Reference

Claude Code plugin & /pair-assistant

What the pair marketplace plugin installs, how to add, update and remove it, and what /pair-assistant can do, install, update, run CLI jobs and configure pair, and how it writes.

The pair Claude Code plugin is an optional alternative to typing pair-cli yourself. The CLI stays the default path (Quickstart); the plugin gives Claude Code users one skill, /pair-assistant, that runs the CLI for you and helps you configure pair.

Source: packages/knowledge-hub/dataset/plugin/skills/pair-assistant/SKILL.md

What the plugin installs

One skill: /pair-assistant. claude plugin details pair@pair reports Skills (1), Agents (0), Hooks (0), MCP servers (0), LSP servers (0). The full skill catalog never ships in the plugin: the CLI writes it into your repository (.claude/skills/), so no skill name resolves from two sources and the plugin can stay installed next to a CLI install. The channel overview shows where it sits among the install channels.

Add, update, remove

/plugin marketplace add foomakers/pair      # register the marketplace
/plugin install pair@pair                   # install the plugin
/plugin marketplace update pair             # refresh the marketplace
/plugin update pair@pair                    # update the plugin
/plugin uninstall pair@pair                 # remove it
  • Smaller clone: /plugin marketplace add foomakers/pair --sparse .claude-plugin packages/knowledge-hub/dataset/plugin limits the checkout to the two directories that matter.
  • The cache is disposable: Claude Code copies the plugin into ~/.claude/plugins/cache and /plugin update replaces it wholesale. Nothing you own lives there; the skill writes into your repository.
  • No version is pinned, so an update always fetches the current skill.

Capability menu

Ask /pair-assistant what it can do and it lists two things.

CLI jobs (options always read from pair-cli --help, never from a list in the skill):

  • install, update
  • kb-info, kb-validate, kb-verify
  • package, scaffold-kb
  • update-link, validate-config
  • kb-cache, tokens

Each CLI command names its request in a "Via" line.

Configuration areas: autonomy, cycle hooks, blocking severities, Publish-PR hooks, workflow profiles, kept registries (skipRegistries), format-check-command, worktree-setup-command, review enforcement and identity, coverage guardrail, PR states, PM tool and State Mapping, Definition of Ready/Done, process profile, risk matrix and tag projection, harness and model policy, quality gates and branch protection, package-local adoption, template overrides, and a full adoption pass.

Configuration areas: area, file, owner and validator for each thing /pair-assistant configures

Figure: every area the assistant can write has one owning file and one validator; the assistant never writes outside this table.

How to ask

You sayIt routes to
"let green cards go up to merge"## Autonomy in tech/automation.md (merge), see autonomy gates
"add a pre-verify hook that runs the tests"## Cycle Hooks in tech/automation.md
"use profile X for the review"workflowProfiles in pair.config.json
"keep my own AGENTS.md"update --skip-registries agents, persisted as skipRegistries
"map not-planned to Done"## State Mapping, through /pair-capability-setup-pm
"switch the harness to pi"/pair-capability-setup-harness
"update pair"pair-cli update (honours skipRegistries, prints the skip line)
"how many tokens are my pair files"pair-cli tokens

How it writes

  1. It shows the diff (file, section, before, after) and asks. It writes only after an explicit yes.

  2. It validates first, on a temporary copy, with the cycle scripts the CLI installed in .claude/skills/pair-workflow-cycle/scripts/:

    • autonomy-policy.mjs resolve
    • cycle-hooks.mjs load
    • blocking-severities.mjs read
    • workflow-profile.mjs resolve

    A non-zero result or HALT stops with the script output; nothing is written. Scripts missing: it offers update first.

  3. It writes through the owner: /pair-capability-record-decision for adoption files, or the section-owning skill (/pair-capability-setup-pm, -setup-harness, -setup-gates, /pair-process-bootstrap). It never edits adoption files itself. pair.config.json is not an adoption file: workflowProfiles is a shown edit plus an ADL via record-decision.

  4. A malformed config stops it: it shows the script output and offers a fix; it never writes over a broken file. An area outside the menu is reported as such, never invented.

Requests the skill cannot map to a command or area are answered from your own .pair/llms.txt, naming the file used. It never runs a bare npx pair-cli (an unrelated package of that name exists on npm).

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