Waza

Engineering habits you already know, turned into skills AI agents can run.

Why

Waza (技, わざ) is a Japanese martial arts term for technique: a move practiced until it becomes instinct.

A good engineer does not just write code. They think through requirements, review their own work, debug systematically, design interfaces that feel intentional, and read primary sources. They write clearly, and learn new domains by producing output, not consuming content.

AI is more capable than most engineers at raw output. But without structure, that capability drifts into generic, imprecise work. Waza channels it into precision: eight skills that set clear goals and constraints, then let the model do what it does best.

Part of a trilogy: Kaku (書く) writes code, Waza (技) drills habits, Kami (紙) ships documents. Think of them as a family: Kaku is the dad, Waza the big sister, Kami the little sister.

Skills

Each engineering habit gets an installed skill. In Claude Code, type the slash command. In Codex, invoke the installed skill by name and follow the same playbook.

Skill	When	What it does
/think	Before building anything new	Challenges the problem, pressure-tests the design, and produces a decision-complete plan another agent can implement.
/design	Building frontend interfaces	Produces distinctive UI, including screenshot-driven aesthetic iteration, with a committed direction rather than generic defaults.
/check	After a task, before merging or release	Reviews the diff, extracts project-specific constraints, handles approved release/publish/push/reaction follow-through, and verifies with evidence.
/hunt	Any bug, regression, or unexpected behavior	Systematic debugging. Root cause confirmed before any fix is applied, especially when something used to work.
/write	Writing or editing prose	Rewrites prose to sound natural in Chinese and English. Cuts stiff, formulaic phrasing.
/learn	Diving into an unfamiliar domain	Six-phase research workflow: collect, digest, outline, fill in, refine, then self-review and publish.
/read	Any URL or PDF	Reads URLs and PDFs with platform-specific routing. Plain reads return a concise summary; Markdown output is used when asked to convert, quote, cite, save, or feed downstream work.
/health	Auditing Agent Health	Checks Codex, Claude Code, project instructions, verifier output, and AI maintainability with a budget-aware summary pass before deep inspection.

Each skill is a folder with reference docs, helper scripts, and gotchas from real failures.

Install and Update

Most users should install Waza globally, so the same skills are available in every project.

Claude Code

npx skills add tw93/Waza -a claude-code -g -y

This installs /think, /design, /check, /hunt, /write, /learn, /read, and /health. Install just one with npx skills add tw93/Waza --skill think -a claude-code -g -y.

Codex

npx skills add tw93/Waza -a codex -g -y

Install just one with npx skills add tw93/Waza --skill think -a codex -g -y. Codex sessions can invoke installed skills by name or link to the installed SKILL.md path shown by npx skills path tw93/Waza.

Claude Code plugin marketplace (single-skill entries require Claude Code v2.1.143+)

/plugin marketplace add tw93/Waza
/plugin install waza@waza

This installs all eight skills. Install just one with /plugin install waza-<name>@waza (for example, waza-think@waza) on Claude Code v2.1.143 or newer.

Claude Desktop

Download waza.zip, open Customize > Skills > "+" > Create skill, and upload the ZIP.

Pi coding agent

Pi can load Waza's standard skills/<name>/SKILL.md layout from the repo or from the published @tw93/waza npm package, which exposes pi.skills metadata pointing at ./skills. /health audits Pi settings, configured packages, and local skill roots alongside Claude Code and Codex.

Update

npx skills update -g -y

Marketplace installs use claude plugin update <skill>. Claude Desktop users can replace the old skill with the latest waza.zip.

Project Context

Waza keeps the generic programmer habits inside the public skill. /check becomes project-aware by reading the target repository's public context and the user's task constraints.

• Project commands come from README files, package manifests, Makefiles, CI workflows, and explicit user instructions.
• Project hard stops include generated artifacts, protected files, version synchronization, release assets, and domain-specific safety risks.
• Public docs and examples must not include credentials, certificate paths, private key filenames, tokens, or personal machine details.

See skills/check/references/project-context.md for the review context template.

Chaining Skills

Skills are designed to be chained together, but transitions are manual. Each skill stops after completing its task and waits for you to decide the next step.

Common workflows:

• Design a feature: /think → approve → say "implement X" → /check → merge
• Ship a fix: /hunt → fix → /check → release/publish/push/issue follow-through
• Research and write: /read (fetch sources) → /learn (synthesize) → /write (polish)
• Debug and verify: /hunt (find root cause) → fix → /check (review changes)

Each arrow represents a manual user action. Skills don't automatically trigger each other.

Extras

Statusline

A minimal statusline for Claude Code: context window, 5-hour quota, and 7-day quota. Color-coded by usage, no progress bars, no noise.

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tw93/Waza/v3.26.0/scripts/setup-statusline.sh | bash

Codex has native statusline items. Add to ~/.codex/config.toml:

[tui]
status_line = ["model-with-reasoning", "current-dir", "context-used", "five-hour-limit", "weekly-limit"]
status_line_use_colors = true

Codex shows remaining quota; the Claude Code statusline above shows used percentage (upstream does not yet expose five-hour-used / weekly-used).

English Coaching

Optional rule for English practice. When your prompt contains an English mistake, the agent appends a short 😇 correction; Chinese-only prompts stay untouched.

# Claude Code
curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tw93/Waza/v3.26.0/scripts/setup-rule.sh | bash -s -- english claude-code

# Codex
curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tw93/Waza/v3.26.0/scripts/setup-rule.sh | bash -s -- english codex

Anti-Patterns

Optional always-on guardrails for cross-skill behaviors: stop acting before reading, no hallucinated paths, no scope creep, no unsolicited summaries. Skill-agnostic, applies in every session.

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tw93/Waza/v3.26.0/scripts/setup-rule.sh | bash -s -- anti-patterns claude-code

Use codex instead of claude-code for Codex. Curl URLs are pinned to the current release tag for reproducibility; swap v3.26.0 for main if you want bleeding-edge scripts.

Routing Hint

Optional pointer that tells the host to prefer Waza skills when a request matches their triggers. Useful for Codex, Pi, and other agents that do not auto-route from skill description. Claude Code already routes through descriptions, so this is opt-in even there.

curl -sL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/tw93/Waza/v3.26.0/scripts/setup-rule.sh | bash -s -- waza-routing claude-code

Use codex instead of claude-code for Codex.

Uninstall

npx skills remove tw93/Waza -g
rm -f ~/.claude/statusline.sh
rm -f ~/.claude/rules/english.md
rm -f ~/.claude/rules/anti-patterns.md
rm -f ~/.claude/rules/waza-routing.md

For Claude Desktop, delete Waza from Customize > Skills. For Codex rule installs, remove the marked Waza blocks from ~/.codex/AGENTS.md.

Background

Tools like Superpowers and gstack are impressive but heavy: too many skills, too much configuration, too steep a learning curve.

Every rule the author writes is also a ceiling. The model can only do what the instructions say. Waza goes the other way: each skill sets a clear goal and the constraints that matter, then steps back. As models improve, that restraint pays compound interest.

Eight skills for the habits that actually matter. Each does one thing, has a clear trigger, and stays out of the way. Built from real projects, refined through 300+ sessions across 7 projects. Every gotcha traces to a real failure.

The /health skill grew from the six-layer Claude Code framework described in this post, and now covers Codex, Claude Code, Pi, verifier surfaces, and AI maintainability.

Support

• If Waza helped you, share it with friends or give it a star.
• Got ideas or bugs? Open an issue or PR, feel free to contribute your best AI model.
• I have two cats, TangYuan and Coke. If you think Waza delights your life, you can feed them canned food 🥩.

License

MIT License. Feel free to use Waza and contribute.