Release Notes - v0.5.4rc1

Release Date: 2026-03-13
Changes: v0.5.5.dev0 → ci/dev-canary-release

Summary

Release 0.5.4rc1 introduces a complete "skills" system for Cognee: a self-improving skill framework (ingest, route, execute, observe, and amend), new REST and MCP tools for managing skills, CLI commands, and many docs and examples. The release also improves parsing, scoring with LLM-based metrics, and adds end-to-end tests and demos for the new workflows.

Highlights

• New cognee-skills package: author, ingest and run agent skills with self-improvement
• REST API endpoints + MCP tools and a CLI to manage and execute skills
• LLM-based scoring and automatic amendment workflow (inspect → amendify → apply)
• End-to-end examples, demos and extensive tests to help get started
• Parser improvements, flat-file SKILL.md support, and numerous docs updates

Breaking Changes

• None identified in this release. New endpoints, MCP tools, and CLI commands are additive. If you rely on custom MCP toolsets or older CLI scripts, you may need to update integrations to use the new skill tool names and REST routes.

New Features

• New cognee_skills package providing: skill parsing, execution, inspection, observe/promote flows, amendify (auto-fix) and preview flows
• REST API endpoints for skills (GET/POST routers) so external apps can list, load and query skills
• MCP tools added to cognee-mcp server: get_skill_context, load_skill, execute_skill, observe_skill_run, promote_skill_runs, ingest/upsert/remove/list skills and skill resources
• CLI commands to ingest, upsert, list and execute skills from the command line (cognee skills ...)
• execute_skill callable function and tool: run a skill end-to-end and automatically record results for learning
• LLM-based scoring for skill runs instead of only binary success/failure — runs now get a score to drive learning and selective amendment

Improvements

• Skill parser improved and made more flexible; supports flat-file SKILL.md inputs and better parsing of task patterns
• Refactored naming and simplified step implementations for clearer behavior and easier extension
• Docs: many README and in-package docs updated with agent instructions, examples, and usage guides (including agent routing prompts and skill format reference)
• Added time-component and weight mechanisms in skill preference scoring and promotion workflow
• More robust tests: e2e pipeline tests, client load/list tests, and many unit tests for skill flows and amendify

Bug Fixes

• Fixed nodeset handling and preservation of original instructions when amending skills
• Fixed availability checks for MCP integration and various version bumps/uv version fixes
• More flexible parser fixes addressing parsing edge cases

Technical Changes

• Large new test suite additions and CI-focused changes (many new tests under cognee/cognee_skills/tests)
• New API router implemented at cognee/api/v1/skills/routers/get_skills_router.py
• MCP server extended in cognee-mcp/src/server.py with skills tools and resources
• New CLI code at cognee/cli/commands/skills_command.py and skill client implementation at cognee/cognee_skills/client.py
• Substantial new modules: parser, execute, observe, inspect, amendify, preview_amendify and pipeline for skills

Generated by Cognee Release Notes Generator on 2026-03-13