SkillBase | SignalWire

SkillBase is the abstract base class for all agent skills. Skills are modular, reusable capabilities — such as weather lookup, web search, or calendar access — that can be added to any AgentBase agent with a single call to agent.addSkill().

Extend SkillBase to create custom skills. You must implement the abstract methods getManifest() and getTools(), and optionally override lifecycle and prompt methods.

For the catalog of built-in skills and their configuration parameters, see the Skills page.

Static Members

SUPPORTS_MULTIPLE_INSTANCES

booleanDefaults to false

When true, the same skill can be added to an agent multiple times with different configurations.

getParameterSchema()

static method

Returns metadata about all parameters the skill accepts. See getParameterSchema.

Constructor

1 constructor(skillName: string, config?: SkillConfig)

skillName

stringRequired

Unique identifier for the skill (e.g., "weather", "web_search").

config

SkillConfig

Optional configuration key-value pairs for the skill instance.

Instance Properties

skillName

string

The registered name for this skill instance (readonly).

instanceId

string

Unique identifier for this skill instance (readonly).

config

SkillConfig

Configuration parameters passed to the constructor (protected).

swaigFields

Record<string, unknown>

SWAIG metadata extracted from config, automatically merged into tool definitions (readonly).

Methods

setup

Initialize the skill and prepare resources.

cleanup

Release resources when the skill is removed or the agent shuts down.

getParameterSchema

Return metadata about all parameters the skill accepts.

getGlobalData

Return data to merge into the agent’s global data.

getHints

Return speech recognition hints for this skill.

getInstanceKey

Get the unique key used to track this skill instance.

getPromptSections

Return prompt sections for the agent.

getSkillData

Extract this skill’s namespaced data from raw request data.

getSkillNamespace

Get the namespace key used to store this skill’s data.

updateSkillData

Write data under this skill’s namespace into a FunctionResult.

isInitialized

Check whether the skill has been initialized.

markInitialized

Mark the skill as initialized.

validateEnvVars

Validate that required environment variables are set.

getManifest (abstract)

1 abstract getManifest(): SkillManifest

Returns the skill’s metadata including name, description, version, required environment variables, and required packages. You must implement this in every subclass.

getTools (abstract)

1 abstract getTools(): SkillToolDefinition[]

Returns the SWAIG tool definitions this skill provides. You must implement this in every subclass. Each tool is registered with the agent when the skill is loaded.

getConfig

1 getConfig<T = unknown>(key: string, defaultValue?: T): T

Read a configuration value by key, with an optional fallback default. Returns the value cast to type T, or defaultValue if the key is not present.

key

stringRequired

The configuration key to look up.

defaultValue

Value to return if the key is not present in the config.

Examples

Custom skill

1 import { SkillBase, SkillManifest, SkillToolDefinition } from '@signalwire/sdk';
2 
3 class MyWeatherSkill extends SkillBase {
4   constructor(config?: Record<string, unknown>) {
5     super('my_weather', config);
6   }
7 
8   getManifest(): SkillManifest {
9     return { name: 'my_weather', description: 'Look up weather', version: '1.0.0' };
10   }
11 
12   getTools(): SkillToolDefinition[] {
13     return [{
14       name: 'get_weather',
15       description: 'Get current weather for a city',
16       parameters: { city: { type: 'string', description: 'City name' } },
17       handler: async (args) => ({ response: 'Sunny, 72F' }),
18     }];
19   }
20 }

Using a skill

1 import { AgentBase } from '@signalwire/sdk';
2 
3 const agent = new AgentBase({ name: 'weather-agent' });
4 agent.setPromptText("You are a helpful assistant.")
5 agent.addSkill("weather")
6 
7 // Or with custom configuration
8 agent.addSkill("weather", { units: "celsius" })
9 
10 // Entry point
11 agent.run()