Frequently Asked Questions

Skillsmith is an agent skill platform for AI assistants. It helps you find, install, compare, and manage skills that enhance your development environment with specialized capabilities.

Skillsmith works with any MCP-compatible agent. Per-client config snippets for Claude Code, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Windsurf, and Codex CLI are in the main README at https://github.com/smith-horn/skillsmith#quick-setup. After adding to your client settings, restart the client and try a Skillsmith tool.

Yes, Skillsmith offers a free Community tier that includes 1,000 API calls per month, skill search and discovery, skill installation, and basic recommendations. Paid plans are available for users who need more API calls and advanced features.

Skillsmith indexes thousands of skills across various categories including development tools, testing frameworks, deployment helpers, documentation generators, and more. You can browse available skills on our Skills page or search using your MCP client.

Each skill search, recommendation request, or skill installation counts as one API call. Viewing cached results and browsing the skill catalog does not count against your quota.

Yes, you can upgrade or downgrade your plan at any time. When upgrading, you'll get immediate access to the new tier's features. When downgrading, changes take effect at the start of your next billing cycle.

You'll receive a notification when approaching your limit (at 80% and 90% usage). Once exceeded, API calls will be rate-limited until the next billing cycle or until you upgrade to a higher tier.

Yes, Individual and Team plans include a 14-day free trial with full access to all features. Enterprise trials are available upon request by contacting our sales team.

We accept all major credit cards (Visa, Mastercard, American Express, Discover) and can arrange invoicing for Enterprise customers. All payments are processed securely through Stripe.

You can manage your subscription from your Account dashboard. When you cancel, you'll retain access to paid features until the end of your current billing period, then be downgraded to the free Community tier.

Private skills (available on Team and Enterprise plans) are custom skills that are only visible to your organization. They're perfect for proprietary workflows, internal tools, or company-specific integrations.

Team plans include shared workspaces where team members can collaborate on skills, share recommendations, and maintain consistent tooling across the organization. Admins can control skill sharing and access permissions.

The analytics dashboard (Individual and above) shows your skill usage patterns, most-used skills, recommendation accuracy, and API consumption trends. Team plans include aggregated team analytics.

Skills are categorized into five trust tiers: Official (platform- or partner-maintained, fully reviewed), Verified (publisher identity verified and quality-checked), Curated (GitHub-verified vendor orgs and curated publishers), Community (basic scan passed and metadata present, publisher not verified), and Unverified (no verification performed). This helps you understand the reliability and review status of each skill before installing.

Generate a license key from your Account dashboard. Use this key in the Authorization header of your API requests: 'Authorization: Bearer sk_live_...' The key is only shown once when generated, so store it securely.

Rate limits vary by tier: Community (100/min), Individual (200/min), Team (300/min), Enterprise (600/min). These limits help ensure fair usage and service availability for all users.

Skills that have been installed work offline within your MCP client. However, searching for new skills, getting recommendations, and checking for updates requires an internet connection.

You can report issues or request features through our GitHub repository at github.com/smith-horn/skillsmith/issues. For Enterprise customers, dedicated support channels are available.

Pick by where your work already lives — they all read the same local skill database and share one API key. The MCP server runs inside any MCP-compatible agent (Claude Code, Cursor, Copilot, Codex, Windsurf — MCP is the Model Context Protocol that agents use to talk to external tools) and lets the assistant search, compare, recommend, and install skills inline in your agent session; pick it for context-aware suggestions, install-without-leaving-the-chat, and team features like shared workspaces and audit export. The CLI is a terminal binary (skillsmith or sklx) that runs without an agent session: scriptable exit codes, JSON output, offline-friendly local search, batch operations, and the author family for scaffolding, validating, and publishing your own agent skills; pick it for CI, automation, or skill authoring. The VS Code extension (skillsmith-vscode on the Marketplace) is a graphical front end that spawns the MCP server in the background and adds an editor-native experience: sidebar tree, quick-pick search, rendered SKILL.md detail panel (the markdown-with-frontmatter file format that defines an agent skill), create-skill wizard, and SKILL.md frontmatter intellisense; pick it if you live in VS Code. The CLI is the only surface that publishes to the registry today; team-admin tools (audit export, SIEM, RBAC) flow through MCP. Full comparison: /product.

The MCP server and CLI share one local SQLite database at ~/.skillsmith/skills.db (overridable with SKILLSMITH_DB_PATH); the VS Code extension uses it transitively because it spawns the MCP server. The DB caches skill metadata and an FTS5 full-text index (SQLite's built-in keyword search — fast, ranked, no external service) for instant offline lookup. There is no vector virtual table by default — semantic search is opt-in (SKILLSMITH_USE_HNSW=true) and uses an in-memory vector index over 384-dim ONNX embeddings (Open Neural Network Exchange — a portable ML model format with a runtime that runs inference on CPU, no GPU or API call required), with the embedding blobs cached in SQLite. skillsmith sync does an incremental pull from the registry API: it fetches changes since lastSyncAt, dedupes, upserts only rows whose content_hash or updated_at has moved, and records the run in sync_history. sync does not recompute embeddings — those generate on demand if semantic search is enabled. skillsmith import-local goes the other direction: it walks SKILL.md files from your client's skills directory (default ~/.claude/skills/, or pass --client cursor/copilot/windsurf/agents) into the same database, marked source='local' so a subsequent sync — even with --force — leaves locally-imported rows alone. Net effect: fast offline keyword search, optional opt-in semantic search, no metadata leaves your machine after sync, in exchange for some disk and a sync cadence you control. Full deep dive: /blog/inside-the-local-skill-database.

Enterprise customers receive a 99.9% uptime guarantee. If we fail to meet this commitment, you'll receive service credits as outlined in your service agreement.

Enterprise plans support SAML 2.0 for single sign-on integration with your identity provider (Okta, Azure AD, Google Workspace, etc.). Our team will help configure the integration during onboarding.

Enterprise audit logs capture all user actions including skill installations, permission changes, API key operations, and team membership changes. Logs can be exported or integrated with your SIEM system.

Yes, Enterprise plans can be customized to meet your organization's specific needs including custom terms, dedicated support, volume pricing, and additional compliance requirements.