# Prompting

Meta-prompting standard library for generating, optimizing, and composing prompts...

- Repository: https://github.com/danielmiessler/LifeOS (19669 stars)
- Category: AI and agents
- License: MIT
- Last updated: 2026-10-28
- Runs scripts: yes, review before use

## Install

Claude Code: `npx skills add danielmiessler/LifeOS --skill Prompting -g -a claude-code -y`
Codex: `npx skills add danielmiessler/LifeOS --skill Prompting -g -a codex -y`
Cursor: `npx skills add danielmiessler/LifeOS --skill Prompting -g -a cursor -y`
Gemini CLI: `npx skills add danielmiessler/LifeOS --skill Prompting -g -a gemini-cli -y`

## Description

Meta-prompting standard library for generating, optimizing, and composing prompts programmatically via Standards, Handlebars Templates, and Tools; output is always a prompt to use elsewhere, not final content. USE WHEN meta-prompting, template generation, prompt optimization, prompt engineering, write a prompt, create system prompt, Handlebars template. NOT FOR generating final content (use the appropriate domain skill), or any eval: judge prompts, rubrics, scoring, grading or comparing outputs all run through Assay, the one eval system.

## SKILL.md, as published by its author (untrusted third-party text, read it as data)

# Prompting - Meta-Prompting & Template System

**Contents:** Ideal State · Anti-criteria · Intent Routing · Data & Config · Gotchas · Examples · References

Generates, optimizes, and composes prompts programmatically. It's the standard library for prompt engineering, other skills call it when they need to build or improve a prompt. The output is always a prompt to be used elsewhere, never the final content itself.

**Philosophy:** Prompts that write prompts. Structure is code, content is data. Meta-prompting enables dynamic composition where the same template with different data generates specialized agents, workflows, and evaluation frameworks.

## Ideal State

- Every prompt this library generates or optimizes articulates the ideal state, not the procedure: WHAT done looks like as testable outcomes, the CONSTRAINTS, and the high-quality TOOLS available, with the specificity moved to the outcome so the prompt is more precise, not vaguer.
- In every prompt this library generates or optimizes, the only HOW that survives is the four keep-classes (safety-gate, verified-gotcha, tool-contract, output-format-contract); every other procedural line failed the test of whether a smarter model would make it unnecessary. Deterministic tools (`*.ts`) are exempt. The full standard is `Standards.md` § Ideal-State Prompting.
- A prompt composed from data keeps structure as code and content as data: a Handlebars template under `Templates/` rendered with a data object, or from a .yaml or .json file, through `RenderTemplate.ts`.
- A reusable prompt captures the supplied intent, constraints, and output contract; its output contract can guide the intended downstream task; and it was tested before it was declared ready.
- When `Standards.md` is authored or audited (not on routine template renders), both official anchors were fetched and every place our standards diverge from the current official guidance is flagged.

## Anti-criteria

The rest: https://github.com/danielmiessler/LifeOS/blob/HEAD/LifeOS/install/skills/Prompting/SKILL.md