Prose Detect Skill

You locate an existing OpenProse installation by checking a priority-ordered list of signals. You return the resolved PROSE_ROOT path (pointing to skills/open-prose/ inside the OpenProse repo), or report that no installation was found and suggest running /prose-setup.

All other prose-integration skills call this skill before operating — detection is centralized here so each skill doesn't re-implement discovery independently.

Triggers

"detect prose" / "find prose" / "locate openprose"
"where is prose installed"
"check if prose is available"
"prose-detect" (direct invocation from other skills)
Called automatically by prose-run, prose-reader, prose-validate, forme-manifest before execution

Detection Protocol

Work through the following signals in order. Use the first one that resolves to a valid installation.

Signal 1: Environment Variable

# Check PROSE_ROOT or AIWG_PROSE_ROOT
echo "$PROSE_ROOT"
echo "$AIWG_PROSE_ROOT"

If set, validate that $PROSE_ROOT/prose.md exists. If valid, use this path.

Signal 2: AIWG Config File

# Check .aiwg/config.json for saved prose path
cat .aiwg/config.json 2>/dev/null | python3 -c "import sys,json; d=json.load(sys.stdin); print(d.get('prose',{}).get('path',''))" 2>/dev/null

If prose.path is set and {prose.path}/prose.md exists, use this path.

Signal 3: AIWG-Local Install

# Check if AIWG installed Prose locally
ls ~/.aiwg/prose/skills/open-prose/prose.md 2>/dev/null

If exists, PROSE_ROOT = ~/.aiwg/prose/skills/open-prose.

Signal 4: Project Plugin Manifest

Walk CWD upward looking for .claude-plugin/plugin.json with OpenProse entry:

# Search CWD and ancestors for .claude-plugin/plugin.json
dir="$(pwd)"
while [ "$dir" != "/" ]; do
  if [ -f "$dir/.claude-plugin/plugin.json" ]; then
    # Check if it references open-prose
    python3 -c "
import json, sys
with open('$dir/.claude-plugin/plugin.json') as f:
    d = json.load(f)
# Plugin root is the directory containing .claude-plugin/
if d.get('name') == 'open-prose':
    print('$dir/skills/open-prose')
" 2>/dev/null
    break
  fi
  dir="$(dirname "$dir")"
done

If found, use the resolved path.

Signal 5: User Home Directory

# Check if user has previously run Prose
ls ~/.prose/agents/ 2>/dev/null

If ~/.prose/agents/ exists, PROSE_ROOT is likely nearby. Check:

ls ~/.prose/skills/open-prose/prose.md 2>/dev/null

Signal 6: Global CLI

# Check for global CLI install
which prose 2>/dev/null

If found, use prose --root or prose info to resolve the installation path.

Signal 7: Not Found

If no signal resolves to a valid PROSE_ROOT, output:

## OpenProse Not Found

No OpenProse installation was detected. Checked:
- $PROSE_ROOT / $AIWG_PROSE_ROOT environment variables
- .aiwg/config.json prose.path
- ~/.aiwg/prose/ (AIWG-local install)
- .claude-plugin/plugin.json in CWD and ancestors
- ~/.prose/ (user home)
- `prose` CLI on PATH

To install OpenProse, run:

```bash
/prose-setup

Or provide a custom path:

# Set env var
export PROSE_ROOT=/path/to/prose/skills/open-prose

# Or configure in .aiwg/config.json
{"prose": {"path": "/path/to/prose/skills/open-prose"}}


Do NOT install silently. Always confirm with the user before running `/prose-setup`.

## Validation

After resolving a candidate path, validate it by checking for required files:

```bash
# Minimum required files
ls "$PROSE_ROOT/prose.md"
ls "$PROSE_ROOT/forme.md"

If either file is missing, the path is invalid — continue to the next signal.

Output

On success, output:

## OpenProse Located

**PROSE_ROOT**: /path/to/prose/skills/open-prose
**Detected via**: [signal name — env var | aiwg-config | aiwg-local | plugin-manifest | user-home | cli]
**prose.md**: present
**forme.md**: present

Prose integration skills are ready to use.

Also set PROSE_ROOT in the session environment if the platform supports it.

Caching

Once detected, save the resolved path to .aiwg/config.json so Signal 2 succeeds on future calls:

{
  "prose": {
    "path": "/resolved/path/to/skills/open-prose",
    "detectedVia": "aiwg-local",
    "lastVerified": "2026-04-02T00:00:00Z"
  }
}

Only write the cache if the detection succeeds and the path is validated.

Model

This skill runs on Haiku — it's pure file-system checks and shell commands. No reasoning needed.

Used By

All prose-integration skills call prose-detect as their first step:

/prose-reader
/prose-run
/prose-validate
/forme-manifest

References

@$AIWG_ROOT/agentic/code/addons/prose-integration/README.md — prose-integration addon overview
@$AIWG_ROOT/agentic/code/addons/aiwg-utils/rules/research-before-decision.md — Priority-ordered detection chain before deciding installation path
@$AIWG_ROOT/agentic/code/addons/aiwg-utils/rules/human-authorization.md — Never install silently; always confirm before running prose-setup
@$AIWG_ROOT/docs/cli-reference.md — CLI reference for AIWG addon configuration