Configuration#

SkillsCtl reads configuration from a YAML file at ~/.config/skillsctl/config.yaml. You can also override any setting with environment variables or command-line flags.

Initialize configuration#

Run the interactive setup to create the config file:

skillsctl config init

No configuration found. Let's set up skillsctl.

API URL [http://localhost:8080]: https://skills.corp.example.com
Skills directory [/home/you/.claude/skills]:

Config saved to /home/you/.config/skillsctl/config.yaml

This writes a config file with the values you entered. Run it again any time to change them.

View current configuration#

List all current configuration values:

skillsctl config list

api_url: https://skills.corp.example.com

Get a single value#

skillsctl config get api_url

https://skills.corp.example.com

Set a value#

skillsctl config set api_url https://skills-staging.corp.example.com

Updated api_url in /home/you/.config/skillsctl/config.yaml

Configuration options#

Key	Description	Default
`api_url`	Registry server URL	`http://localhost:8080`
`skills_dir`	Directory where skills are installed	`~/.claude/skills`

Environment variables#

Every configuration key has a corresponding environment variable with the SKILLCTL_ prefix and the key uppercased:

Environment variable	Config key	Example
`SKILLCTL_API_URL`	`api_url`	`https://skills.corp.example.com`

Environment variables are useful in CI/CD pipelines and containerized environments where you don’t want a config file on disk:

SKILLCTL_API_URL=https://skills.corp.example.com skillsctl explore

Precedence#

When the same setting is provided in multiple places, SkillsCtl uses this order (highest to lowest priority):

Flag - e.g. --api-url https://... on the command line
Environment variable - e.g. SKILLCTL_API_URL
Config file - ~/.config/skillsctl/config.yaml
Default - built-in default value

This means a flag on a single command always wins, making it easy to override the config for one-off operations without editing anything.

Config file format#

The config file is standard YAML:

api_url: https://skills.corp.example.com

You can edit it directly with any text editor. SkillsCtl writes config values with go.yaml.in/yaml/v3 directly (not Viper) so environment variables are never baked into the file.

Credentials file#

Authentication tokens are stored separately at ~/.config/skillsctl/credentials.json. This file is managed automatically by skillsctl auth login and skillsctl auth logout. Do not edit it manually.

Next steps#

Publishing skills - share skills with your team