skills

Posit Agent Skills

A collection of Agent Skills from Posit!

Agent Skills are an open standard for extending coding agents with specialized knowledge and workflows. Skills are automatically activated by your coding assistant based on your task, and work across many harnesses — including Posit Assistant, Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Cline, and more. If you use Posit Assistant, see the Posit Assistant skills documentation.

Available Skills

Posit Developer

General-purpose developer skills useful across any language, project type, or context.

• critical-code-reviewer - Conduct rigorous, adversarial code reviews identifying security holes, lazy patterns, edge case failures, and bad practices across Python, R, JavaScript/TypeScript, SQL, and front-end code
• describe-design - Research a codebase and create architectural documentation describing how features or systems work, with Mermaid diagrams and stable code references suitable for humans and AI agents
• new-work - Create a todo tracking document for a new feature, bug, or task; keeps it updated with decisions, plans, and progress for the rest of the session
• review-testing - Review test code for quality, design, and completeness after implementing a feature or fixing a bug, covering assertion completeness, mocking boundaries, fixture design, test smells, and coverage gaps
• working-on - Set an existing tracking document as the source of truth for the current session, keeping it updated with decisions and progress

GitHub

Skills for GitHub pull request workflows — creating PRs, addressing review feedback, and resolving threads.

• pr-create - Creates a pull request from current changes, monitors GitHub CI, and debugs any failures until CI passes
• pr-threads-address - Review all unresolved PR review threads, address them by making necessary code changes, and commit the changes appropriately
• pr-threads-resolve - Bulk resolve unresolved PR review threads

Open Source

Skills for open-source R and Python package developers, streamlining common workflows like releases, changelogs, and contributor acknowledgments.

• create-release-checklist - Create a release checklist and GitHub issue for an R package, with automatic version calculation and customizable checklist generation
• release-post - Create professional package release blog posts following Tidyverse or Shiny blog conventions, with support for both R and Python packages

R Package Development

R package development skills for working with the r-lib ecosystem and modern R package workflows.

• r-tidyverse-style - Review and clean up R package code using the tidyverse style guide, separating mechanical style changes from behavior-sensitive refactors
• r-testthat - Best practices for writing R package tests using testthat 3+, including test structure, expectations, fixtures, snapshots, mocking, and BDD-style testing
• r-cli - Comprehensive guidance for using the cli R package for command-line interface styling, semantic messaging, and user communication with inline markup, progress indicators, and theming
• r-cran-extrachecks - Prepare R packages for CRAN submission by checking for common ad-hoc requirements not caught by devtools::check(), including documentation standards, DESCRIPTION field formatting, and URL validation
• r-lifecycle - Manage R package lifecycle according to tidyverse principles using the lifecycle package, covering deprecation workflows, function/argument renaming, superseding, and experimental stages
• r-package-development - R package development with devtools, testthat, and roxygen2, covering key commands, coding conventions, testing, documentation, and NEWS.md practices
• r-mirai - Async, parallel, and distributed computing in R using mirai, covering explicit dependency passing, daemon setup, parallel mapping with mirai_map(), Shiny integration, remote/HPC launchers, and migration from future/parallel
• alt-text - Generate and improve accessible alt text for data visualizations and images in pkgdown sites and Quarto documents, covering vignette code chunks (fig.alt), static markdown images, and multi-plot chunks

ggsql

Skills for writing ggsql queries — a grammar of graphics for SQL.

• ggsql - Write ggsql queries — a grammar of graphics for SQL. Use when the user wants to create, modify, or understand a ggsql visualization query

Shiny

Skills for Shiny app development in both R and Python.

• brand-yml - Create and apply brand.yml files for consistent styling across Shiny apps, with support for bslib (R) and ui.Theme (Python), including automatic brand discovery and theming functions for plots and tables
• shiny-bslib - Build modern Shiny dashboards using bslib with Bootstrap 5 layouts, cards, value boxes, navigation, theming, and modern inputs. Includes migration guide from legacy Shiny patterns
• shiny-bslib-theming - Comprehensive theming for Shiny apps using bslib, covering bs_theme(), Bootswatch themes, custom colors, typography, Bootstrap Sass variables, custom Sass/CSS rules, dark mode, dynamic theming, and R plot theming

Quarto

Skills for Quarto document creation and publishing.

• brand-yml - Create and apply brand.yml files for consistent styling across Quarto projects, supporting HTML documents, dashboards, RevealJS presentations, Typst PDFs, and websites with automatic brand discovery and theme layering
• authoring - Comprehensive guidance for Quarto document authoring and R Markdown migration. Write new Quarto documents with best practices, convert R Markdown files, migrate bookdown/blogdown/xaringan/distill projects, and use Quarto-specific features like hashpipe syntax, cross-references, callouts, and extensions
• alt-text - Generate and improve accessible alt text for figures in Quarto documents using Amy Cesal's three-part formula (chart type, data description, key insight). Supports code-generated plots and static images

Connect

Skills for deploying and managing content on Posit Connect.

• deploy-to-connect - Deploy or publish Python and R content to a Posit Connect server using rsconnect-python or the R rsconnect package. Covers interactive apps and dashboards, web APIs, rendered documents, and prepared bundles/manifests

Installation

Using npx skills add (Any Agent)

Install skills from this repository into any supported coding agent (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor, Cline, and many more) using the npx skills add CLI:

# List available skills without installing
npx skills add posit-dev/skills --list

# Install skills via an interactive menu
npx skills add posit-dev/skills --all

# Install specific skills by category name
npx skills add posit-dev/skills --skill cli --skill lifecycle

# Install to Claude Code only, globally
npx skills add posit-dev/skills --agent claude-code --global

Posit Assistant

Install skills into your Posit Assistant skills directory:

# User-level, shared with other harnesses that follow the Agent Skills spec
npx skills add posit-dev/skills --agent posit-assistant

# Or copy skills directly
cp -r open-source/release-post ~/.posit/assistant/skills/

Skills can also be installed at the project level in .posit/assistant/skills/, or in the harness-agnostic ~/.agents/skills/ location. See the Posit Assistant skills documentation for details, and plugins for installing skills from a marketplace.

Claude Code

Method 1: Add Marketplace

Add this repository as a plugin marketplace in Claude Code:

/plugin marketplace add posit-dev/skills

Then browse and install the skill categories you need through the Claude Code UI.

Method 2: Direct Installation

Install specific skill categories directly:

/plugin install posit-dev@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install github@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install open-source@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install ggsql@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install r-lib@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install shiny@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install quarto@posit-dev-skills
/plugin install connect@posit-dev-skills

Each command installs all skills in that category.

Method 3: Manual Installation

For customization or offline use:

1. Clone this repository:

   git clone https://github.com/posit-dev/skills.git
   cd skills
   

2. Copy individual skills to your Claude Code skills directory:

   cp -r open-source/release-post ~/.config/claude-code/skills/
   

3. Or install all skills from a category:

   for skill in open-source/*/; do
     cp -r "$skill" ~/.config/claude-code/skills/
   done
   

Claude.ai and the Claude API

Skills can be uploaded to Claude.ai following the Creating Custom Skills guide, or loaded programmatically in your applications via the Skills API.

Using Skills

Once installed, your coding assistant will automatically activate relevant skills based on your task. You don't need to explicitly invoke them.

For example, with the release-post skill installed:

You: Help me write a release post for dplyr 1.2.0

Assistant: I'll help you create a release post. First, let me gather some information...

The assistant will use the skill's knowledge to guide you through creating a properly formatted release post.

Skill Categories

This repository organizes skills into categories to make it easier to find and install skills relevant to your work:

Category	Description
posit-dev	General-purpose developer skills (code review, architecture docs)
ggsql	ggsql query writing — a grammar of graphics for SQL
github	GitHub PR workflows (create PRs, address review threads, resolve threads)
open-source	Open-source R/Python package workflows (releases, changelogs)
r-lib	R package development with the r-lib ecosystem
shiny	Shiny app development and deployment (R and Python)
quarto	Quarto document creation and publishing
connect	Posit Connect deployment and management

Contributing

We welcome contributions! Please see CONTRIBUTING.md for guidelines on creating new skills.

We highly recommend using Anthropic's skill-creator skill to help you build high-quality skills. Skills should be grouped together by category, but the category groups are flexible. Feel free to propose new categories as needed.

License

This repository is licensed under the MIT License. See LICENSE for details.

Resources

• Agent Skills specification
• Posit Assistant skills documentation
• Announcing Agent Skills
• Using Skills in Claude
• Creating Custom Skills
• Skills API Documentation
• Anthropic's Official Skills Repository

Support

If you have questions or encounter issues, check the Agent Skills specification or open an issue on GitHub.

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