[FEATURE] Claude Code sessions cannot publish/update skills to the account Skills store - expose the Chat surface's "Save skill" flow
Problem
Custom skills now live in the account-level cloud Skills store, and the Chat/Cowork surface has a first-class publish loop: the agent edits a skill, the chat renders a skill card, and the user clicks Save skill -> Upload and replace. Done.
Claude Code desktop sessions have no equivalent. The model can READ materialized cloud skills (skills-plugin cache) and prepare an updated SKILL.md, but has no path to publish it:
- No
present_files/ skill-card tool in the Claude Code toolset, so the desktop client never renders a Save-skill card. - The Skills page upload dialog requires the OS file picker (not automatable, by design).
- Driving claude.ai/customize/skills via Claude-in-Chrome reaches the page's file input, but
file_upload(correctly) only accepts user-attached files - agent-staged paths are rejected. - Filesystem skills don't appear on the Skills page at all (#43095), so there's no "promote local skill to cloud" path either.
Net effect: a Claude Code session that learns something worth folding into a skill must hand off to a separate Chat conversation (e.g. via the skill's "Edit with Claude") just for the final publish click - a full context switch, and the Chat agent re-does an edit the Code session already made, for what is one click on the other surface.
User story
A heavy Claude Code user maintains ~12 custom skills (consulting dev workflows) in the cloud store so colleagues receive live-updated shares. Standing instruction to Claude: every "remember this" should also update the matching skill. Today that means: Claude Code drafts the new SKILL.md -> stages a file -> user opens Chat -> pastes a hand-off prompt -> Chat re-applies the edit -> user clicks Save skill -> confirms replace. Two agents, two contexts, one edit.
Request
Expose the skill publish/update primitive to Claude Code desktop sessions - any of:
present_files(or a dedicatedsave_skilltool) wired to the same Save-skill card the Chat client already renders, or- a "Save as skill / Replace existing skill" affordance on
.skillfiles produced inside a Claude Code session, or - an authenticated local-harness API to upsert an account skill, keeping the same replace-confirmation UX.
Related
#43095 (filesystem skills invisible on the Skills page), #46836 / #46844 (Save-and-Replace staleness), #50041 (present_files file access).
Environment: Claude Code desktop app, macOS, account-level skills (2026-06-12).
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Found 3 possible duplicate issues:
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Not a duplicate.
Title: Claude's direct edits to /mnt/skills/user/[skill]/SKILL.md during a session don't persist back to the account-level Skill
Description: When Claude edits a personal skill's SKILL.md file directly via its file-editing tools during a conversation (not through the Skills panel UI), the edit is not reflected in the Skills panel afterward — the change appears to only modify an ephemeral session-local copy of the mounted file, not the actual stored Skill object. This is effectively the inverse of issue #65928 (panel edits not syncing to the mount) — here, a mount edit doesn't sync back to the panel/account.
Repro:
Have Claude use its file-editing tool to add content to an existing personal skill's SKILL.md in /mnt/skills/user/
Confirm the edit succeeded in that session (re-view the file)
Open Settings → Customize → Skills → the same skill
The added content is not present
Impact: Claude has no reliable way to durably update a user's skill mid-conversation, and gave the user false confidence that an edit was permanent when it wasn't.
Adding a data point from Cowork (cloud sessions, Windows desktop app). It looks like the same gap is now hitting Cowork as well, as a regression.
Until early September 2026, the loop worked in Cowork. The session built a full
.skillpackage (SKILL.md +references/+scripts/) and delivered it as a file. The file card offered Save skill → Upload and replace. That was the only way to update a skill's reference files.Since 10 Sep 2026, the only publish path Cowork offers is the
propose_skillsreview card, and it replaces SKILL.md only. I've hit this in 4 sessions in a row, the last on 11 Sep. The session now tells the model not to hand over a packaged skill file.Verified on a low-stakes test skill:
propose_skillscard replaces SKILL.md, and the existingreferences/files are kept. ✅references/file from a session changes only the session's local snapshot. Nothing reaches the account store: checksums were identical in a session started afterwards. Yet the model reported the edit as done. ❌Impact
references/orscripts/. Those are exactly the files where progressive disclosure says detailed content should live.Ask (either would solve it)
propose_skillscarry a full package: SKILL.md +references/+scripts/, with add/replace/delete per file; or.skillfile → Save skill / Upload and replace card in Cowork.+1 on the original request for Claude Code desktop sessions too.