Episode 65
The Kernel: Skills, Commands, and Why the Model Doesn’t Matter
A skill is the kernel of an agentic system. It sits between the model and every action the agent takes, so you can swap the underlying model and nothing about how the work gets done has to change. This episode closes the Agentic OS miniseries: Tim Harting and Gavin Franklin break down skills and commands, the two core primitives of a portable agentic operating system, and how they work as version-controlled standard operating procedures that both people and agents can run.
Resources and downloads
The artifacts Greg’s team built for this episode, free to download.
The Kernel: Skills, Commands, and Why the Model Doesn’t Matter
Explains the kernel of an agentic system: skills and commands that sit between the model and every action, so the model can change while the contract does not. Breaks down the anatomy of a skill (frontmatter, tiers, and trigger phrases), the four skill tiers from core to contributor, and when to reach for a slash command versus letting a skill fire on natural language.
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