plugins-reference
Claude Code plugins configuration reference. Use when creating plugins, bundling commands/agents/hooks/skills/MCP servers, setting up marketplaces, or distributing extensions.
What this skill does
# Claude Code Plugins Reference
Plugins bundle commands, agents, skills, hooks, and MCP servers into distributable packages.
## Plugin Structure
```
my-plugin/
├── .claude-plugin/
│ └── plugin.json # Required: plugin manifest
├── commands/ # Slash commands
│ └── deploy.md
├── agents/ # Subagent definitions
│ └── reviewer.md
├── skills/ # Agent skills
│ └── api-patterns/
│ └── SKILL.md
├── hooks/
│ └── hooks.json # Hook configurations
├── .mcp.json # MCP server configs
└── .lsp.json # LSP server configs
```
## plugin.json Manifest
```json
{
"name": "my-plugin",
"version": "1.0.0",
"description": "Plugin description",
"author": {
"name": "Author Name",
"email": "[email protected]"
},
"keywords": ["keyword1", "keyword2"]
}
```
## Required vs Optional Fields
| Field | Required | Description |
|-------|----------|-------------|
| `name` | Yes | Unique identifier (kebab-case) |
| `version` | No | Semantic version |
| `description` | No | Brief description |
| `author` | No | Author info |
| `commands` | No | Custom command paths |
| `agents` | No | Custom agent paths |
| `skills` | No | Custom skill paths |
| `hooks` | No | Hook config path/object |
| `mcpServers` | No | MCP config path/object |
| `lspServers` | No | LSP config path/object |
## Installation Scopes
| Scope | Location | Use Case |
|-------|----------|----------|
| `user` | `~/.claude/settings.json` | Personal (default) |
| `project` | `.claude/settings.json` | Team shared |
| `local` | `.claude/settings.local.json` | Project, gitignored |
## Plugin Commands
**Install plugin**:
```bash
/plugin install plugin-name@marketplace
claude plugin install plugin-name@marketplace --scope project
```
**Uninstall plugin**:
```bash
/plugin uninstall plugin-name
```
**Enable/Disable**:
```bash
/plugin enable plugin-name
/plugin disable plugin-name
```
**Update plugin**:
```bash
/plugin update plugin-name
```
**Validate plugin**:
```bash
/plugin validate ./path/to/plugin
claude plugin validate ./path/to/plugin
```
## Marketplace Setup
### marketplace.json
```json
{
"name": "my-marketplace",
"owner": {
"name": "Team Name"
},
"plugins": [
{
"name": "plugin-name",
"source": "./plugins/plugin-name",
"description": "Plugin description"
}
]
}
```
### Marketplace Commands
```bash
# Add marketplace
/plugin marketplace add owner/repo
/plugin marketplace add https://gitlab.com/org/plugins.git
# Update marketplaces
/plugin marketplace update
# List marketplaces
/plugin marketplace list
```
## Plugin Sources
### Relative Path
```json
{ "source": "./plugins/my-plugin" }
```
### GitHub
```json
{
"source": {
"source": "github",
"repo": "owner/repo"
}
}
```
### Git URL
```json
{
"source": {
"source": "url",
"url": "https://gitlab.com/org/plugin.git"
}
}
```
## Environment Variable
Use `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}` in hooks and MCP configs:
```json
{
"hooks": {
"PostToolUse": [{
"hooks": [{
"type": "command",
"command": "${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}/scripts/format.sh"
}]
}]
}
}
```
## Project-Required Plugins
Add to `.claude/settings.json`:
```json
{
"extraKnownMarketplaces": {
"company-tools": {
"source": {
"source": "github",
"repo": "org/claude-plugins"
}
}
},
"enabledPlugins": {
"formatter@company-tools": true
}
}
```
## Common Issues
| Issue | Solution |
|-------|----------|
| Plugin not loading | Check `plugin.json` syntax |
| Commands missing | Ensure `commands/` at root, not in `.claude-plugin/` |
| Hooks not firing | Check script permissions (`chmod +x`) |
| MCP fails | Use `${CLAUDE_PLUGIN_ROOT}` for paths |
## Debugging
```bash
# Debug mode shows plugin loading
claude --debug
# Check for errors
/plugin # Navigate to Errors tab
```
---
For complete documentation, see:
- [plugins-full.md](plugins-full.md) - Plugin creation guide
- [plugins-tech-reference.md](plugins-tech-reference.md) - Complete technical reference
- [marketplace.md](marketplace.md) - Marketplace distribution
Related in AI Agents
skill-development
IncludedComprehensive meta-skill for creating, managing, validating, auditing, and distributing Claude Code skills and slash commands (unified in v2.1.3+). Provides skill templates, creation workflows, validation patterns, audit checklists, naming conventions, YAML frontmatter guidance, progressive disclosure examples, and best practices lookup. Use when creating new skills, validating existing skills, auditing skill quality, understanding skill architecture, needing skill templates, learning about YAML frontmatter requirements, progressive disclosure patterns, tool restrictions (allowed-tools), skill composition, skill naming conventions, troubleshooting skill activation issues, creating custom slash commands, configuring command frontmatter, using command arguments ($ARGUMENTS, $1, $2), bash execution in commands, file references in commands, command namespacing, plugin commands, MCP slash commands, Skill tool configuration, or deciding between skills vs slash commands. Delegates to docs-management skill for official documentation.
reprompter
IncludedTransform messy prompts into well-structured, effective prompts — single or multi-agent. Use when: "reprompt", "reprompt this", "clean up this prompt", "structure my prompt", rough text needing XML tags and best practices, "reprompter teams", "repromptception", "run with quality", "smart run", "smart agents", multi-agent tasks, audits, parallel work, anything going to agent teams. Don't use when: simple Q&A, pure chat, immediate execution-only tasks. See "Don't Use When" section for details. Outputs: Structured XML/Markdown prompt, quality score (before/after), optional team brief + per-agent sub-prompts, agent team output files. Success criteria: Single mode quality score ≥ 7/10; Repromptception per-agent prompt quality score 8+/10; all required sections present, actionable and specific.
adaptive-compaction
IncludedAdaptive add-on policy and recovery layer that decides WHEN to compact, prune, snapshot, or fork -- replacing fixed-percent auto-compaction across Claude Code, Codex, and MCP-capable hosts. Trigger on auto-compact timing or damage: "when should I compact", "is it safe to compact now or start a fresh session", "auto-compact fires too early/mid-task", "switching to an unrelated task but the window still has space", "context rot", "answers get worse the longer the session runs", "the agent forgot the plan or my decisions after it summarized", "add a layer on top that manages context without changing the agent", raising autoCompactWindow to give the policy room, or installing/tuning a cross-tool compaction policy or PreCompact hook -- even when "compaction" is never said but the problem is context-window pressure or post-summarization memory loss. Do NOT use to summarize a conversation, build RAG, write a summarization prompt (decides WHEN not HOW), or answer max-context-length trivia.
agent-skill-creator
IncludedCreate cross-platform agent skills from workflow descriptions. Activates when users ask to create an agent, automate a repetitive workflow, create a custom skill, or need advanced agent creation. Triggers on phrases like create agent for, automate workflow, create skill for, every day I have to, daily I need to, turn process into agent, need to automate, create a cross-platform skill, validate this skill, export this skill, migrate this skill. Supports single skills, multi-agent suites, transcript processing, template-based creation, interactive configuration, cross-platform export, and spec validation.
llm-wiki
IncludedUse when building or maintaining a persistent personal knowledge base (second brain) in Obsidian where an LLM incrementally ingests sources, updates entity/concept pages, maintains cross-references, and keeps a synthesis current. Triggers include "second brain", "Obsidian wiki", "personal knowledge management", "ingest this paper/article/book", "build a research wiki", "compound knowledge", "Memex", or whenever the user wants knowledge to accumulate across sessions instead of being re-derived by RAG on every query.
skill-master
IncludedAgent Skills authoring, evaluation, and optimization. Create, edit, validate, benchmark, and improve skills following the agentskills.io specification. Use when designing SKILL.md files, structuring skill folders (references, scripts, assets), ingesting external documentation into skills, running trigger evals, benchmarking skill quality, optimizing descriptions, or performing blind A/B comparisons. Keywords: agentskills.io, SKILL.md, skill authoring, eval, benchmark, trigger optimization.