probe

World Models research observation: when the learned dynamics model (M) is unreliable, prefer a cheap real probe over an imagined rollout. This skill is that safety valve.

When to use /probe

• Dreamer confidence < 0.5 for a proposed action.
• You catch yourself guessing about a file's contents, a dependency version, or a test count.
• A PostToolUse hook reported high surprise and you want to re-ground before the next step.
• You are about to state a prediction you can't actually defend.

Cheap, reversible probes (pre-approved)

The following are side-effect-free (or trivially reversible) and are pre-approved in this skill's allowlist:

Intent	Probe
What changed locally?	git status, git diff, git log -5 --oneline
What branch am I on?	git branch --show-current
What's in this directory?	ls -la <path>
Type check without emit	tsc --noEmit
What tests exist?	pytest --collect-only -q
Are there lint errors?	ruff check <path>, eslint --no-fix <path>
Is this dep installed?	npm ls <pkg>, node --version, python --version
Is this tool on PATH?	which <cmd>

Procedure

1. State the one-sentence QUESTION you want grounded.
2. Choose the MINIMUM probe that answers it. Smaller is better — a probe is not a survey.
3. Run it; read the actual output.
4. Update your working belief (and, if this probe was prompted by a prior surprise, consider /reflect next).

What /probe is NOT for

• Anything that writes to the filesystem.
• Anything that installs packages or touches the network.
• Anything that takes more than a few seconds.
• "While I'm here, let me also check…" — keep it to the single grounded question.

For everything else, use /predict then run the action normally.

Arguments

$ARGUMENTS — the question you want grounded, in one sentence.

Your response should:

1. Restate the question.
2. Choose and run the single minimum probe.
3. Report the observed answer (ground truth), nothing more.