Agent skill · software engineering · mattpocock
scaffold-exercises
Create exercise directory structures with sections, problems, solutions, and explainers that pass linting. Use when user wants to scaffold exercises, create exercise stubs, or set up a new course section.
Why this skill is useful
Adds a structured directory scaffolding process with specific naming conventions and linting requirements that the AI wouldn't reliably generate on its own.
What it needs
Requires pnpm installed locally. About 2k tokens when loaded. Last updated 2026-08-06. 207,363 stars on the source repository.
What this skill does
Scaffold Exercises Create exercise directory structures that pass pnpm ai-hero-cli internal lint, then commit with git commit. Directory naming Sections: XX-section-name/ inside exercises/ (e.g., 01-retrieval-skill-building) Exercises: XX.YY-exercise-name/ inside a section (e.g., 01.03-retrieval-with-bm25) Section number = XX, exercise number = XX.YY Names are dash-case (lowercase, hyphens) Exercise variants Each exercise needs at least one of these subfolders: problem/ - student workspace with TODOs solution/ - reference implementation explainer/ - conceptual material, no TODOs When stubbing, default to explainer/ unless the plan specifies otherwise. Required files Each subfolder (problem/, solution/, explainer/) needs a readme.md that: Is not empty (must have real content, even a single title line works) Has no broken links When stubbing, create a minimal readme with a title and a description: If the subfolder has code, it also needs a main.ts (>1 line). But for stubs, a readme-only exercise is fine. Workflow 1. Parse the plan - extract section names, exercise names, and variant types 2. Create directories - mkdir -p for each path 3. Create stub readmes - one readme.md per variant folder with a title 4. Run lint - pnpm ai-hero-cli internal lint to validate 5. Fix any errors - iterate until lint passes Lint rules summary The linter (pnpm ai-hero-cli internal lint) checks: Each exercise has subfolders (problem/, solution/, explainer/) At least one of problem/, explainer/, or explainer.1/ exists readme.md exists and is non-empty in the primary subfolder No .gitkeep files No speaker-notes.md files No broken links in readmes No pnpm run exercise commands in readmes main.ts required per subfolder unless it's readme-only Moving/renaming exercises When renumbering or moving exercises: 1. Use git mv (not mv) to rename directories - preserves git history 2. Update the numeric prefix to maintain order 3. …
How to use it
Reference it in AdaL, Claude Code, Cursor or any coding agent — nothing to install:
@skills mattpocock/scaffold-exercises