low-level-dev-skills

A curated suite of AI agent skills for systems and low-level programming — C/C++, Rust, Zig, GPU, bare-metal firmware, Linux kernel/driver development, computer architecture, compiler internals, HPC, and more. These skills provide expert guidance for compilers, debuggers, profilers, build systems, sanitizers, low-level programming, embedded development, observability, virtualization, security, and WebAssembly.

View on skills.sh

Installation

Install all skills with a single command:

npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --all

Or select specific skills interactively:

npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills

Install globally to make skills available in all projects:

npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --all --global

Install by language / tag

Install specific skill bundles using the --skill flag (space-separated list):

# C/C++ toolchain (compilers, debuggers, build systems, profilers)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill gcc clang llvm msvc-cl cross-gcc pgo cmake make ninja meson conan-vcpkg static-analysis gdb lldb core-dumps linux-perf valgrind flamegraphs strace-ltrace heaptrack sanitizers fuzzing elf-inspection linkers-lto binutils dynamic-linking assembly-x86 assembly-arm interpreters simd-intrinsics memory-model cpu-cache-opt

# Rust bundle (compiler, Cargo, debugging, profiling, FFI, cross, sanitizers, async, security)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill rustc-basics cargo-workflows rust-debugging rust-profiling rust-ffi rust-cross rust-sanitizers-miri rust-unsafe rust-async-internals rust-security rust-no-std rust-build-times

# Zig bundle (compiler, build system, C interop, debugging, cross, testing, comptime)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill zig-compiler zig-build-system zig-cinterop zig-debugging zig-cross zig-testing zig-comptime

# Embedded (RTOS, OpenOCD, linker scripts, embedded Rust, bare-metal)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill freertos zephyr openocd-jtag linker-scripts embedded-rust baremetal-startup mmio-and-bit-manipulation interrupts-and-exceptions-baremetal gpio-baremetal uart-serial-baremetal spi-i2c-baremetal dma-baremetal stm32-baremetal low-power-embedded

# Bare-metal focused
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill baremetal-startup mmio-and-bit-manipulation interrupts-and-exceptions-baremetal peripherals-from-datasheet gpio-baremetal uart-serial-baremetal spi-i2c-baremetal timers-pwm-baremetal adc-dac-baremetal dma-baremetal stm32-baremetal datasheet-and-refmanual-reading bootloaders-embedded low-power-embedded

# Kernel & driver development
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill linux-kernel-architecture kernel-memory-management kernel-concurrency device-tree platform-device-model writing-char-drivers bus-drivers-i2c-spi kernel-debugging-advanced qemu-for-kernel-development kernel-internals device-drivers

# Computer architecture
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill cpu-pipelines-and-hazards memory-hierarchy-and-caches virtual-memory-paging-and-tlb abi-and-calling-conventions branch-prediction-and-speculation

# QEMU & constrained-systems tooling
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill qemu-embedded-simulation qemu-for-kernel-development protocol-analysis resource-optimization-lowend verilog-basics-for-lowlevel

# Observability (eBPF, binary hardening)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill ebpf ebpf-rust binary-hardening

# WebAssembly
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill wasm-emscripten wasm-wasmtime

# The core essentials (compiler + debugger + profiler for all languages)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill gcc clang rustc-basics zig-compiler gdb lldb linux-perf cmake cargo-workflows zig-build-system

# Build systems only
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill cmake make ninja meson conan-vcpkg static-analysis zig-build-system cargo-workflows build-acceleration bazel include-what-you-use

# Profilers and performance tools
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill linux-perf valgrind flamegraphs strace-ltrace heaptrack rust-profiling intel-vtune-amd-uprof hardware-counters

# Runtime safety (sanitizers, fuzzing, Miri, binary hardening)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill sanitizers fuzzing rust-sanitizers-miri rust-unsafe binary-hardening rust-security

# Binary analysis (ELF, linkers, dynamic linking, binutils, DWARF)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill elf-inspection linkers-lto binutils dynamic-linking dwarf-debug-format

# GPU programming (CUDA, Triton, ROCm, memory model)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill cuda cuda-profiling cuda-debugging triton-lang hip-rocm gpu-memory-model

# Kernel internals and drivers
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill kernel-internals device-drivers kernel-debugging kernel-testing os-dev-scratch

# Async I/O and kernel bypass networking
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill io-uring dpdk af-xdp

# Allocators and NUMA
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill custom-allocators numa-programming

# Compiler internals (frontend, IR, passes, codegen, MLIR, JIT)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill compiler-frontend llvm-passes llvm-ir-and-passes compiler-optimizations-deep code-generation-and-backends mlir jit-compilation

# Virtualization
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill qemu-kvm hypervisor-internals containers-internals

# HPC and parallel programming
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill openmp mpi rdma-verbs

# Security and reverse engineering
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill reverse-engineering kernel-security

# Platform-specific (ARM SVE, RISC-V privileged, Apple Silicon)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill arm-sve riscv-privileged apple-silicon

# Emerging languages (Carbon, Hare)
npx skills add mohitmishra786/low-level-dev-skills --skill carbon-lang hare-lang

Supported Agents

Skills work with 30+ AI coding agents:

Agent	Skill Directory
Claude Code	.claude/skills/
Cursor	.cursor/skills/
Codex	.codex/skills/
GitHub Copilot	.github/copilot/skills/
Cline	.cline/skills/
Windsurf	.windsurf/skills/
Gemini CLI	.gemini/skills/
Kilo	.kilo/skills/

And many more including: Amp, Antigravity, Augment, Droid, Goose, Kiro CLI, OpenCode, Roo, Trae, VSCode, and others.

Usage Examples

After installation, invoke skills in your AI agent:

C/C++ toolchain

/gcc How do I enable link-time optimization?
/gdb Set a conditional breakpoint in GDB
/cmake What's the modern way to find packages?
/static-analysis Run clang-tidy on my whole project
/pgo Walk me through a GCC PGO workflow
/dynamic-linking My binary can't find its shared library
/cpp-modules How do I write a C++20 named module?
/cpp-templates How do I use concepts as constraints?
/binary-hardening How do I add RELRO and PIE to my binary?

Rust

/rustc-basics Configure a release build for maximum performance
/cargo-workflows Set up a Cargo workspace with multiple crates
/rust-debugging Debug a Rust panic with GDB
/rust-profiling Generate a flamegraph for my Rust binary
/rust-ffi Generate bindings to a C library with bindgen
/rust-cross Cross-compile Rust for ARM with cargo-zigbuild
/rust-async-internals Debug a waker leak in my async code
/rust-security Audit my dependencies with cargo-deny
/rust-no-std Set up a no_std crate for embedded
/rust-build-times Speed up my Rust workspace compilation

Zig

/zig-compiler What optimization mode should I use?
/zig-build-system Add a C library to my build.zig
/zig-cinterop Call a C function from Zig using @cImport
/zig-cross Cross-compile Zig for Raspberry Pi
/zig-testing How do I detect memory leaks in Zig tests?
/zig-comptime Write a generic Stack using comptime

Embedded and bare-metal

/freertos How do I detect stack overflow in FreeRTOS?
/zephyr Build and flash a Zephyr app with west
/openocd-jtag Connect GDB to my STM32 via OpenOCD
/linker-scripts Place my code in CCM RAM with a linker script
/embedded-rust Flash and debug with probe-rs and defmt
/baremetal-startup Fix .bss init so globals are zero before main
/stm32-baremetal Scaffold CMSIS-only STM32F4 without HAL
/bootloaders-embedded Jump from bootloader to app at 0x08010000

Kernel drivers and architecture

/linux-kernel-architecture Where does the page fault handler live?
/device-tree Write a DTS node for an I2C sensor with interrupt
/writing-char-drivers Add ioctl to my platform driver
/cpu-pipelines-and-hazards Break a RAW hazard in this hot loop
/llvm-ir-and-passes Explain what -O2 changed in this LLVM IR
/qemu-embedded-simulation Run my Cortex-M firmware in QEMU with GDB

Observability and security

/ebpf Write a bpftrace one-liner to trace system calls
/ebpf-rust Write an eBPF program in Rust with Aya
/binary-hardening Check my binary with checksec
/wasm-emscripten Compile my C library to WebAssembly
/wasm-wasmtime Embed wasmtime in my Rust application

Profiling & analysis

/linux-perf Generate a flame graph from perf data
/strace-ltrace Trace system calls to find a missing config file
/sanitizers Which sanitizer should I use for memory leaks?
/valgrind How do I suppress known false positives?
/heaptrack Find allocation hotspots in my C++ server
/intel-vtune-amd-uprof Analyze pipeline stalls in my hot function
/hardware-counters Measure cache miss rate with perf stat

Advanced debugging

/concurrency-debugging Read a TSan data race report
/debug-optimized-builds Why does GDB say "value optimized out"?
/dwarf-debug-format Set up debuginfod for automatic symbols

GPU and HPC

/cuda How do I fix warp divergence in my kernel?
/cuda-profiling Is my kernel memory-bound or compute-bound?
/openmp Parallelize this loop with a dynamic schedule
/mpi Debug a deadlock in my MPI_Send/Recv pattern

Kernel and systems

/kernel-internals Interpret /proc/meminfo during memory pressure
/device-drivers Write a platform_driver with threaded IRQs
/io-uring Build a server with liburing multi-shot accept
/qemu-kvm Boot my custom kernel with -kernel -append

Security and platform

/reverse-engineering Triage this stripped ELF with Ghidra
/kernel-security Write an AppArmor profile for my daemon
/arm-sve Write a vector-length agnostic SAXPY kernel
/apple-silicon Profile my app with Instruments on M-series

Skills

C/C++ Compilers (8 skills)

Skill	Purpose
gcc	GCC flags, optimization levels, warnings, diagnostics
clang	Clang/LLVM tooling, diagnostics, sanitizer integration
llvm	LLVM IR, passes, opt/llc pipeline
msvc-cl	MSVC cl.exe and clang-cl, Windows toolchain
cross-gcc	Cross-compilation triplets, sysroots, embedded targets
pgo	Profile-guided optimization — GCC, Clang, BOLT
cpp-modules	C++20 modules: named modules, header units, CMake integration
cpp-templates	Template error reading, concepts, requires-clauses, Templight

Debuggers (6 skills)

Skill	Purpose
gdb	GDB sessions, breakpoints, reverse debug, remote debug
lldb	LLDB commands, GDB migration, IDE integration
core-dumps	Core file analysis, debuginfod, production crash triage
concurrency-debugging	TSan reports, deadlock triage, happens-before reasoning
debug-optimized-builds	RelWithDebInfo, -Og, inlined frames, "value optimized out"
dwarf-debug-format	DWARF sections, dwarfdump, split DWARF, debuginfod

Profilers (7 skills)

Skill	Purpose
linux-perf	perf record/report, flame data, kernel symbols
valgrind	memcheck, cachegrind, suppression files
flamegraphs	perf-to-SVG pipeline, reading frames
strace-ltrace	Syscall and library call tracing, ENOENT/EPERM triage
heaptrack	Heap allocation profiling, leak detection, hotspots
intel-vtune-amd-uprof	VTune hotspots, microarchitecture analysis, roofline model
hardware-counters	perf stat -e, PAPI, cache miss rates, IPC analysis

Build Systems (9 skills)

Skill	Purpose
make	Idiomatic Makefiles, pattern rules, dep generation
cmake	Modern CMake, targets-first, toolchain files
ninja	Ninja diagnosis, parallelism, CMake integration
meson	Meson setup, wrap system, cross-compilation
static-analysis	clang-tidy, cppcheck, scan-build — triage workflow
conan-vcpkg	C/C++ package management with Conan and vcpkg
build-acceleration	ccache, sccache, unity builds, PCH, split-DWARF
bazel	BUILD files, cc_library/cc_binary, remote execution, Bzlmod
include-what-you-use	IWYU with CMake, reports, forward declarations

Binary Analysis (4 skills)

Skill	Purpose
elf-inspection	readelf, objdump, nm, ldd, section analysis
linkers-lto	GNU ld/gold/lld, -flto, link order, symbol issues
binutils	ar, strip, objcopy, addr2line workflows
dynamic-linking	dlopen, RPATH/RUNPATH, soname versioning, LD_PRELOAD

Runtime Safety (6 skills)

Skill	Purpose
sanitizers	ASan/UBSan/TSan/MSan decision trees and report triage
fuzzing	libFuzzer/AFL, corpus, CI integration
binary-hardening	checksec, RELRO, PIE, CFI, shadow stack, seccomp-bpf
wasm-emscripten	emcc flags, EXPORTED_FUNCTIONS, memory model, Asyncify
wasm-wasmtime	wasmtime CLI, WASI preview2, component model, Rust embedding

Low-Level Programming (9 skills)

Skill	Purpose
assembly-x86	x86-64 AT&T/Intel syntax, calling conventions, inline asm
assembly-arm	AArch64/ARM Thumb, AAPCS, inline asm
assembly-riscv	RV32/RV64 ISA, psABI, inline asm, QEMU simulation
interpreters	Bytecode VMs, dispatch loops, JIT fundamentals
simd-intrinsics	SSE2/AVX2/NEON intrinsics, auto-vectorization reports
memory-model	C++/Rust memory orderings, acquire-release, lock-free patterns
cpu-cache-opt	Cache misses, AoS vs SoA, false sharing, prefetching
cpp-coroutines	co_await/co_yield/co_return, promise_type, frame layout, GDB
linux-kernel-modules	LKMs, Kbuild, /proc, sysfs, char devices, KGDB

Observability (2 skills)

Skill	Purpose
ebpf	bpftool, libbpf, bpftrace, verifier errors, XDP, CO-RE
ebpf-rust	Aya framework, aya-bpf, aya-log, map sharing, tokio integration

Embedded (5 skills)

Skill	Purpose
freertos	Tasks, queues, mutexes, stack overflow detection, GDB debugging
zephyr	west build, Kconfig, devicetree, logging, native_sim target
openocd-jtag	OpenOCD config, flash programming, GDB remote, JTAG vs SWD
linker-scripts	MEMORY/SECTIONS, VMA vs LMA, .bss/.data init, weak symbols
embedded-rust	probe-rs, cargo-embed, defmt, RTIC, cortex-m-rt, no_std

Bare-Metal (14 skills)

Skill	Purpose
baremetal-startup	Reset vector, .data/.bss, stack, crt0, Cortex-M/RISC-V bring-up
mmio-and-bit-manipulation	volatile MMIO, RMW, alignment, endianness, register masks
interrupts-and-exceptions-baremetal	NVIC, ISRs, priority, HardFault, latency
peripherals-from-datasheet	Driver methodology from reference manual register maps
gpio-baremetal	Pin modes, AF mux, EXTI — STM32, nRF, ESP32 patterns
uart-serial-baremetal	Polling and IRQ UART, baud, framing, DMA basics
spi-i2c-baremetal	Master transactions, register read/write protocols
timers-pwm-baremetal	Timer config, PWM, input capture, output compare
adc-dac-baremetal	Sampling, calibration, DMA, DAC output
dma-baremetal	Channel setup, memory/peripheral transfers, IRQ completion
stm32-baremetal	CMSIS-only STM32 project layout without HAL
datasheet-and-refmanual-reading	Fast extraction from DS/RM, errata, pin tables
bootloaders-embedded	VTOR relocation, app validation, OTA/DFU basics
low-power-embedded	Sleep/stop/standby, clock gating, wake sources

Kernel & Driver Development (9 skills)

Skill	Purpose
linux-kernel-architecture	Subsystems, boot flow, initcalls, source navigation
kernel-memory-management	Buddy, SLUB, kmalloc, vmalloc, zones, OOM
kernel-concurrency	Spinlocks, mutex, RCU, seqlock, barriers
device-tree	DTS syntax, bindings, phandles, overlays
platform-device-model	platform_driver, probe/remove, sysfs, deferred probe
writing-char-drivers	file_operations, cdev, copy_to/from_user, ioctl, mmap
bus-drivers-i2c-spi	i2c_driver, spi_driver, regmap client drivers
kernel-debugging-advanced	ftrace, trace-cmd, kprobes, kgdb, vmcore
qemu-for-kernel-development	QEMU + rootfs for kernel/module iteration

Computer Architecture (5 skills)

Skill	Purpose
cpu-pipelines-and-hazards	Pipeline stages, RAW hazards, forwarding, stalls
memory-hierarchy-and-caches	L1/L2/L3, coherence, false sharing, prefetch
virtual-memory-paging-and-tlb	Page tables, faults, TLB pressure, huge pages
abi-and-calling-conventions	SysV AMD64, AAPCS, RISC-V psABI, stack frames
branch-prediction-and-speculation	Predictors, mispredict, Spectre/Meltdown awareness

QEMU & Constrained Systems (4 skills)

Skill	Purpose
qemu-embedded-simulation	Bare-metal ARM/RISC-V in QEMU, -kernel, GDB
protocol-analysis	sigrok/PulseView I2C/SPI/UART decode
resource-optimization-lowend	Flash/RAM, linker maps, stack analysis, -Os
verilog-basics-for-lowlevel	Read RTL for MMIO, resets, CDC, bus interfaces

Rust (12 skills)

Skill	Purpose
rustc-basics	RUSTFLAGS, Cargo profiles, MIR/asm output, monomorphization
cargo-workflows	Workspaces, features, build.rs, nextest, cargo-deny
rust-debugging	rust-gdb/rust-lldb, backtraces, tokio-console, dbg!
rust-profiling	cargo-flamegraph, cargo-bloat, cargo-llvm-lines, Criterion
rust-ffi	bindgen, cbindgen, sys crates, safe FFI wrappers
rust-cross	cross tool, cargo-zigbuild, bare-metal, no_std
rust-sanitizers-miri	ASan/TSan with RUSTFLAGS, Miri for unsafe UB detection
rust-unsafe	Raw pointers, transmute, UnsafeCell, audit checklist
rust-async-internals	Future/poll model, Pin/Unpin, tokio-console, select!/join!
rust-security	cargo-audit, cargo-deny, RUSTSEC, safe FFI, fuzzing pipeline
rust-no-std	#![no_std], core vs std, alloc crate, custom allocators
rust-build-times	cargo-timings, sccache, Cranelift, workspace splitting, mold

Zig (7 skills)

Skill	Purpose
zig-compiler	zig build-exe/lib, optimize modes, zig cc, error messages
zig-build-system	build.zig, modules, C integration, build.zig.zon packages
zig-cinterop	@cImport, translate-c, extern struct, packed struct, exports
zig-debugging	GDB/LLDB with Zig, panics, error return traces, std.debug
zig-cross	Built-in cross-compilation, target triples, zig cc cross, WASM
zig-testing	zig build test, comptime testing, test allocators, fuzz testing
zig-comptime	comptime evaluation, anytype generics, @typeInfo reflection

GPU (6 skills)

Skill	Purpose
cuda	CUDA kernels, memory hierarchy, streams, nvcc, Thrust
cuda-profiling	Nsight Systems/Compute, NCU CLI, roofline diagnosis
cuda-debugging	cuda-gdb, compute-sanitizer, device printf, error codes
triton-lang	Triton JIT kernels, autotuning, PyTorch integration
hip-rocm	AMD HIP, hipify porting, rocprof, MI300X tuning
gpu-memory-model	SIMT, coalescing, bank conflicts, occupancy tradeoffs

Kernel Internals (5 skills)

Skill	Purpose
kernel-internals	Scheduler, buddy/SLUB, VFS, page cache, OOM killer
device-drivers	platform/i2c/spi drivers, IRQ, DMA, regmap, udev
kernel-debugging	kgdb, kdb, ftrace, kprobes, dyndbg, crash dumps
kernel-testing	KUnit, kselftest, syzkaller, LTP, KernelCI
os-dev-scratch	Bootloader, long mode, IDT, paging, context switch

Async I/O (3 skills)

Skill	Purpose
io-uring	liburing SQE/CQE, multi-shot, provided buffers, SEND_ZC
dpdk	EAL, PMD, mbuf pools, huge pages, RSS, testpmd
af-xdp	UMEM, XSK rings, XDP_REDIRECT, zero-copy packet I/O

Allocators (2 skills)

Skill	Purpose
custom-allocators	Pool/arena allocators, jemalloc/mimalloc tuning, GlobalAlloc
numa-programming	numactl, libnuma, NUMA-aware structures, lstopo

Compiler Internals (7 skills)

Skill	Purpose
compiler-frontend	Lexer, Pratt parser, AST, type checker, LLVM IR emission
llvm-passes	New Pass Manager, PassPlugin, llvm-lit, analysis utilities
llvm-ir-and-passes	Read LLVM IR/SSA, opt pipelines, llvm-dis inspection
compiler-optimizations-deep	RA, vectorization, PGO, BOLT, LICM depth
code-generation-and-backends	ISel, TableGen, llc, target lowering overview
mlir	Dialects, ODS, lowering passes, mlir-opt, Torch-MLIR/IREE
jit-compilation	ORC JIT, LLJIT, Cranelift, inline caches, W^X policy

Virtualization (3 skills)

Skill	Purpose
qemu-kvm	KVM flags, virtio, VFIO passthrough, libvirt, kernel boot
hypervisor-internals	VT-x/SVM, VMCS/VMCB, EPT/NPT, APIC virtualization
containers-internals	namespaces, cgroups v2, overlayfs, runc, seccomp

Security (2 skills)

Skill	Purpose
reverse-engineering	Ghidra, radare2, Binary Ninja, stripped binary triage
kernel-security	SELinux, AppArmor, seccomp, KASLR, CET, PAC/BTI, KASAN

HPC (3 skills)

Skill	Purpose
openmp	Parallel for, reductions, SIMD, task parallelism, GPU offload
mpi	Send/recv, collectives, non-blocking, MPI+OpenMP hybrid
rdma-verbs	libibverbs, queue pairs, RDMA read/write, RoCE, perftest

Platform (3 skills)

Skill	Purpose
arm-sve	SVE/SVE2 intrinsics, predicates, VLA loops, Graviton tuning
riscv-privileged	M/S/U modes, CSRs, PLIC/CLINT, OpenSBI, Sv39/Sv48
apple-silicon	Unified memory, AMX/Accelerate, MPS, Instruments, Rosetta

Languages (2 skills)

Skill	Purpose
carbon-lang	Carbon syntax, C++ interop, carbon-toolchain, migration
hare-lang	hare build/test, stdlib, C FFI, tagged union errors

Total: 142 skills

Design

Each skill follows the SKILL.md format. The body stays under 500 lines; detailed reference material lives in references/ and is loaded only when needed (progressive disclosure).

Skills cross-reference each other where workflows overlap (e.g., rust-profiling + linux-perf, zig-cinterop + zig-build-system, sanitizers + fuzzing, embedded-rust + linker-scripts, ebpf + ebpf-rust).

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! To add or improve a skill:

1. Fork the repository
2. Create or modify skills in skills/<category>/<skill-name>/SKILL.md
3. Follow the SKILL.md format with required sections (Purpose, Triggers, Workflow, Related skills)
4. Add reference files in references/ for content that exceeds 500 lines
5. Submit a pull request

Topics

ai-agent-skills low-level-programming c-cpp-toolchain systems-programming compilers debuggers profilers build-systems rust zig embedded bare-metal cross-compilation ebpf webassembly freertos zephyr risc-v cuda gpu linux-kernel kernel-drivers computer-architecture qemu hpc mpi virtualization reverse-engineering