Skill Governance and Automation

Problem

As a skill repository grows (30+ skills), quality drifts:

• Descriptions become vague (poor activation triggers)
• Evidence sections go stale (cites old competition results)
• Cross-references break ([[links]] to renamed/deleted skills)
• Skills overlap or contradict each other
• No standard summary for quick inventory

The 6-Dimension Skill Audit

For each skill, check:

Dimension 1: Activation Trigger Quality

□ Description starts with "Use when: (1)..." (specific triggers)
□ At least 2 concrete trigger conditions
□ At least 1 "Do NOT use for" exclusion
□ Trigger conditions are testable (not subjective)

BAD: "Tips for Kaggle competitions"
GOOD: "Use when: (1) OOF improved but LB didn't, (2) gap > 1%"

Dimension 2: Evidence Currency

□ Evidence section cites real numbers (not "usually helps")
□ At least 1 competition/experiment as source
□ Evidence date < 6 months old (or marked as "classic, still valid")
□ If competition-specific: competition still active or lesson still applies

STALE: "Validated on S6E4 (2026-05)" → check if still true
CURRENT: "Validated on 20+ competitions through 2026-07"

Dimension 3: Solution Actionability

□ Solution has concrete steps (not just principles)
□ Code examples or commands provided where relevant
□ Decision trees or flowcharts for complex decisions
□ Anti-patterns section (what NOT to do + why)

VAGUE: "Be careful with ensembles"
ACTIONABLE: "If model correlation > 0.97, remove the weaker model"

Dimension 4: Cross-Reference Integrity

□ All [[skill-name]] links point to existing skills
□ No circular dependencies (A → B → A)
□ Related skills are actually related (not just same domain)
□ No two skills cover the same scope without differentiation

Dimension 5: Scope Boundaries

□ Clear scope: what this skill covers
□ Clear exclusions: what this skill does NOT cover
□ No overlap with another skill > 30%
□ If overlap exists: one is the "primary", other links to it

Dimension 6: Format Compliance

□ Frontmatter: name, description present and accurate
□ Title: H1 heading matches name
□ Structure: Problem → Context → Solution → Evidence
□ Length: 50-300 lines (not a 1000-line wall, not a 5-line stub)
□ Tags: relevant search keywords

Skill Card Template (Auto-Generatable)

For each skill, generate a standardized 5-line card:

| Skill | Trigger | Key Rule | Evidence | Last Validated |
|-------|---------|----------|----------|----------------|
| autogluon-first | New tabular competition | Run AutoGluon best_quality as step 1 | House Prices CV 0.1180 | 2026-06 |

Automation script concept:

# For each skills/examples/*/SKILL.md:
#   1. Parse frontmatter (name, description)
#   2. Extract first "Use when" from description
#   3. Extract first concrete rule from body
#   4. Extract first evidence line
#   5. Check file modification date
#   6. Output summary card

Skill Lifecycle

CREATE:
  1. Experiment produces reusable insight
  2. Write SKILL.md following format compliance (Dimension 6)
  3. Validate: run through all 6 audit dimensions
  4. Add to README skills table
  5. Cross-reference from related skills

MAINTAIN:
  1. Quarterly: re-run 6-dimension audit
  2. After new experiments: update evidence if relevant
  3. When referenced skill changes: update cross-references
  4. When trigger conditions change: update description

DEPRECATE:
  1. Mark with ⚠️ in README
  2. Add "SUPERSEDED BY: [[new-skill-name]]" at top
  3. Keep file for historical reference (don't delete)
  4. Remove from active cross-references

Staleness Detection

A skill is STALE if:

• Last evidence > 12 months old AND no "classic" marker
• Referenced competition has ended AND lesson doesn't generalize
• Referenced tool/library has major version change
• New evidence contradicts the skill's rule

Staleness action:

1. Verify: is the rule still true? (test against current state)
2. If YES → add "classic, still valid" marker + recent evidence
3. If NO → update rule or deprecate

Evidence

• Repository grew from 0 → 36+ skills over 4 months
• Audit caught: 3 stale evidence sections, 2 broken cross-references, 1 scope overlap
• NVIDIA's skill-card-generator inspired the automated card concept
• Format evolved from ad-hoc markdown to structured frontmatter + 6 dimensions