Control Agent Skill

Apply the principle of Control — the level of autonomy a system gives the user, and how that level should be matched to the user''s…

Context cost
5.3k tokensestimated from the bundle, loaded when it triggers
Bundle
2 files · 21.3 kBtext throughout, nothing executable
Licence
Apache-2.0the author’s own terms
Last change
—no release on file
Servers it uses
Noneruns standalone

What it does

Apply the principle of Control — the level of autonomy a system gives the user, and how that level should be matched to the user''s expertise and the task''s stakes. Use when designing for novice vs. expert audiences, choosing between fully automated and manually controlled behaviors, deciding what to expose vs. abstract away, or building products that span experience levels (a tool a beginner will use once and an expert will use thousands of times). Too much control overwhelms novices; too little frustrates experts. The skill is calibrating control to the user, the task, and the moment.

What this skill changes about the agent has not been set out here as a list. Its SKILL.md, shown below, says it in the author’s own words.

design
Filed under

Design & Media

The skill itself

A skill is instructions the model reads, so you can see what you are getting: below is the start of its SKILL.md. The front matter loads with every session, the body loads when the skill triggers, and the whole file comes with the install.

SKILL.md13.5 kB · preview
--- name: control ---
6# Control
7
8> **Definition.** Control is the degree of authority and decision-making the system delegates to the user. A high-control system exposes parameters, asks for choices, and lets the user direct outcomes; a low-control system makes decisions on the user's behalf, hiding parameters and presenting outcomes. Neither is universally better. The right level of control depends on the user's expertise, the stakes of the task, and how often the user will perform the task.
9
10The classic illustration: a microwave. A novice user wants three buttons — popcorn, defrost, reheat. An expert wants the panel of granular options — exact wattage, time in seconds, multi-stage cooking sequences. A microwave that exposes only the three buttons frustrates the expert; a microwave that exposes only the granular panel intimidates the novice. The well-designed microwave does both: large simple presets up front, granular controls available but tucked away.
11
12The same problem appears in software a hundred times a day. A photo editor for a casual user is "auto-enhance"; for a professional, it's curves, levels, masks, and color spaces. A code editor for a beginner is "run this script"; for an expert, it's customizable shortcuts, plugin systems, and direct shell access. The challenge is rarely "what should this product do" but "how much control over the doing should the user have."
13
14## Why control matters
15
16The principle named "control" in the design literature is sometimes also called "user agency" or "user autonomy" — different traditions, same problem. The effect is well-documented: users with appropriately calibrated control perform tasks faster, with fewer errors, and report higher satisfaction. Users with insufficient control feel constrained and frustrated; users with excessive control feel overwhelmed and paralyzed.
17
18The cost of miscalibration is paid in a few specific ways. **Novices facing too much control freeze.** They can't decide which option matters and which doesn't, and either pick poorly (defaulting to whichever is most prominent) or abandon the task. **Experts facing too little control work around the system.** They open external tools, write scripts, find hacks. The work-arounds are often less reliable than the system would be if it just exposed the controls the experts need. **Mid-level users — neither novice nor expert — get the worst of both.** A simplified UI that experts work around is usually also too simplified to teach anyone how the underlying system works, leaving mid-level users perpetually stuck.
19
20## Three dimensions of control
21
22Control is not a single dial but several interacting dimensions.
23
24**Granularity.** How fine-grained are the choices? "Loud / Medium / Quiet" is low-granularity; a continuous slider with 0–100 is high-granularity. Granularity affects how precisely the user can express intent and how much cognitive effort each choice requires.
This is a preview of SKILL.md. Download or install the skill to get the whole thing.
In the file
SKILL.md2,075 words
Files2
LicenceApache-2.0
Why you can read it

Nothing in a skill executes. The client loads the text and the model follows it, so a skill can be audited the way a runbook is — by reading it.

What it costs in context

Skills are not billed by the call. They are paid for in context: every token the instructions occupy is a token your code, your diff and your conversation cannot use. Here is what this one takes and when it takes it.

≈160
always loaded
The name and description, so the model knows the skill exists and when to reach for it.
5,165
on trigger
The instruction body and 1 supporting file, read only when the skill fires.
2.7%
of a 200k window
Ten skills this size would take about 27% of the window before you open a file.
050k100k150k200k context window

5.3k tokens, estimated from the bundle at four bytes to the token, held for the rest of the session once it triggers. Heavy. Teams tend to install this one per project rather than globally, and load it only when the job comes up.

Servers bill, skills cost

A server charges by the month. A skill charges once per session, in context, and then keeps charging it for as long as the session lives.

Before and after

The same question, put to the same model twice: once as it comes, and once with these instructions loaded.

No worked example has been published for this skill yet.

The procedure it runs

The procedure has not been set out here step by step. It is in the body of its SKILL.md: the start of it is shown above, and the whole file comes with the install.

Prose, not code

These steps are written for a model to follow, not executed by a runtime. It can still be told to skip one, and it will say so when it does.

Servers it uses

None. This skill calls no MCP servers at all.

Everything it needs is in the instructions, so it works in a project with nothing connected — the model reads the file and changes how it works with what it can already reach.

Its SKILL.md does not declare which tools it asks the agent for, so what it touches is whatever the instructions themselves ask for — read them before you install it.

What it asks for
Writes filesnot declared
Network accessnot declared

This SKILL.md carries no allowed-tools line, so neither is declared. A skill grants no permissions of its own — it can only ask for tools your client already has.

What it will not do

Every skill is narrow, and the useful ones say where they stop. These are the jobs this one is the wrong tool for.

What this skill is not for has not been published here. Nothing is implied by that: it is a section the author has not filled in.

What is in the bundle

2 files, 21.3 kB on disk. A bundle is text throughout: the instructions the model reads, plus the templates it fills in.

  • SKILL.md13.5 kB
  • references/lineage.md7.8 kB
What is not in it

No dependencies and nothing executable: a skill is text the agent reads, so the bundle is 2 files you can review in full before installing. The Apache-2.0 licence covers the templates and examples as well as the instructions.

Install

Installing copies the bundle into your project. Nothing runs at install time — the files sit on disk until the model reads them.

# Control · 5.3k tokens when loaded · macOS, Linux mkdir -p .claude/skills && t=$(mktemp -d) && curl -fsSL -o "$t/bundle.tar.gz" https://mcprush.com/api/skills/control/bundle.tar.gz && tar -xzf "$t/bundle.tar.gz" -C "$t" && [ -d "$t/control" ] && { [ ! -e .claude/skills/control ] || { mv .claude/skills/control "$t/.previous" && echo "Previous copy moved to $t/.previous"; }; } && mv "$t/control" .claude/skills/ && echo "Installed .claude/skills/control"
On Windows, or any OS with Node 20+
npx mcprush@latest skill add hashgraph-online/control

Windows PowerShell says 'running scripts is disabled on this system'? Run Set-ExecutionPolicy -Scope CurrentUser RemoteSigned once, or type npx.cmd instead of npx (codex.cmd, gemini.cmd, grok.cmd likewise). PowerShell 7 needs neither. Writes to .claude/skills/control/ in the current project. For every project instead, run mkdir -p ~/.claude/skills && t=$(mktemp -d) && curl -fsSL -o "$t/bundle.tar.gz" https://mcprush.com/api/skills/control/bundle.tar.gz && tar -xzf "$t/bundle.tar.gz" -C "$t" && [ -d "$t/control" ] && { [ ! -e ~/.claude/skills/control ] || { mv ~/.claude/skills/control "$t/.previous" && echo "Previous copy moved to $t/.previous"; }; } && mv "$t/control" ~/.claude/skills/ && echo "Installed ~/.claude/skills/control" (macOS, Linux) — or add --global to the npx line. The curl line replaces .claude/skills/control/ only after the download succeeds, so files left there by another skill of the same name, or by an older release, do not mix in. A copy already there is moved aside, not deleted, and the line prints where.

Which clients pick it up on their own

A skill is a folder of text. Most of these read a skills folder and pick it up without being told; the rest take the same folder another way — an upload in the app, a parameter on an API call — and then choose it by its description just the same.

Claude Code.claude/skills/
Claude DesktopCustomize › Skills
ChatGPTSkills › Create › Upload
Cursor.cursor/skills/
VS Code.github/skills/
Codex CLI.agents/skills/
Gemini CLI.gemini/skills/
Grok Build.grok/skills/
Microsoft CopilotSkills › Upload a skill
PerplexityComputer › Skills › Upload a skill
DeepSeek Harness.dsh/skills/
Zed.agents/skills/
Devin Desktop.devin/skills/
Windsurf (legacy).windsurf/skills/
OpenAI Agents SDKInstructions or sandbox Skills
HTTP / APIa request parameter
This release
Versionnot versioned
Publishedno release date on file
PriceFree
Referencehashgraph-online/control

Versions

Its author publishes no version number, so there is nothing here to pin to: what you install is the folder as it stands today. Instructions change more often than APIs do — a skill can be rewritten entirely without anything it depends on moving.

Pinning

Nothing to pin to: this skill carries no version number of its own. What you install is what the folder holds on the day you install it.

Reviews

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Publisher
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