Authoring Dags

What it does

When your agent uses it

• Creating a new DAG
• Write pipeline code
• Handling questions about DAG patterns and conventions
• Extending an existing DAG with a follow-up/downstream task

Example prompts

• “add a DAG named X”
• “write a pipeline”
• “add a task that runs after Y”
• “/authoring-dags”

Requirements

• Docker

Workflow steps

6 steps, taken from the step headings in SKILL.md.

1. 1Discover
2. 2Plan
3. 3Implement
4. 4Validate
5. 5Test
6. 6Iterate

What it can do on your machine

Read from SKILL.md and the folder at commit 486ee63. 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

  Shell commands in SKILL.md call:

  • uv

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

• Network

  No URLs in SKILL.md. Its commands use uv, which can reach the network depending on how they are called.

  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

Authoring Dags loads about 1.8k tokens when it runs. Until then it costs about 105 tokens; SKILL.md has 665 words of instructions outside code blocks.

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

~105

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

~1.8k

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 astronomer/agents at commit 486ee63, republished under its Apache-2.0 licence (© astronomer). 665 words, ~1,769 tokens.

name

authoring-dags

description

Workflow and best practices for writing Apache Airflow DAGs. Use when creating a new DAG, write pipeline code, handling questions about DAG patterns and conventions or extending an existing DAG with a follow-up/downstream task. ANY request shaped like 'add a DAG named X', 'write a pipeline', 'add a task that runs after Y', or 'extend the DAG'. For testing and debugging DAGs, see the testing-dags skill.

+-----------------------------------------+
| 1. DISCOVER                             |
|    Understand codebase & environment    |
+-----------------------------------------+
                 |
+-----------------------------------------+
| 2. PLAN                                 |
|    Propose structure, get approval      |
+-----------------------------------------+
                 |
+-----------------------------------------+
| 3. IMPLEMENT                            |
|    Write DAG following patterns         |
+-----------------------------------------+
                 |
+-----------------------------------------+
| 4. VALIDATE                             |
|    Check import errors, warnings        |
+-----------------------------------------+
                 |
+-----------------------------------------+
| 5. TEST (with user consent)             |
|    Trigger, monitor, check logs         |
+-----------------------------------------+
                 |
+-----------------------------------------+
| 6. ITERATE                              |
|    Fix issues, re-validate              |
+-----------------------------------------+

af dags errors

af dags get <dag_id>

af dags warnings

af dags explore <dag_id>

# Ask user first, then:
af runs trigger-wait <dag_id> --timeout 300

© astronomer, 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 1 other file in skills/authoring-dags of astronomer/agents.

• SKILL.md
• reference/best-practices.md

Open the folder on GitHubat commit 486ee63

Used in 1 other repository

We found 1 copy of this SKILL.md (exact, near-identical or edited) in other folders, from 1 other GitHub owner. This page covers the copy in astronomer/agents, which our catalogue first saw on October 7, 2026.

• Kilo-Org/kilo-marketplaceskills/authoring-dags