Slash commands & subagents
Slash commands
A markdown file in ~/.claude/commands/ becomes /<filename>. It is a prompt
template — you invoke it, so it always fires, unlike a skill.
---
description: Shown in the / menu
argument-hint: "[what to pass]"
allowed-tools: Read, Grep, Bash
---
Instructions. $ARGUMENTS is substituted.
In this kit
| Command | Does |
|---|---|
/papercut [friction] | Logs small frictions to PAPERCUTS.md — the retries, undocumented steps, misleading errors |
/skills-sync | Updates third-party skills and reports what changed in the instructions, not just version numbers |
/papercut is worth the habit. None of those frictions deserve a ticket
individually; together they show exactly where a repo needs sanding down.
Skill vs command
| Fires when | Use for | |
|---|---|---|
| Skill | the model decides its description matches | capabilities that should apply automatically |
| Command | you type it | procedures you want to trigger deliberately |
A procedure you want control over is a command. /papercut is a command
because sweeping a session for frictions should never start on its own.
There was a /plan-challenge here. It was cut once grilling turned up doing
the same job better — the lesson being to check what is installed before writing
a fourth version of it.
Subagents
A markdown file in ~/.claude/agents/. Each runs in its own context window
with its own tools and model.
---
name: reviewer
description: When to dispatch this agent
tools: Read, Grep, Glob, Bash
model: opus
---
System prompt for the agent.
In this kit
| Agent | Model | For |
|---|---|---|
explorer | sonnet | Read-only search that returns conclusions, not file dumps |
reviewer | opus | Correctness, regressions, wiring, tests, docs |
security | opus | Trust boundaries, authz, secrets, data exposure — concrete exploitability only |
Why they exist
Context economy. The main session should get "auth is wired in
src/auth/guard.ts:42, used by 6 modules", not forty files. That is the whole
argument for explorer.
House rules (also in CLAUDE.md): never Fable, never more than 5 at a
time, one task each.
More
wshobson/agents is a large multi-harness subagent marketplace worth mining.