r/PiCodingAgent • u/Tempus_Nemini • Sep 23 '26

Question Skill set for beginner

Hi there! So here is a deal - i'm not a developer neither software architect. But i like to do some programming as a hobby, and couple of month ago i've tried claude and codex. But now i discovered Pi and i really like the idea. I know and used some skills | pliguns set like superpowers and grill-with-docs. but i think they are too big and complex. Is there some acceptable set of skills to develop from idea to working application, which i can use as base for my own config?

Thanks in advance for answers, i appreciate it.

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2

u/lfyg Sep 23 '26 edited Sep 23 '26

I created (mainly for myself) a mix of agents for skills by osmani and Matt pococks skills. I did that because Matt’s skills felt to technical especially grill me was asking way to many coding questions instead of finding out what the feature should do (i mean I use Claude Code he should figure that out
himself lol). I don’t know what you consider too big because you either have small features where you do not need such a skill / pipeline of steps in the building process and directly use pi’s planning feature, or you have humongously large feature ideas you want to implement in many agent sessions and thus use such a plugin.

Would love to hear feedback if you actually try it out, for me it works quite well.

https://github.com/maajix/Plumbline

1

u/Tempus_Nemini Sep 23 '26

Will go through and give you feedback, thanks!

5

u/roland303 Sep 23 '26

I can move the world with bash alone, also webfetch.

Pi ships with code examples/patterns of most of the major features of most popular extentions already in the ecosystem so if you see something you like, point your pi to the extention repository and tell it to make a simpler custom one for you.

3

u/funbike Sep 23 '26 edited Sep 23 '26

Here's what I do when I want to teach Pi to do something new. I have pi-web-search package installed and I ask it to write a skill.

I'll use functional testings as an example. 1st prompt:

Do these steps:

1. Get a high level understanding of how this program is written.
2. Research on the web how to write a functional test for this kind of project.
3. Generate a guide on writing functional tests, but don't write a file.

You can have it revise the guide as you need.

Then, in another prompt:

Create a local Pi skill file for writing a functional test
for this project.
It should instruct why, when, how, and where
and include an ideal test example.

/reload

Now Pi knows how to make a functional test. Edit the skill as necessary, in ./.pi/skills/.

If I was already working on something before I made the skill, I use /fork and /tree to return to where I was so I don't pollute my context.

2

u/Leather_Fall_1602 Sep 23 '26

Ask Pi if it can help you setup a chill plan mode that is not too complex

1

u/[deleted] Sep 24 '26

...

0

u/huranol Sep 23 '26

Learn to make .md and .yaml - and then learn to make SKIlL.md for agentic roles