Agent skills

Vertique’s agent skills help your coding agent work from the framework documentation packaged with the versions your application uses.

• Answers matched to your dependencies. The knowledge skill reads each module’s reference from its resolved JAR, including configuration, extension points, and Dagger wiring.
• Help choosing what to include. Ask which starter or archetype fits your application, or which modules you need for a capability. Starter composition comes from the versioned module reference; archetype guidance is maintained in the skill.
• A source you can check. Packaged-document output identifies the artifact version and JAR hash. When the tool needs a project or version to resolve a question, it asks for that input.

Use the skills when creating an application, adding a framework capability, or diagnosing wiring and configuration. The Quickstart is the hands-on path to your first running application, and Application model explains what your code and the framework each own.

Install the skills

The companion vertique-skills repository provides vertique-knowledge in the Agent Skills format. It includes integrations for Claude Code, OpenAI Codex CLI, GitHub Copilot, and Cursor.

1. Have Node.js 18 or newer and Maven available on your PATH. Maven retrieves artifact documentation when it is not already in your local repository.
2. Follow the installation instructions for your coding agent to add the repository and enable its skills.
3. Open your Vertique application in the agent and confirm vertique-knowledge is available. Start with the module containing the application’s pom.xml if you use a multi-module build.

The skills are an agent-side tool and add no runtime dependency to your application. Installation steps stay in the companion repository so you can follow the instructions for your agent’s plugin mechanism.

Ask about your application

Start by asking the agent to establish the version and module inventory:

Use vertique-knowledge to identify this application's Vertique version and list its
modules, including annotation processors. Read the matching module references before
suggesting changes.

Then ask a concrete question about the feature you want to build:

Use vertique-knowledge to explain what vertique-starter-rest includes at the version
this application uses, and which Dagger modules my application component should include.

You can also ask which starter fits a headless service, how a module’s configuration is wired, or which reference explains a missing generated binding. Ask the agent to name the artifact version it read and cite the relevant module reference in its answer.

Check the knowledge from a terminal

The same knowledge tool is available directly, without an agent plugin. The following commands come from the companion project’s CLI quickstart. Run them from your Vertique application’s root directory.

npx --yes github:vertiquehq/vertique-skills knowledge resolve

The output identifies the Vertique version and how it was determined, normally through the application parent and imported BOM. To inspect the application’s declared modules and annotation processor paths, run:

npx --yes github:vertiquehq/vertique-skills knowledge list

To read a starter’s complete packaged reference, run:

npx --yes github:vertiquehq/vertique-skills knowledge module vertique-starter-rest

The document output includes the selected version, resolution provenance, and archive hash. If the project or artifact cannot be resolved, the tool reports the missing input and does not substitute documentation from another version. The GitHub invocation above uses the companion repository’s default branch. Its code version is separate from the framework version being read.

How version matching works

The tool reads your POM, the Vertique application parent, and the imported BOM to determine which artifact version to read. Explicit coordinates and direct dependency versions are also supported. Normal version detection reads POM files without running your application’s build. Resolving an effective Maven graph is a separate, explicit option.

The canonical module reference lives inside the artifact at META-INF/vertique/module.md. The tool reads a local Maven copy when available. Otherwise Maven acquires the artifact using your repository configuration. The CLI’s --offline option restricts artifact lookup to your local Maven repository. It does not prevent npx from acquiring the CLI itself.

When working in the Vertique framework source tree, the tool can read the checked-out module reference and identifies it as working-tree content. An explicit version selects a published artifact instead. If a particular version has no packaged reference, the tool reports that absence.

When the tool needs more information

Situation	What to provide
A multi-module project has no single application version	Point --project at the relevant application module.
The project uses Gradle or has no detectable Vertique version	Supply the framework version with --version.
An artifact is unavailable in offline mode	Make it available in the local Maven repository or allow artifact retrieval.
A release has no packaged module reference	Inspect that release’s source or other version-specific documentation. Do not assume a different release has the same contract.

Use Testing to verify the changes the agent makes. Version-matched documentation gives the agent the right contract. Compilation and tests show whether your application follows it.

Learn more

• Vertique skills: installation and supported coding agents.
• Knowledge CLI quickstart: commands, output, and resolution options.
• Artifacts: application parent, BOM, starters, and dependencies.
• Dependency injection: application components and generated wiring.

Continue reading

• Previous: Quickstart
• Next: Application model