information, and templates from being placed in the wrong files.

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/spinningrachel/career-engine/plugin-builder
Any agent
npx skills add spinningrachel/career-engine --skill plugin-builder
Clone the repo
git clone --depth 1 https://github.com/spinningrachel/career-engine

Made for: Claude Code, Codex.

Per session 52 Skills are progressive disclosure: only the name and description are preloaded; the body loads when the skill is used.
When invoked 1,980 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 $0.00052 $0.01980
Opus 5 $0.00026 $0.00990
Sonnet 5 $0.00010 $0.00396
Haiku 4.5 $0.00005 $0.00198

Measured 2d ago against content hash ef5a00ff82a2, method: parsed. Prices are Anthropic first-party input rates as of 2026-08-30, from the pricing page.

Security

Grade A, and why

plugin-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 2d 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/plugin-builder/SKILL.md · 164 lines

How it starts

The opening of the file, as written. The whole thing — 164 lines — stays where its author put it; the contents beside it link to each section on GitHub.

Plugin Builder — Working Doctrine

This skill is the craft layer for plugin-builder sessions. The governing rules live in CLAUDE.md — read that first. This skill gives you the decision trees, checklists, and conventions you need to apply those rules without re-deriving them every time.


The Three Questions Before Every Change

Before touching any file, answer these three questions:

  1. What content type is this? (See content-type decision tree below.)
  2. Which file owns this content type? (See content placement rules in CLAUDE.md.)
  3. Is it personal data? If yes, it belongs in career-data, never the plugin.

If you cannot answer all three confidently, ask the user before writing.


Content-Type Decision Tree

Is it a rule about what to write, how to write it, or a writing philosophy?
  → skill file (skills/<name>/SKILL.md)

Is it a step-by-step procedure, a routing decision, or an output format spec?
  → agent file (agents/<name>.md)

Is it the user's personal data — role facts, voice profile, sent letters, .dotx?
  → career-data skill (never the plugin)

Is it a blank template with {{...}} placeholders for the user to fill at setup?
  → references/ in the plugin

Is it a slash command that invokes a skill or agent?
  → commands/ in the plugin

When something could fit two categories, the tie-break is: does it apply every time this task runs? If yes → skill. If it varies by session input → agent.


Before Writing a New Agent

A new agent needs all of the following in the same session. Do not close the session until every item is done:

  • Agent file at agents/<name>.md with frontmatter (name, description, tools)
  • Skill directory at skills/<name>/SKILL.md with frontmatter (name, description, allowed-tools)
  • If it introduces a new pipeline: a row in the Pipeline Registry in CLAUDE.md and in the career-engine entry skill
  • If it reads reference files: a loading table in the agent file pointing at the right files
  • If it writes new reference files: those files added to references/REFERENCES.md and wired into every consuming agent
  • QA run and .plugin rebuild

Read the full file on GitHub · 164 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. 2d ago First seen · 164 lines · 52 tokens per session scan A ef5a00ff82a2

Subscribe to this mod's changes

plugin-builder is a skill published in the GitHub repository spinningrachel/career-engine (4 stars, last pushed 20d ago), licensed MIT. It adds 52 tokens to every session and 1,980 once invoked, about $0.0003 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 2026-08-31.