Plugin files and settings files

Plugin files are extra Markdown files kept with a plugin, such as reference notes that your agents and skills read while they work. An plugin is a named bundle of what your AI coding tools work with: skills, agents, rules, MCP servers and plugin files. The plugin files under the folder settings/ are the settings files. They hold the project's workflow settings, which say how agents test, review and use git.

Plugin files stay with the plugin in Athenode and are not written into your repository. Your AI agent reads a file from the installed plugin each time it needs it, so a change you save in the web UI applies from the next read, with no install in between.

Part	Rule
Name	Up to 255 characters: letters, digits, dashes, underscores and dots, such as api-conventions.md. A name is unique within its folder.
Summary	Optional, up to 500 characters. A short line that says what the file or folder holds, shown to an agent when it lists the files.
Content	Markdown, up to 50,000 characters per file.
Folders	Up to 10 levels deep.

You need the owner or editor role to change plugin files. For a viewer the files are marked Read-only. The roles and permissions page has the full list.

Create a plugin file or a folder

Create a plugin file for knowledge that is too long or too specific for the rules of the plugin, such as the web shop's API conventions or the checklist for a release.

1. On the Plugins page, select the plugin's card. Its blueprint appears below the cards.
2. On the blueprint, select the Files part. The files open in the inspector, under the title Plugin files.
3. Select Add and choose + File or + Folder.
4. Enter the Name and, optionally, the Summary.
5. Select Create.
6. Select the file in the tree, write its content in Markdown and save it.

The file appears in the tree and in the Files part of the blueprint. To put a file into a folder, select the folder before you add the file.

Edit, rename or delete a plugin file

Select a file in the tree to open its content, change it and save. If someone else changes the same file while you are editing, the editor says "This file was changed elsewhere while you were editing it." and offers Discard my changes and reload.

The edit control next to a file or folder opens a dialog where you change its Name and Summary. The delete control removes it after you confirm.

A file is moved to another folder from your AI tool: ask /atn:manage to move it.

Point a skill or an agent at a plugin file

An agent reads a plugin file when its instructions tell it to. Name the file by its path in the instructions of the skill or agent, or in the rules. A line such as "Before changing an endpoint, read the plugin file references/api-conventions.md." is enough.

The agent lists and reads the files through the Athenode MCP server, with the tools plugins_files_list and plugins_files_get. Your AI tool may ask you to allow these tools the first time they are used. A file's summary helps here, because the agent sees the summaries when it lists a folder and can pick the file it needs without opening each one.

Find the settings files of a plugin

The settings files are in the folder settings of the plugin's file tree. The standard Athenode plugin comes with five of them: settings/SETTINGS.md, which is the overview, and one file for each category of the workflow settings, settings/gitflow.md, settings/testing.md, settings/code-review.md and settings/methodology.md. The workflow skills and agents read them each time they run. The standard Athenode plugin says what each file holds.

A sub-project is a folder of a repository with its own workflow settings, such as the frontend and backend folders of the web shop. Each sub-project has a folder under settings/ with its own copies of the four category files. The files directly under settings/ apply to everything outside the sub-projects.

Change the workflow settings

The settings files are filled in by the /atn:settings skill. Run it in your AI tool once after the first install, and again whenever the way your project works changes.

/atn:settings

The skill looks at your repository, asks about each category with a recommended answer, and saves your answers to the settings files. Change the settings by running the skill and not by editing the files. Each run writes the settings part of the files again, and an edit made there by hand is replaced. The one part of a settings file the skill leaves alone is the ## Custom section.

Add your own rules to a ## Custom section

Every settings file has a ## Custom section for rules of your own on that subject. /atn:settings keeps the section as you wrote it, and agents follow it together with the settings above it. Use it for what the skill's questions do not cover, such as a branch that must never be pushed to or a test command that needs an extra flag.

1. On the Plugins page, select the plugin's card, then the Files part of the blueprint.
2. In the tree, open the folder settings and select the file for the subject, for example gitflow.md.
3. Write your rules under the heading ## Custom and leave the rest of the file as it is.
4. Save the file.

A ## Custom section in settings/gitflow.md could read:

## Custom

- Never push to `main`. Open a pull request from the feature branch.
- Start every release tag with `shop-v`.

The rules apply the next time a skill or an agent reads the file. In a repository with sub-projects, write the rule into the file of the sub-project it concerns, or into the file directly under settings/ for the rest of the repository.

Check the settings files before you publish or after you add a plugin

The settings files travel with the plugin. When you publish a plugin to the plugin library, the files under settings/ are included and published as they are, with their ## Custom sections. Read them before you publish.

A plugin you add from the plugin library carries its publisher's settings files. After you install that plugin, run /atn:settings so that the settings fit your project.

Manage plugin files from your AI tool

From your AI tool, ask /atn:manage to list, read, create, change, move or delete plugin files. It works on the installed plugin unless you name another. It warns you before it touches a settings file, where it edits the ## Custom section and leaves the rest to /atn:settings.

Your AI agent reaches the same actions through the tools plugins_files_list, plugins_files_get, plugins_files_create, plugins_files_update and plugins_files_delete of the Athenode MCP server.