Transaction Trace Analysis

What it does

When your agent uses it

• Reconstructing transaction behavior from tables
• Object histories
• Validation records
• Producing classified transaction outputs from trace evidence

Example prompts

• “Use the transaction-trace-analysis skill to teach evidence-based analysis of transaction logs and traces”
• “/transaction-trace-analysis”

Workflow steps

6 steps, taken from the first numbered list in SKILL.md.

1. 1Schema normalization: name every column; identify scope for each counter/timestamp.
2. 2Per-txn reconstruction: summarize each txn’s evidence and candidate serialization point fields.
3. 3Per-key reconstruction: build a timeline per key; validate what orders it (wts? counter?).
4. 4Decision modeling: re-express the protocol’s decision rule in terms of trace fields.
5. 5Classification: prove “must abort” vs “could commit” vs “unknown from evidence.”
6. 6Output: dedupe ids, sort if required, write exact format.

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 9a1f4dd. It shows what the files ask for, not the result of running them.

• Tool permissions

  Pre-approves nothing: there is no allowed-tools line, so your agent's usual permission prompts apply.

  From allowed-tools in the SKILL.md frontmatter.

• Runs code

  No scripts in the folder and no shell commands in SKILL.md.

  From the folder's file list and the shell code blocks in SKILL.md.

• Network

  No URLs in SKILL.md.

  From URLs in SKILL.md, links to its own repository left out.

• Credentials

  Names no API keys, tokens, secrets or passwords.

  From names ending in _API_KEY, _TOKEN, _SECRET, _KEY or _PASSWORD in SKILL.md.

Context cost

Transaction Trace Analysis loads about 845 tokens when it runs, and up to ~4.3k if it reads all its reference files. Until then it costs about 83 tokens; SKILL.md has 276 words of instructions outside code blocks.

Always · name and description, kept in context so the agent knows when to use it

~83

When it runs · the whole SKILL.md, loaded when a task matches

~845

With references · SKILL.md plus every file in references/, read only if the agent opens them

~4.3k

Estimates: characters ÷ 4, the usual rule of thumb; real counts depend on the model's tokenizer. Scripts and assets cost tokens only if the agent reads them.

Safety

Automated static check — not a guarantee. Review scripts before installing. It scans the text of SKILL.md for risky patterns (piping downloads into a shell, reading credential files, hidden Unicode, destructive commands); files beside SKILL.md are not scanned.

SKILL.md

The full file from benchflow-ai/skillsbench at commit 9a1f4dd, republished under its Apache-2.0 licence (© benchflow-ai). 276 words, ~845 tokens.

name

transaction-trace-analysis

description

Teaches evidence-based analysis of transaction logs and traces. Use when reconstructing transaction behavior from tables, TSV/CSV files, timestamps, counters, object histories, validation records, abort records, retries, partial logs, or when producing classified transaction outputs from trace evidence.

txn_id -> {
  seen_keys: [...],
  read-evidence: (key, observed_version_fields...),
  write-evidence: (key, installed_version_fields...),
  validation/abort-evidence: [...],
  candidate_commit_fields: ...,
}

key -> timeline [
  { event: write/abort/validate, txn_id, version_fields, counter_fields },
  ...
]

© benchflow-ai, Apache-2.0. Rendered from Markdown: HTML in the file is shown as text, images as links, and headings moved down two levels. Raw file

Files

SKILL.md and 7 other files (references) in tasks/tictoc-unnecessary-abort-detection/environment/skills/transaction-trace-analysis of benchflow-ai/skillsbench.

• SKILL.md
• references/evidence-quality-and-uncertainty.md
• references/object-version-history.md
• references/output-classification-patterns.md
• references/timestamp-and-ordering-fields.md
• references/trace-schema-normalization.md
• references/transaction-history-reconstruction.md
• references/validation-and-abort-records.md

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 9a1f4dd