Paper refactors Agent skill protocol to solve context crowding
Zachly · x · 2026-08-18
The paper Attention is All You Have argues that dumping 56,804 skill descriptions into the system prompt causes attention scarcity and reliability collapse. The proposed protocol decouples installation:
- Addressing: Paths target skills/subtrees for zero-residency reading.
- Persistence: :save copies skills to the project's git tree.
- Triggering: :install adds only a .gitignore-style line, costing minimal prompt space.
This separation eliminates the token tax by dividing content, persistence, and auto-triggering.
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