Pi Skill Palette

A command palette for Pi coding agent that lets you explicitly select which skill to inject with your next message.

/skill

Why

Agents don't always know when to read their skills. Instead of relying on automatic detection based on task context, this extension gives you direct control. Select a skill from the palette and it gets sent alongside your next message.

Install

pi install npm:pi-skill-palette

Restart pi to load the extension.

Quick Start

1. Type /skill and press Enter
2. Start typing to fuzzy-filter skills
3. Use ↑/↓ to navigate, Enter to select
4. Send your message - the skill context is automatically included

The selected skill appears in the footer and a widget until consumed. Re-select a queued skill to unqueue it (with confirmation).

Keyboard Shortcuts

Key	Action
↑ / ↓	Navigate skills
Enter	Select / Unqueue skill
Esc	Cancel
Tab	Switch buttons (in confirmation dialog)
Y / N	Quick confirm/cancel unqueue

Skill Locations

Skills are loaded from these directories (in order):

1. ~/.codex/skills/ - Codex user skills (recursive)
2. ~/.claude/skills/ - Claude user skills (one level deep)
3. .claude/skills/ - Claude project skills (one level deep)
4. ~/.pi/agent/skills/ - Pi user skills (recursive)
5. ~/.pi/skills/ - Legacy user skills (recursive)
6. .pi/skills/ - Pi project-specific skills (recursive)

Each skill must be in its own directory with a SKILL.md file containing YAML frontmatter:

---
name: my-skill
description: Brief description of what this skill does
---

# Skill Content

The actual skill instructions go here...

Theming

Customize colors by creating theme.json in the extension directory. Copy theme.example.json as a starting point:

cp theme.example.json theme.json

Theme values are ANSI SGR codes ("36" for cyan, "2;3" for dim+italic, "38;2;215;135;175" for RGB).

Property	Description
border	Box borders
title	Title text
selected	Selection indicator
selectedText	Selected item text
queued	Queued badge
searchIcon	Search icon
placeholder	Placeholder text
description	Skill descriptions
hint	Footer hints
confirm	Confirm button
cancel	Cancel button

How It Works

When you select a skill, it's queued in memory with visual indicators in the footer and widget. On your next message, the skill content is sent via the before_agent_start extension event as a custom message alongside your prompt. Skills are deduplicated by name (first occurrence wins) and symlinks are followed when scanning directories.

Limitations

• Skills are loaded once at startup (restart pi to pick up new skills)
• Theme changes require a restart
• First occurrence wins when skills share the same name across directories