Skeletons

Skeletons are agent templates that don’t generate JSON files. They exist only to be inherited by other agents.

Purpose

Use skeletons to:

Create reusable configuration components
Define common tool settings
Build agent templates
Organize complex inheritance hierarchies

Declaration

Mark an agent as a skeleton with skeleton = true:

[agents]
git-base = { skeleton = true }

kg will skip generating ~/.kiro/agents/git-base.json but the configuration is available for inheritance.

Example: Git Permissions

Create a skeleton with git commands:

[agents.git-readonly]
skeleton = true

[agents.git-readonly.toolsSettings.execute_bash]
allowedCommands = [
    "git status .*",
    "git fetch .*",
    "git diff .*",
    "git log .*"
]
autoAllowReadonly = true

Use it in real agents:

[agents.rust]
inherits = ["git-readonly"]
allowedTools = ["@rustdocs", "@cargo"]

Example: Permission Levels

Create a hierarchy of permission skeletons:

[agents.git-readonly]
skeleton = true
[agents.git-readonly.toolsSettings.execute_bash]
allowedCommands = ["git status .*", "git fetch .*", "git diff .*"]

[agents.git-write]
skeleton = true
inherits = ["git-readonly"]
[agents.git-write.toolsSettings.execute_bash]
allowedCommands = ["git add .*", "git commit .*"]

[agents.git-full]
skeleton = true
inherits = ["git-write"]
[agents.git-full.toolsSettings.execute_bash]
allowedCommands = ["git push .*", "git pull .*"]

Then use them:

[agents.reviewer]
inherits = ["git-readonly"]

[agents.developer]
inherits = ["git-write"]

[agents.maintainer]
inherits = ["git-full"]

Validation

Skeletons appear in kg validate output but are marked as templates:

kg validate

They won’t appear in the generated agents directory.

Best Practices

Use descriptive names that indicate purpose (git-readonly, not git1)
Keep skeletons focused on a single concern
Document what each skeleton provides
Avoid deep skeleton-only inheritance chains (max 2-3 levels)

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