Give your agent the Markata skill

Let's be honest: a lot of websites get built alongside coding agents. Give the agent the instructions that ship with Markata, rather than a stale prompt found in a chat.

The skill is bundled with the Go binary; you don't need a separate installer or a proprietary cloud service.

1. Open your site repository

cd my-site
markata agent list-agents

This prints the agent identifiers and their project/global skill locations. Supported harnesses include OpenCode, Codex, Claude Code, Cursor, GitHub Copilot, Gemini CLI, and more.

2. Install the skill

Use auto-detection (fallback: portable .agents/skills/markata-go-site/):

markata agent install

Or choose your harness explicitly:

markata agent install --agent opencode
markata agent install --agent claude-code
markata agent install --agent codex

Run only the command for the agent you use. For Claude Code, the project skill goes in .claude/skills/markata-go-site/; for a universal project install, it goes in .agents/skills/markata-go-site/.

If you work across many site repositories, install globally with an explicit agent:

markata agent install --agent opencode --global

3. Check it

markata agent doctor

On a Markata upgrade, bring your skill up to date:

markata agent update
markata agent doctor

Use --dry-run on install or update to preview paths, or markata agent install --force to overwrite local customizations.

4. Start with a small instruction

Read the installed Markata site skill and the current configuration. Create a draft Markdown post about what this site is for. Do not change the theme, plugins, or deployment setup. Show me the file and run a fast build to check it.

Agents can inspect the site with:

markata config show
markata list posts
markata explain content
markata build --fast

Keep a human in the loop for publishing and deployment. Markata's skill guides agents through frontmatter, themes, feed patterns, templates, site builds, and when not to create a plugin.

Fixes

• If the wrong harness is detected, pass --agent explicitly.
• If no skill is found, run markata agent install --dry-run and check the reported destination.
• After upgrading the binary, run markata agent doctor and then markata agent update.
• Keep the installed skill with your site's source control when you want a reproducible project setup.

Next: Write your first post or Quickstart.