SKILL.md format specification

A skill is a Markdown file with a YAML frontmatter block. DuDuClaw parses the frontmatter into SkillMeta and treats the body as the skill content. Both the Anthropic <skill-name>/SKILL.md layout and the legacy flat <skill>.md layout are supported.

Frontmatter fields

---
name: compress-context          # required — machine-stable id / registry key
description: Compress the conversation history when it grows too long
trigger: /compress              # optional invocation trigger
tools: [search, code]           # optional tool allowlist
tags: [utility, memory]         # optional
author: agnes                   # optional
version: 1.0.0                  # optional
requires: [tokenizer]           # optional — other skills this depends on
skill_type: atomic              # atomic | functional | planning
compose_mode: parallel          # parallel | sequential | conditional

# WP8 — localisation. Employees see the display strings for their locale.
display:
  zh-TW:
    name: 壓縮對話
    description: 對話太長時自動壓縮歷史
  ja-JP:
    name: 会話を圧縮
    description: 会話履歴が長くなったら圧縮する

# WP8 — time saved per use, set by the skill-activation approval flow.
estimated_minutes_saved: 15
---

# Skill body (Markdown)
...

`name` and `description`

name is the machine-stable identity used as the registry key, for override dedup, and in requires. It never changes with locale. description is the default (usually English) summary.

`display` — localised names (WP8)

A map keyed by locale (zh-TW / en / ja-JP / …). Each entry has an optional name and description. Presentation surfaces (skill_list, skill_search, the dashboard SkillMarketPage, channel messages) resolve display text with this fallback chain:

requested locale → zh-TW → original `name` / `description`

Blank localised strings are skipped, so a half-filled entry never shadows the original. Skills predating WP8 have an empty display map and render from name/description unchanged — fully backward compatible.

`estimated_minutes_saved` (WP8)

Minutes this skill saves per use, gathered in the skill-creation dialogue (“大概能省下幾分鐘?”) and written on manager approval (action_kind = skill_activation). The WP10 leaderboard multiplies it by usage count to rank skills by cumulative time saved. Absent ⇒ treated as 0 by the leaderboard.

Backward compatibility

Every field except name is optional with a sensible default. A SKILL.md with only name and a body parses. A file with no frontmatter at all is treated as a body-only skill whose name comes from the filename.