agent-tool-builder

Tools are how AI agents interact with the world. A well-designed tool is the difference between an agent that works and one that hallucinates, fails silently, or costs 10x more tokens than necessary. This skill covers tool design from schema to error handling. JSON Schema best practices, description writing that actually helps the LLM, validation, and the emerging MCP standard that's becoming the lingua franca for AI tools. Key insight: Tool descriptions are more important than tool implementa

24,269 stars

Best use case

agent-tool-builder is best used when you need a repeatable AI agent workflow instead of a one-off prompt.

Tools are how AI agents interact with the world. A well-designed tool is the difference between an agent that works and one that hallucinates, fails silently, or costs 10x more tokens than necessary. This skill covers tool design from schema to error handling. JSON Schema best practices, description writing that actually helps the LLM, validation, and the emerging MCP standard that's becoming the lingua franca for AI tools. Key insight: Tool descriptions are more important than tool implementa

Teams using agent-tool-builder should expect a more consistent output, faster repeated execution, less prompt rewriting.

When to use this skill

  • You want a reusable workflow that can be run more than once with consistent structure.

When not to use this skill

  • You only need a quick one-off answer and do not need a reusable workflow.
  • You cannot install or maintain the underlying files, dependencies, or repository context.

Installation

Claude Code / Cursor / Codex

$curl -o ~/.claude/skills/agent-tool-builder/SKILL.md --create-dirs "https://raw.githubusercontent.com/davila7/claude-code-templates/main/cli-tool/components/skills/ai-research/agent-tool-builder/SKILL.md"

Manual Installation

  1. Download SKILL.md from GitHub
  2. Place it in .claude/skills/agent-tool-builder/SKILL.md inside your project
  3. Restart your AI agent — it will auto-discover the skill

How agent-tool-builder Compares

Feature / Agentagent-tool-builderStandard Approach
Platform SupportNot specifiedLimited / Varies
Context Awareness High Baseline
Installation ComplexityUnknownN/A

Frequently Asked Questions

What does this skill do?

Tools are how AI agents interact with the world. A well-designed tool is the difference between an agent that works and one that hallucinates, fails silently, or costs 10x more tokens than necessary. This skill covers tool design from schema to error handling. JSON Schema best practices, description writing that actually helps the LLM, validation, and the emerging MCP standard that's becoming the lingua franca for AI tools. Key insight: Tool descriptions are more important than tool implementa

Where can I find the source code?

You can find the source code on GitHub using the link provided at the top of the page.

Related Guides

SKILL.md Source

# Agent Tool Builder

You are an expert in the interface between LLMs and the outside world.
You've seen tools that work beautifully and tools that cause agents to
hallucinate, loop, or fail silently. The difference is almost always
in the design, not the implementation.

Your core insight: The LLM never sees your code. It only sees the schema
and description. A perfectly implemented tool with a vague description
will fail. A simple tool with crystal-clear documentation will succeed.

You push for explicit error hand

## Capabilities

- agent-tools
- function-calling
- tool-schema-design
- mcp-tools
- tool-validation
- tool-error-handling

## Patterns

### Tool Schema Design

Creating clear, unambiguous JSON Schema for tools

### Tool with Input Examples

Using examples to guide LLM tool usage

### Tool Error Handling

Returning errors that help the LLM recover

## Anti-Patterns

### ❌ Vague Descriptions

### ❌ Silent Failures

### ❌ Too Many Tools

## Related Skills

Works well with: `multi-agent-orchestration`, `api-designer`, `llm-architect`, `backend`

Related Skills

n8n-mcp-tools-expert

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Expert guide for using n8n-mcp MCP tools effectively. Use when searching for nodes, validating configurations, accessing templates, managing workflows, or using any n8n-mcp tool. Provides tool selection guidance, parameter formats, and common patterns.

browser-extension-builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Expert in building browser extensions that solve real problems - Chrome, Firefox, and cross-browser extensions. Covers extension architecture, manifest v3, content scripts, popup UIs, monetization strategies, and Chrome Web Store publishing. Use when: browser extension, chrome extension, firefox addon, extension, manifest v3.

Security Scanning Tools

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

This skill should be used when the user asks to "perform vulnerability scanning", "scan networks for open ports", "assess web application security", "scan wireless networks", "detect malware", "check cloud security", or "evaluate system compliance". It provides comprehensive guidance on security scanning tools and methodologies.

Red Team Tools and Methodology

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

This skill should be used when the user asks to "follow red team methodology", "perform bug bounty hunting", "automate reconnaissance", "hunt for XSS vulnerabilities", "enumerate subdomains", or needs security researcher techniques and tool configurations from top bug bounty hunters.

scvi-tools

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

This skill should be used when working with single-cell omics data analysis using scvi-tools, including scRNA-seq, scATAC-seq, CITE-seq, spatial transcriptomics, and other single-cell modalities. Use this skill for probabilistic modeling, batch correction, dimensionality reduction, differential expression, cell type annotation, multimodal integration, and spatial analysis tasks.

etetoolkit

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Phylogenetic tree toolkit (ETE). Tree manipulation (Newick/NHX), evolutionary event detection, orthology/paralogy, NCBI taxonomy, visualization (PDF/SVG), for phylogenomics.

deeptools

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

NGS analysis toolkit. BAM to bigWig conversion, QC (correlation, PCA, fingerprints), heatmaps/profiles (TSS, peaks), for ChIP-seq, RNA-seq, ATAC-seq visualization.

personal-tool-builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Expert in building custom tools that solve your own problems first. The best products often start as personal tools - scratch your own itch, build for yourself, then discover others have the same itch. Covers rapid prototyping, local-first apps, CLI tools, scripts that grow into products, and the art of dogfooding. Use when: build a tool, personal tool, scratch my itch, solve my problem, CLI tool.

slack-bot-builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Build Slack apps using the Bolt framework across Python, JavaScript, and Java. Covers Block Kit for rich UIs, interactive components, slash commands, event handling, OAuth installation flows, and Workflow Builder integration. Focus on best practices for production-ready Slack apps. Use when: slack bot, slack app, bolt framework, block kit, slash command.

web-artifacts-builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Suite of tools for creating elaborate, multi-component claude.ai HTML artifacts using modern frontend web technologies (React, Tailwind CSS, shadcn/ui). Use for complex artifacts requiring state management, routing, or shadcn/ui components - not for simple single-file HTML/JSX artifacts.

Telegram Bot Builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

This skill should be used when the user asks to "create a Telegram bot", "build a Telegram chatbot", "set up a Telegram webhook", "add inline keyboards to a bot", "handle Telegram callback queries", "implement Telegram payments", "send media via Telegram bot", "configure Telegram bot commands", "deploy a Telegram bot", or mentions the Telegram Bot API, telegram bot tokens, getUpdates, setWebhook, or bot frameworks like node-telegram-bot-api, grammy, python-telegram-bot, or aiogram. Provides comprehensive guidance for building production-ready Telegram bots with Node.js and Python.

rust-cli-builder

24269
from davila7/claude-code-templates

Plan and build production-ready Rust CLI tools using clap for argument parsing, with subcommands, config file support, colored output, and proper error handling. Uses interview-driven planning to clarify commands, input/output formats, and distribution strategy before writing any code.