Agents & Skills

Customize the AI's identity, knowledge, shortcuts, and configurations.

Agents

An agent is a system prompt that defines the AI's behavior, personality, and instructions. Only one agent is active at a time — it appears as the first context element.

Built-in agents

Agent	Purpose
Default	General-purpose coding assistant
Context Builder	Codebase exploration and understanding
Context Cleaner	Context management and hygiene
Planner	Task planning and breakdown
Worker	Focused implementation and testing

Creating custom agents

Use the agent_create tool with a name and content (the system prompt text). The agent is saved as a .md file in .context-pilot/agents/.

# The AI creates agents via tool calls:
agent_create(name: "Reviewer", content: "You are a code reviewer...")

You can also create agents manually by adding .md files to .context-pilot/agents/ with YAML frontmatter:

---
name: Reviewer
description: Code review specialist
---
You are a code reviewer focused on security, performance, and readability...

Managing agents

agent_create — Create a new agent
Edit_prompt — Modify name, description, or content
agent_delete — Remove a custom agent (built-ins can't be deleted)
agent_load — Activate an agent as the current system prompt

Skills

A skill is a knowledge document that gets loaded as a context panel. Skills provide additional instructions, coding standards, API references, or domain knowledge.

How skills work

Create a skill with skill_create (or add a .md file to .context-pilot/skills/)
Load it with skill_load — it appears as a dynamic panel the AI can see
Unload with skill_unload when no longer needed

Skills are ideal for project-specific conventions, framework documentation, or coding standards that should persist across conversations.

💡 Example A "Rust Best Practices" skill loaded with coding conventions means the AI follows your standards without you repeating them every conversation.

Managing skills

skill_create — Create a new skill
Edit_prompt — Modify content (updates live if loaded)
skill_delete — Remove a skill (unloads first if loaded)
skill_load — Add skill to context as a panel
skill_unload — Remove skill from context

Commands

A command is a text shortcut expanded inline when you type /command-name in the input field. Commands are replaced with their content before the message is sent.

Creating commands

# Create a command:
command_create(name: "review", content: "Please review the code changes...")

Then typing /review in the input field expands to the full review prompt.

Managing commands

command_create — Create a new command
Edit_prompt — Modify content
command_delete — Remove a command (built-ins can't be deleted)

Presets

A preset is a snapshot of your entire worker configuration — active agent, active modules, disabled tools, panel state, and module data. Load a preset to instantly switch contexts.

Built-in presets

Preset	Agent	Focus
Admin	Default	Unrestricted access to all modules and tools
Worker	Worker	Implementation — file editing, git, console
Planner	Planner	Task planning with todo and scratchpad
Context Builder	Context Builder	Full exploration mode
Context Cleaner	Context Cleaner	Minimal read-only cleanup mode

Custom presets

Configure your environment how you want it, then save with preset_snapshot_myself. Load later with preset_load.

ℹ️ What presets capture Active agent, active modules, disabled tools, per-worker module data (todos, scratchpad, git settings), loaded skills, and dynamic panel configurations. Not captured: conversation messages or global config (provider, model).

Storage Format

All prompts (agents, skills, commands) are stored as Markdown files with YAML frontmatter in .context-pilot/:

.context-pilot/
├── agents/
│   ├── default.md          # Built-in
│   └── my-reviewer.md      # Custom
├── skills/
│   ├── rust.md             # Built-in
│   └── my-project-rules.md # Custom
├── commands/
│   └── review.md           # Custom
└── presets/
    ├── admin.json          # Built-in
    └── my-setup.json       # Custom

Built-in prompts are regenerated from embedded defaults on startup if missing. Custom ones are yours to edit, share, or version control.