--- title: Skills slug: skills description: Choose which skills your assistant can use and tailor their instructions to fit your site. productSlug: cedros productLabel: Cedros sectionKey: assistant sectionLabel: Assistant --- # Skills The Skills section is where you decide what your assistant is allowed to do and how it should do it. A skill is a packaged ability — answering a certain kind of question, running a routine, queuing a background job — and this page lists every skill your site has. From here you can turn skills on or off, search and filter the list, write your own custom skills, and open any skill to fine-tune its instructions. Changes here shape how your assistant behaves in [Assistant Chat](assistant-chat.md). ## What's on this page ### Header At the top you'll see the section title **Skills** and a short description: "Choose which skills your assistant can use and tailor their instructions to fit your site." If you don't have permission to make changes, a read-only hint appears reading "Missing data:settings:write permission." When you see this, you can browse the list but every control is disabled. ### Toolbar Above the list are three controls: - **Filter** — A dropdown that narrows the list. Options are **All skills**, **Service skills**, **Workflow skills**, **Custom skills**, **Disabled**, and **Customized**. Use it to focus on one source type, on the skills you've switched off, or on the ones whose instructions you've changed. - **Search** — A text box with the placeholder "Search by name, capability, or trigger." Type to filter the list. It matches against the skill name, description, source, the example phrases that trigger or skip the skill, the operations and jobs it can use, and the steps inside a workflow skill. - **Add skill** — Opens the form to create your own custom skill. It's disabled while the list is loading or if you don't have edit permission. ### The skills list The main area is a table with one row per skill, sorted by name. Each row shows five columns: - **Status** — A toggle switch labeled "Enable [skill name]." Switch it on to let the assistant use the skill, off to keep it from using it. Disabled if you don't have edit permission or while the list is loading. - **Skill** — The skill name in bold, with its description below. If a skill has no description, this reads "No description provided." - **Type** — A small badge showing where the skill comes from: **Service**, **Workflow**, or **Custom**. - **Instructions** — A badge reading **Customized** if you've edited the skill's instructions, or **Default** if it still uses the packaged wording. - **Risk** — A color-coded badge showing how cautious the skill is: **High**, **Medium**, **Low**, or a dash (—) if no risk level is set. Click anywhere on a row to open that skill's detail view — see [Skill Detail](skill-detail.md). You can also sort the table by clicking a column heading. ### Add skill dialog When you click **Add skill**, a dialog titled "Add skill" opens with the note: "Create a custom skill with your own instructions. It joins the catalog alongside packaged skills and can be toggled or edited like any other." It has these fields: - **Name** (required) — A short name, for example "Refund policy." - **Description (optional)** — A line answering "When should the assistant reach for this skill?" - **Instructions** (required) — What the assistant should know or do when this skill applies. - **Risk level (optional)** — A dropdown with **No risk level**, **Low**, **Medium**, and **High**. At the bottom are **Cancel** and **Add skill**. The **Add skill** button stays disabled until you've entered both a name and instructions; while it's saving, it reads "Adding…" and the form is locked. ### Empty state If your site has no skills at all, the list is replaced by a heading reading "No skills installed." with the line "Your site doesn't have any assistant skills yet." If you have skills but your current filter or search hides them all, you'll instead see "No skills match this view." with "Adjust filters or clear search to see more." While the catalog is loading, the area shows "Loading assistant skills…" ## Common things you can do here ### Turn a skill on or off Find the skill's row and click the toggle switch in the **Status** column. On lets the assistant use the skill in chat; off keeps it out of reach. The change applies right away. ### Find a skill Type part of a name, capability, or trigger phrase into **Search**, or pick an option from **Filter** to narrow by source type, to show only **Disabled** skills, or to show only **Customized** ones. Combine the two to zero in on what you need. ### See which skills you've changed Open the **Filter** dropdown and choose **Customized**, or scan the **Instructions** column for the **Customized** badge. These are the skills whose instructions differ from the packaged defaults. ### Add your own skill 1. Click **Add skill** in the toolbar. 2. Enter a **Name** and write the **Instructions**. 3. Optionally add a **Description** and pick a **Risk level**. 4. Click **Add skill**. The new skill is a **Custom** skill and joins the list alongside the packaged ones. You can toggle and edit it just like any other. ### Adjust how a skill behaves Click the skill's row to open its detail view, where you can rewrite its instructions and review what it's allowed to do. See [Skill Detail](skill-detail.md). ## Tips - **Packaged vs. custom skills.** **Service** and **Workflow** skills ship with your site; **Custom** skills are ones you create here. All three kinds can be turned on or off and have their instructions edited the same way. - **Editing instructions doesn't replace a skill.** When you change a packaged skill's instructions, its **Instructions** badge switches to **Customized**, but the skill itself stays in the list. You can return to the packaged wording from the detail view. - **Risk badges are a heads-up, not a block.** A **High** risk badge tells you a skill does more sensitive work; it doesn't stop the skill from running when enabled. - **Search reaches deep.** It looks past the name and description into trigger phrases, allowed operations, job types, and a workflow's inner steps, so a keyword that isn't in the title can still surface the right skill. - **Disabled skills stay listed.** Turning a skill off doesn't remove it — use the **Disabled** filter to find everything you've switched off. ## Troubleshooting - **The Add skill button and toggles are greyed out?** You don't have the data:settings:write permission. Look for the "Missing data:settings:write permission" hint near the title — an admin needs to grant you edit access. - **The list says "No skills match this view"?** Your filter or search is hiding everything. Clear the **Search** box and set **Filter** back to **All skills** to see the full catalog. - **The list says "No skills installed"?** Your site has no skills yet. This is different from the message above — there's nothing to filter, so adding a custom skill with **Add skill** is the way to start. - **The Add skill button won't submit?** The **Name** and **Instructions** fields are both required. The button stays disabled until both have text. - **A skill I enabled isn't being used in chat?** Make sure its **Status** toggle is on here, then confirm the assistant is set up to chat — see [Assistant Chat](assistant-chat.md). Some skills only run in specific situations described in their **When to use** phrases on the [Skill Detail](skill-detail.md) page. - **The page is stuck on "Loading assistant skills…"?** The catalog is still loading. Give it a moment; if it doesn't clear, refresh the page.