What are Skills on the Claude Platform? — Transcript

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1. 0:03Skills are folders of instructions,
2. 0:05scripts, and resources that Claude loads
3. 0:06dynamically to improve performance on
4. 0:08specialized tasks. And incorporating
5. 0:10these skills in your agent loop is easy.
6. 0:15A skill is a package set of
7. 0:16instructions, a skill.md file,
8. 0:19optionally with helper files, that you
9. 0:20upload once and then attach to any
10. 0:22messages.create call. You're teaching
11. 0:24Claude how you do something. Your status
12. 0:26report format, your review checklist,
13. 0:28your release notes. Claude reads the
14. 0:30skill, follows the procedure, and
15. 0:32produces output in your shape.
16. 0:35But it's worth knowing a skill versus a
17. 0:37tool. Tools connect Claude to data and
18. 0:39actions. Look up this code section, send
19. 0:41this email. Claude calls it and
20. 0:43something else runs. Skills teach Claude
21. 0:45a procedure. Generate the daily status
22. 0:47report following this template. It's a
23. 0:49playbook Claude reads and follows, which
24. 0:51sometimes means running bundle scripts
25. 0:53itself. Tools are about what Claude can
26. 0:55do, while skills are about how you want
27. 0:57it done. And taking into consideration
28. 0:59that skills also don't load all into
29. 1:01context on startup. It only does the
30. 1:04name and description, so that when your
31. 1:05agent decides when to use the skill, it
32. 1:08will then load it into context.
33. 1:11Skills are uploaded once to your
34. 1:12workspace, then referenced by ID. You
35. 1:14can either upload this directly on the
36. 1:16Claude platform, or you can do it
37. 1:18programmatically.
38. 1:21Like I did here.
39. 1:23Now, I want a status report generator.
40. 1:25The rules for what makes a good status
41. 1:27report, sections, tone, how to
42. 1:29summarize, blockers, live in a
43. 1:31skill-like package ahead of time.
44. 1:33The activity log itself is just a string
45. 1:35that I'm passing in. A few things worth
46. 1:37pointing out is that we're calling the
47. 1:39client.beta.messages.create,
48. 1:41not the standard one, and passing the
49. 1:43skills into the beta's header. As of
50. 1:45this video, skills are still a beta
51. 1:47feature. Container.skills is where the
52. 1:49skill attaches, a list, so you can layer
53. 1:52multiple skills onto one call. And I've
54. 1:54also turned on code execution here.
55. 1:55Skills often pair well with code
56. 1:57execution because the skill procedures
57. 1:59can do real work like in your terminal.
58. 2:02So, let's run it.
59. 2:05The output is a status report formatted
60. 2:07exactly the way the skill said to format
61. 2:09it. Sections, tone, blogger handlings,
62. 2:12all coming from the skill.md file that
63. 2:13you uploaded. The user prompt is one
64. 2:15line, the procedure lives in the skill.
65. 2:17And so, in a production app, this is how
66. 2:20a team would standardize output across
67. 2:21an entire feature. So, with this daily
68. 2:23status report endpoint, every PM gets
69. 2:26the same structure, the same tone, the
70. 2:27same sections, and the same order
71. 2:29without anyone copy-pasting a template
72. 2:31into a prompt.
73. 2:32>> [music]
74. 2:35>> Skills package your procedures.
75. 2:38Upload once with the
76. 2:39client.beta.skills.create
77. 2:41endpoint, attach with container.skills
78. 2:44on any messages.create call, and then
79. 2:46use them when the how matters as much as
80. 2:48the what.