Skills teach aiChat how your team works. Write down your feasibility rules, naming conventions, or zoning shortcuts once, and aiChat follows them in every chat on the project.
What a skill is
A skill is a page of written instructions in Markdown. It tells aiChat when and why to act. aiChat's tools handle how. Open settings with the gear icon to see your skills in two lists: Core Skills from Giraffe and User Skills from your team.
Built-in skills
aiChat comes with these core skills:
Core Behavior: how aiChat works and answers. It's always on.
Layers: showing, hiding, filtering, and styling layers.
Sections: drawing, editing, and deleting buildings.
Summaries: quick totals and charts.
Usage Types: usage type assumptions.
Giraffe Analytics: measures, categories, and tabs in Analytics.
Content Library: content packs and Lightning Bolt flows.
GeoJSON Layers: map layers from your own data.
Regrid / Parcels: US parcel search.
AU Parcels: Australian parcel search.
Your region setting turns the two parcel skills on or off.
Turn a skill on or off
Click the switch next to a skill. A skill that's off sends nothing to the AI, so turning off skills you don't use saves tokens. Core skill switches are saved in your browser only.
Create a skill
Click + New next to User Skills.
Write the skill in the editor.
Click Save.
Double-click the name "New Skill" to rename it. Press
Enterto save the name.
OR
Click Upload, or drop .md files onto the User Skills list. Each file becomes a skill named after the file, switched on.
What to put in a skill
Click Help in settings for a full skill template. Good skills share a few habits:
Say when the skill applies, using the words people will type.
Explain when and why to act, not step-by-step how.
Include a few example requests.
Tell aiChat to ask when a request could mean two things.
Keep it short. Every skill adds to the cost of every message.
Edit, download, or remove a skill
Hover over a skill to see its buttons:
Edit content opens the editor. Press
Escor click Cancel to close it without saving.Download saves the skill as a .md file.
Replace file swaps a user skill's text for an uploaded file.
Remove deletes a user skill.
Drag a user skill by its handle to reorder the list. Click the arrow on a skill to read its text.
🚨 Warning: Remove deletes a user skill right away, with no confirmation. Download it first if you might want it back.
Change a core skill
Click Edit content on a core skill to change how aiChat handles that area. An edited skill shows a modified badge. Click Reset to default to go back to Giraffe's version.
Who sees your skills
User skills and core skill edits are saved to the project. Everyone who opens aiChat on that project gets them.