Claude Code skills are structured prompts that guide Claude through multi-step workflows. They turn complex operations into single commands.

Available skills

/setup-env

Interactive wizard that configures the .env file by discovering real AWS resources.

/setup-env

What it does:

Lists AWS profiles, lets you pick one
Queries STS for account ID and region
Discovers verified SES identities (domains and email addresses)
Walks you through choosing sender details
Discovers existing SES configuration sets
Generates resource names from a prefix
Generates a random HMAC secret for unsubscribe tokens
Writes the .env file
Verifies the output

When to use: First-time setup, switching AWS accounts, or reconfiguring sender details.

/create-sequence

Generates a complete email sequence from a natural language description.

/create-sequence A trial expiring sequence triggered by trial.expiring — send a
"trial ending soon" email immediately, then a "last chance" email after 2 days,
then a "trial expired" email after 3 more days

What it generates:

sequences/<sequenceId>/sequence.config.ts — Step definitions
sequences/<sequenceId>/src/emails/*.tsx — React Email templates
sequences/<sequenceId>/src/render.ts — Build script
sequences/<sequenceId>/package.json and tsconfig.json

What you don't need to edit:

No CDK changes needed. The CDK auto-discovers sequences from sequences/*/sequence.config.ts at deploy time.

Step types it supports:

send — Email with template and subject
wait — Delay (days, hours, minutes)
choice — Branch on subscriber attributes (native Step Functions)
condition — Lambda-based DynamoDB check (has_been_sent, field_exists, field_equals)
events — Fire-and-forget emails triggered during the sequence

/validate-sequence

Validates a sequence config is correct and deployable.

/validate-sequence              # validates all sequences
/validate-sequence onboarding   # validates one

Validation checks (in order):

Config file exists
Required fields present (id, trigger, timeoutMinutes, steps)
All steps valid (type-specific validation, recursive through branches)
Collects all templateKeys
Verifies template HTML files exist in build/
TypeCheck passes (pnpm --filter @mailshot/cdk typecheck)
CDK synth succeeds

Stops at the first failure with a clear error message and file path.

/deploy

Full deployment pipeline with validation, build, and deploy.

/deploy

Phases:

Validate all sequences (/validate-sequence)
Build shared package
Build all sequences (render templates to HTML)
Generate Mermaid diagrams
Verify all template HTML files exist
Build CDK
CDK synth
Show build artifacts and ask for confirmation
cdk deploy to AWS
Report stack outputs

Always asks for confirmation before the actual deploy step.

The AI-native workflow

These skills, combined with the MCP server, enable a complete AI-driven email operations workflow:

Describe a sequence in English
        │
        ▼
/create-sequence ──→ generates all code
        │
        ▼
/validate-sequence ──→ catches errors before deploy
        │
        ▼
/deploy ──→ builds, verifies, deploys to AWS
        │
        ▼
MCP tools ──→ manage subscribers, query engagement, preview templates

No code editor needed. No AWS console needed. No email SaaS dashboard needed. You describe what you want, Claude generates the code, validates it, deploys it, and then manages it — all through conversation.

How skills work

Skills are markdown files in .claude/skills/. Each contains:

A description of what the skill does
Step-by-step instructions for Claude to follow
File templates and validation rules

When you type /create-sequence, Claude Code loads the skill's SKILL.md and follows the instructions as a structured workflow. The skill provides the domain knowledge (file structure, types, conventions) so Claude can generate correct code without you knowing the framework internals.

Skills & Workflows