#Skills — Reusable Playbooks Your AI Can Run

A skill is a saved playbook your AI can follow — a repeatable way to do something useful with your stuff, like filing a document, tracking what's expiring, or formatting a list for printing. You don't have to re-explain the steps each time. Just ask, and the assistant reaches for the right skill.

Skills come in two flavors: a starter set that everyone gets, and your own, which you can add. Both live together in your Skills folder.

#What It Does

Skills turn "how do I get the AI to do X the way I like?" into "just ask." Each skill is a short set of instructions the assistant follows, using your inventory, documents, tags, and location. The assistant notices when a request matches a skill and runs it — or you can ask for one by name.

Because skills are just instructions (not code), they're transparent: you can read exactly what a skill does, and edit your own.

#The Starter Set

Everyone gets a set of first-party skills, ready to run from day one. The everyday ones:

Auto-Filer — drop in a receipt, warranty, manual, or photo of paperwork and it gets classified, retitled, summarized, tagged, and filed in the right folder.
Renewals & Warranty Watch — scans your documents and inventory for expiry, renewal, and warranty-end dates, builds one sorted list, and sets reminders ahead of each.
Print / Share Pack Formatter — formats any collection or set of documents into a clean, print- or share-ready layout (checklist, table, grouped by location, with or without photos and values).

And skills that lean on what makes ambientChat different — your locations, beacons, and visit history:

Find-My / Last Seen — locate a misplaced item from where it was last seen and what's near you now. Ask "where did I leave my keys?" or "when was my passport last seen?"
Guided Tour / Storyteller — at a gallery, garden, shop, or museum, it narrates what's around you from the beacons and exhibits nearby — and can recap a past visit later.
Place Notes / Context-on-Arrival — surfaces your own relevant items, documents, and notes for wherever you are or are heading (GPS-based, no beacons needed). "What do I have for this place?"
Insurance-Ready Home Inventory — builds an insurer-ready pack — items with values, rooms, photos, and supporting receipts/warranties — and exports it as a document. "What's my stuff worth for insurance?"

These are read-only — they stay up to date automatically and you can't change them. (You can always add your own version alongside.)

#How to Use It

#The Skills button — tap to run

Every chat has a ⚡ Skills button that opens a menu of your skills — a shortcut for when you'd rather pick from a list than think of what to type. It's the answer to the blank-page moment of "what can I even ask?"

iOS: the ⚡ button sits in the row of controls just below the message box, next to the ☰ history menu.
Web: the ⚡ Skills button is in the chat header, top-right.

Tap it, then tap any skill in the list — it runs right there in the chat and you watch it work. That's also the easiest way to try out a skill you just created.

#Or just ask in chat

You never have to open the menu — describing the task works just as well:

"I just added a receipt — can you file it?" → runs Auto-Filer.
"What do I need to renew soon?" → runs Renewals & Warranty Watch.
"Format my Garage collection for printing." → runs Print / Share Pack Formatter.
"What skills can you run?" → the assistant lists everything available to you (the starter set plus any you've added).

#Adding Your Own Skill

You own your Skills folder, so you can add your own playbooks. The easiest way is to just describe it in chat — you don't have to write anything yourself.

Creating your own skills is part of a paid plan (Standard and up). On the free plan you get the full starter set and can run any of it — from the ⚡ menu or by asking. Upgrade when you want to build and save your own.

Ways to ask:

"Create a new skill that…"
"Turn what we just did into a skill."
"Save these steps as a skill called Trip Packer."
"Make a skill for formatting my wine collection as a printable list."

The assistant writes it up as a document in your Skills folder. Prefer to do it by hand? Write a markdown document and save it in that folder — anything in your Skills folder is treated as a skill.

A skill has three parts:

A clear name — how you'll refer to it ("Trip Packer").
A one-line description of when to use it — this is how the assistant knows to reach for it. Be specific: "Use when I'm packing for a trip and mention a destination and number of days" triggers far more reliably than "packing."
The steps you want followed, in plain English.

Example — a whole skill in one message:

"Create a skill called Trip Packer. Use it whenever I say I'm going on a trip and give a destination and how many days. Steps: 1) Check the weather for the destination. 2) Pull clothing and travel gear from my inventory that suits the trip. 3) Flag anything expiring while I'm away that I should use up first. 4) Build a checklist grouped by category and offer to save it as a document."

From then on, just say "run my Trip Packer" — or simply "I'm off to Denver for 3 days" — and the assistant follows your steps.

Reading and changing your skills: ask "show me my Trip Packer skill" to see exactly what it does, or "update my Trip Packer skill to also check my medications" to change it. Your own skills are private to you. The starter set is shared with everyone and can't be edited — but ask for "my own version" and you'll get an editable copy to tweak.

The ⚡ Skills menu is a live view of your Skills folder, so you can tidy it right there:

Reorder — press and hold a skill and drag it (iOS), or drag it (web), to set the order you want. Your arrangement sticks.
Folders — group related skills into subfolders inside your Skills folder. The ⚡ menu lets you open a folder and step back out via the breadcrumb at the top.
Share a skill or folder — tap the share icon on any of your own skills (or a subfolder) in the ⚡ menu to share it with a person, a group, or — if you're a superuser — everyone. A small badge shows what you've already shared and with how many people. The starter set is already shared with everyone; skills someone else shared with you aren't re-shareable from here.

#Using Your Skills in Claude or ChatGPT

Your skills travel. If you connect ambientChat to Claude or ChatGPT (via the MCP integration — see "MCP Tools"), those assistants can list and run your skills too, working against your real inventory and documents.

#Exporting a skill to take elsewhere

Want a skill as a file you can drop into another AI app? Ask "export my Trip Packer skill" and you'll get a download link to a .zip containing the skill plus a short "how to connect ambientChat" readme. Load it into Claude, ChatGPT, or a command-line AI as a custom instruction; once that app is connected to your ambientChat, the skill runs against your real data there too. Great for sharing a skill or moving it between assistants.

#Tips & Tricks

Be specific in a skill's description. The description is how the assistant knows when to reach for it. "Use when I drop in a receipt or warranty" triggers far more reliably than "filing."
Let it suggest (Standard and up). On a paid plan you usually don't need to name a skill — describe the task and the assistant picks the right one for you. On the free plan, reach for a skill yourself: tap it in the ⚡ Skills menu or ask for it by name.
Not sure where to start? Open the ⚡ menu. It's the quickest way to see everything you can run.
Read before you trust. Ask "show me the Auto-Filer skill" to see exactly what it does.

#Known Limitations

Skills are instructions, not code. They guide the assistant through steps using your existing tools; they don't run custom scripts or generate pixel-perfect files (that's coming later). For most everyday tasks, instructions are all you need.
The starter set is read-only. You can't edit the first-party skills — but you can create your own version with the changes you want.
Quality depends on your data. A filing or renewals skill can only work with the documents and items you've added.

#Version History

Version	Date	What Changed
1	2026-06-27	Initial guide — starter set, asking in chat, adding your own, using in Claude/ChatGPT
2	2026-07-09	Organizing & sharing — reorder, subfolders/drill-in, and sharing a skill or subfolder from the ⚡ menu
2	2026-07-06	Expanded "Adding Your Own Skill" with example asks and a worked Trip Packer example
3	2026-07-09	Added the ⚡ Skills launcher (tap-to-run, iOS + web), the location/beacon starter skills (Find-My, Guided Tour, Place Notes, Insurance-Ready Inventory), plan notes (creating your own = Standard+; auto-suggest = Standard+), and exporting a skill as a downloadable bundle

Skills — Reusable Playbooks Your AI Can Run