boost-skill-cli 1.0.3

boost — Homebrew for AI coding skills

boost — a package manager for AI coding skills

boost is a CLI that finds, installs, and keeps track of AI coding skills pulled from GitHub-hosted registries, then hooks them straight into Claude Code, Windsurf, and Cursor in one pass. Instead of hand-copying skill files into three different agent folders and hoping you remember to update all of them, you run one command.

What's a "skill," exactly?

A skill is just a SKILL.md file — Markdown plus a bit of YAML up top — that gives an AI agent a repeatable capability: a workflow to follow, a set of house rules, or some domain knowledge it wouldn't otherwise have. Agents like Claude Code pick these up automatically out of ~/.claude/skills/.

Where it gets tedious is everything around that file: tracking down good skills, wiring each one into every agent you use, keeping versions in sync, and handing them off to teammates. That's the part boost takes over — package-manager mechanics for skills, in the same spirit as Homebrew for Mac binaries or npm for JS packages.

Install

Needs Python 3.9+ and git.

pipx install boost-skill-cli        # or: pip install boost-skill-cli
boost --version
boost tap --defaults          # pull in the 5 starter registries

Want the whole ecosystem instead of the starter set? boost ships a curated registry catalog — 90+ classified GitHub registries of skills, Cursor/Windsurf rules, and Claude Code workflows (slash commands & subagents), collectively indexing thousands of items:

boost tap --catalog --dry-run                 # browse the classified catalog
boost tap --catalog --type skill --limit 20   # tap the 20 biggest skill packs
boost tap --catalog --type rule               # every rules registry
boost tap --catalog --category security       # filter by category

boost indexes three item kinds out of the same registries: SKILL.md skills, .mdc/.cursorrules/.windsurfrules rules, and command/agent workflows (Markdown under commands/·agents/·workflows/, or carrying subagent frontmatter). Rules and workflows are searchable today; only skills install.

Or run it straight from a checkout — the runtime is stdlib-only, so there's nothing to install beyond the shim:

git clone https://github.com/jonnyeclectic/boost ~/.boost-src
ln -s ~/.boost-src/boost ~/bin/boost        # anywhere on PATH works

Under the hood

boost pulls down registries, indexes them into a local cache, drops installed skills into one canonical store, and then symlinks them out to whichever agents you've got — all of it tracked in a lock file so state stays reproducible.

GitHub registries  ──boost update──▶  ~/.boost/repos/    (shallow clones)
                                     ~/.boost/cache/    (JSON catalogs)
                   ──boost install─▶  ~/.agents/skills/ (canonical store)
                                     .skill-lock.json  (v3 lock file)
                   ────symlinks───▶  ~/.claude/skills/  ~/.windsurf/skills/  ~/.cursor/skills/

The usual workflow

boost search jira          # look across every tapped registry (AI-ranked when available)
boost install my-jira      # copy, link, lock — with a quality score attached
boost doctor               # sanity check: broken links, lock drift, stale taps

# hand the whole setup to a team:
boost bundle dump > Boostfile     # everyone else runs: boost bundle install

72 commands, organized into 8 groups

boost --help prints the full grouped command list; for a visual tour see docs/overview.html.

Group	Commands
Package Management	install · uninstall · sync · update · reinstall · bundle · import · migrate · pin · unpin · snapshot · export
Discovery & Search	search · discover · recommend · browse · index · trending · stats · count
Skill Information	list · info · cat · edit · preview · explain · log · home · deps · tag
Registry (Taps)	tap · untap · taps · outdated
Intelligence	distill · simulate · infer · absorb · evolve · context · focus · impact
Quality & Health	doctor · lint · audit · verify · drift · test · fingerprint · quarantine · decay · heal · conflict · changelog · attest · health
Configuration	config · clean · create · policy · onboard · completions · schedule · serve · mcp · self-update
Team & Collaboration	cohort · profile · protocol · pulse · replay · who

The AI-assisted commands (search --smart, explain, distill, infer, absorb, evolve, simulate, …) call out to the claude CLI when it's available on your PATH (or ANTHROPIC_API_KEY is set), and fall back to plain heuristics when it isn't — so the tool still works without an API key, just less cleverly.

Working on boost

# everything runs under a disposable HOME, so nothing touches your real setup:
export HOME=/tmp/boost-sandbox && mkdir -p $HOME
python3 tests/make_fixture.py /tmp/fixture-tap
./boost tap /tmp/fixture-tap
./boost install brainstorming
./boost doctor

Standard-library Python only — no third-party runtime dependencies. Every path under ~/.boost and ~/.agents/skills is resolved from $HOME at call time, which is what makes the sandboxing above possible.

Test suite

Three layers, all enforced (make check runs the full set; CI runs the same thing):

Layer	What it does	Gate
make test	pytest across tests/unit/ (every core module) and tests/functional/ (drives all 72 commands in-process against sandboxed homes)	≥80% line coverage of boost_cli (fail_under in pyproject.toml)
make smoke	tests/smoke.sh — 152 checks run through the actual ./boost shim (--online also hits real registries)	all pass
make mutation	mutmut mutates boost_cli/core (~2,600 mutants) and reruns the unit suite against each one	≥80% killed (scripts/mutation_gate.py)

Dev setup: make venv (pulls in pytest, coverage, mutmut — the shipped runtime itself stays dependency-free). Every test run uses a throwaway $HOME, so your actual agent configs are never at risk.