The Library

A meta-skill for private-first distribution of agentics (skills, agents, and prompts) across workspaces, agents, and devices.

Inspiration

This skill was adopted after watching Dan Dubiel's video The Library Meta-Skill: How I Distribute PRIVATE Skills, Agents and Prompts (Agentic Engineer, 2026).

The original template repository is disler/the-library on GitHub. Our version is adapted for a symlink-based multi-workspace setup (see Install Mechanism below) rather than the copy-based approach in the original.

Variables

• LIBRARY_REPO_URL: https://github.com/akaihola/skills-akaihola.git
• LIBRARY_YAML_PATH: ~/prg/skills-akaihola/library/library.yaml
• LIBRARY_SKILL_DIR: ~/prg/skills-akaihola/library/
• SKILLS_BASE_DIR: ~/prg/skills-akaihola/

How It Works

The Library is a catalog of references to your agentics. The library.yaml file points to where skills, agents, and prompts live (local filesystem or GitHub repos). Nothing is fetched until you ask for it.

Our setup uses symlinks, not copies. When you use a skill, it creates a symlink from the workspace's .claude/skills/<name> → the source directory. This means:

• Updates to skills-akaihola propagate instantly — no manual sync needed for already-installed skills
• sync just does a git pull in skills-akaihola/
• A single library.yaml in skills-akaihola/library/ serves all workspaces

Commands

Cookbook

Each command has a detailed step-by-step guide. Read the relevant cookbook file before executing a command.

When a user invokes a /library command, read the matching cookbook file first, then execute the steps.

Source Format

The source field in library.yaml supports these formats (auto-detected):

• /absolute/path/to/SKILL.md — local filesystem path
• ~/relative/path/to/SKILL.md — home-relative path (expand ~ → /home/agent)
• https://github.com/org/repo/blob/main/path/to/SKILL.md — GitHub browser URL
• https://raw.githubusercontent.com/org/repo/main/path/to/SKILL.md — GitHub raw URL

The source always points to the SKILL.md file (or AGENT.md for agents). The library installs the entire parent directory.

Install Mechanism (Symlinks)

Unlike the upstream template which copies files, we use symlinks so updates propagate automatically:

# For skills in skills-akaihola:
ln -sfn ~/prg/skills-akaihola/<skill-name> <target_dir>/<skill-name>

# For skills at arbitrary local paths:
ln -sfn <parent_dir_of_SKILL.md> <target_dir>/<skill-name>

The workspace .claude/skills/ directory is the default target.

Target Directories

default_dirs:
  skills:
    - default: .claude/skills/       # workspace-level (relative to CWD)
    - global: ~/.claude/skills/      # user-level (all sessions)
  agents:
    - default: .claude/agents/
    - global: ~/.claude/agents/
  prompts:
    - default: .claude/commands/
    - global: ~/.claude/commands/

• If user says "global" or "globally" → use the global directory
• Otherwise → use the default directory (relative to current workspace root)

Library Repo Sync

The library skill itself lives in LIBRARY_SKILL_DIR inside the skills-akaihola git repo. When add modifies library.yaml:

1. git pull in LIBRARY_SKILL_DIR first
2. Make the changes
3. git add library.yaml && git commit -m "library: added <type> <name>" && git push

Typed Dependencies

The requires field uses typed references:

• skill:name — references a skill in the library catalog
• agent:name — references an agent in the library catalog
• prompt:name — references a prompt in the library catalog