Skill-Creator

December 2023 • Software

If Claude Code is an agentic OS, "no I can't do that" shouldn't be an answer. The response should be: "I can build that for you."

This project explores that idea. When a user asks for something Claude can't do natively (generate video, send reminders, monitor prices), the agent identifies the underlying capability and builds a reusable skill. The skill persists across sessions, so the user gains a new tool in their toolkit. Over time, your Claude becomes uniquely configured to how you work.

The motivation came from watching people hit walls with Claude Code. Someone asks for a reminder, gets told it's not possible, and moves on. But the building blocks exist: notification services, scheduling tools, APIs. The gap is just wiring. What if the agent could do that wiring for you, and remember it?

My contribution

Concept

System Design

Development

The team

Solo

Thinking in Capabilities

The key insight is abstraction. When someone asks "remind me to water my plants every 3 days," the agent doesn't create a plant-watering skill. It identifies the underlying capability (scheduled notifications) and builds a general reminders skill that works for medications, birthdays, deadlines, or anything else.

This pattern applies across domains. "Text me when Bitcoin drops below 90k" becomes a price-monitor skill. "Make me an AI video" becomes a video-gen skill. "Control my lights" becomes a smart-home skill.

The agent thinks in capabilities, not tasks. This means one skill serves many use cases. A user who asked for a plant reminder now has the infrastructure for any notification they might want in the future.

~/.claude/skills/reminders/SKILL.md
---
name: reminders
description: Send scheduled notifications via ntfy.sh
allowed-tools: Bash
---
# Reminders
Send yourself push notifications on a schedule.

## Setup (first time)
1. Install ntfy app on your phone

2. Subscribe to your personal topic

## Usage
# One-time reminder
bash ~/.claude/skills/reminders/scripts/notify.sh "Your message"

# Delayed reminder
echo "bash notify.sh 'Water plants'" | at now + 3 days
## Examples
"Remind me to take medication at 9am"
"Remind me about the meeting in 2 hours"
"Remind me to water plants every 3 days"

The Flow

When a user asks for something Claude can't do natively, the agent follows a pattern: The final step matters. The agent doesn't just complete the task and move on. It explains what capability the user now has and how they can use it again. This turns a one-time fix into a permanent expansion of what's possible.

User asks for something Claude can't do
               |
               v
Identify the underlying capability
(not "plant-reminder" but "reminders")
               |
               v
Build a general-purpose skill
~/.claude/skills/[capability]/
|-- SKILL.md
+-- scripts/
               |
               v
Execute the original request using the new skill
               |
               v
Educate: "You now have [capability]. Use /skills to see all."

What Gets Created

Each skill lives in ~/.claude/skills/ with a SKILL.md that documents:

What the skill does in plain language
Setup instructions for first-time use (API keys, app installs, dependencies)
Usage examples showing how to invoke it
Allowed tools specifying what the skill can access

The SKILL.md serves two purposes. For the user, it's documentation they can reference. For the agent, it's context that gets loaded in future sessions so Claude knows what capabilities are available and how to use them.

Scripts in the skill folder handle the actual work. These are parameterized and general-purpose, so the same script that sends a plant reminder can send a medication reminder or a birthday notification.

 ~/.claude/skills/reminders/SKILL.md                                                                                                                                          
                                                                                                                                                                               
  ---                                                                                                                                                                          
  name: reminders                                                                                                                                                              
  description: Send scheduled notifications via ntfy.sh                                                                                                                        
  allowed-tools: Bash                                                                                                                                                          
  ---                                                                                                                                                                          
                                                                                                                                                                               
  # Reminders                                                                                                                                                                  
                                                                                                                                                                               
  Send yourself push notifications on a schedule.                                                                                                                              
                                                                                                                                                                               
  ## Setup (first time)                                                                                                                                                        
  1. Install ntfy app on your phone                                                                                                                                            
  2. Subscribe to your personal topic                                                                                                                                          
                                                                                                                                                                               
  ## Usage                                                                                                                                                                     
  # One-time reminder                                                                                                                                                          
  bash ~/.claude/skills/reminders/scripts/notify.sh "Your message"                                                                                                             
                                                                                                                                                                               
  # Delayed reminder                                                                                                                                                           
  echo "bash notify.sh 'Water plants'" | at now + 3 days                                                                                                                       
                                                                                                                                                                               
  ## Examples                                                                                                                                                                  
  - "Remind me to take medication at 9am"                                                                                                                                      
  - "Remind me about the meeting in 2 hours"                                                                                                                                   
  - "Remind me to water plants every 3 days"

Growing With You

Skill Creator turns Claude Code from a tool that helps you into a tool that grows with you. Every time you hit a limitation, you gain a new capability instead of a dead end.

A user who starts with basic coding assistance might end up with:

reminders for scheduling notifications
price-monitor for tracking assets
video-gen for creating content
smart-home for controlling devices
Custom skills specific to their workflow

Each skill was built in response to a real need, which means the collection reflects how that person actually works. Two users with very different workflows end up with very different skill sets, but both have a Claude that feels personally configured.

The vision is an AI assistant that never stops at "I can't do that" but instead asks "should I build that for you?"

You can email me here. I’m pretty active on Twitter, occasionally pop into LinkedIn, and surfing the internet through Are.na.