Crunch Compete

Use when working with Crunch competitions - setting up workspaces, exploring quickstarters, testing solutions locally, or submitting entries.

Security Scan

The skill's instructions, network access, and package requirements are consistent with its stated purpose (setting up and interacting with Crunch competitions); nothing in the bundle requests unrelated credentials or privileged system persistence.

Purpose & Capability

The name/description (Crunch competitions: setup, test, submit) matches the SKILL.md: it directs use of the crunch-cli, creating per-competition venvs, testing locally, browsing quickstarters, and submitting. There are no unrelated required binaries, env vars, or config paths in the registry metadata that would be out of scope.

Instruction Scope

Runtime instructions stay within the competition workflow: creating venvs, pip installing Crunch-related packages from PyPI, running crunch commands, and using the Crunch hub and GitHub API. The skill explicitly requires the user to supply the submission token interactively and instructs the agent to ask before installing unknown packages and not to log tokens. There is no instruction to read unrelated system files or exfiltrate data to unexpected endpoints.

Install Mechanism

This is an instruction-only skill (no install spec). It recommends installing packages from PyPI into isolated virtualenvs and forbids custom URLs or wheel files from unknown sources. Instruction-only status keeps disk-write/install risk low; pip-from-PyPI in a venv is the expected mechanism for this purpose.

Credentials

The registry declares no required env vars or primary credential, which aligns with the skill being interactive. The SKILL.md does require a user-supplied submission token passed via CLI (not an env var) and documents that the CLI will persist it under the project's .crunch/ config. This is expected for a submit workflow but warrants user awareness because persisted tokens on disk are sensitive and depend on the CLI's storage practices.

Persistence & Privilege

always:false and no system-level installs are requested. The skill creates per-project files/venvs and relies on the crunch-cli to store the token under the project's .crunch/ directory — normal for this use case and not an elevation of agent privileges or modification of other skills.

Assessment

This skill appears coherent for Crunch competition workflows, but take these practical precautions before installing or letting an agent run it: 1) Only install crunch-cli and competition SDKs after confirming their source (review the package/project on PyPI/GitHub) — pip packages run code at install time. 2) Use the recommended virtualenvs and do not install into system Python. 3) Be aware the submission token you provide will be stored in the project's .crunch/ directory; review its contents and file permissions and rotate the token if you later suspect compromise. 4) Follow the skill's rule to approve any additional packages before installation (don’t allow silent auto-install of arbitrary PyPI packages). 5) If you want lower risk, perform installation and the first crunch setup yourself locally rather than granting the agent autonomous permission to run install/setup commands.

Cruncher Skill

Guides users through Crunch competition lifecycle: setup, quickstarter discovery, solution development, local testing, and submission.

Prerequisites

• Python 3.9+ with venv module (included in standard Python)
• pip for package installation

Package Installation

This skill installs Python packages from PyPI into isolated virtual environments:

Package	Source	Purpose
crunch-cli	PyPI	CrunchDAO competition CLI (setup, test, submit)
jupyter	PyPI	Notebook support (optional)
ipykernel	PyPI	Jupyter kernel registration (optional)
Competition SDKs (e.g. crunch-synth, birdgame)	PyPI	Competition-specific libraries (varies)

Agent rules for package installation:

• Always use a virtual environment — never install into system Python
• Only install known packages listed above or referenced in competition docs (PACKAGES.md)
• Ask the user before installing any package not listed here
• All packages are from PyPI — no custom URLs, no --index-url overrides, no .whl files from unknown sources

Credentials

Submission Token (required for setup & submit)

• How to get: User logs into CrunchDAO Hub, navigates to the competition's submit page (/competitions/<competition>/submit), and copies their token
• How it's used: Passed once via --token <TOKEN> during crunch setup
• Persistence: After setup, the CLI stores the token in the project's .crunch/ config directory. All subsequent commands (crunch test, crunch push, crunch download) authenticate automatically — no need to pass the token again
• If token expires: Run crunch update-token inside the project directory to refresh it

Agent rules for tokens:

• Always ask the user to provide the token — never assume, guess, or reuse tokens from other projects
• Never write tokens into source files, scripts, notebooks, or any committed file
• Never log or echo tokens in shell output (use --token <TOKEN> placeholder in examples shown to user)
• Tokens are user-specific and project-scoped — each crunch setup call requires the user to supply one

GitHub API (optional, unauthenticated)

• Used only for browsing quickstarter listings via api.github.com (public repo, no auth needed)
• Rate-limited to 60 requests/hour per IP; sufficient for normal use

Network Access

Operation	Requires network	Endpoint
crunch setup	Yes	hub.crunchdao.com
crunch push	Yes	hub.crunchdao.com
crunch download	Yes	hub.crunchdao.com
crunch test	No	Local only
crunch list	Yes	hub.crunchdao.com
pip install	Yes	pypi.org
Quickstarter browsing	Yes	api.github.com

Quick Setup

Each competition needs its own virtual environment (dependencies can conflict).

mkdir -p ~/.crunch/workspace/competitions/<competition>
cd ~/.crunch/workspace/competitions/<competition>
python -m venv .venv && source .venv/bin/activate 
pip install crunch-cli jupyter ipykernel --upgrade --quiet --progress-bar=off
python -m ipykernel install --user --name <competition> --display-name "Crunch - <competition>"

# Get token from: https://hub.crunchdao.com/competitions/<competition>/submit
crunch setup <competition> <project-name> --token <TOKEN>
cd <competition>-<project-name>

For competition-specific packages and full examples, see references/competition-setup.md.

Core Workflow

1. Discover

crunch list                    # List competitions

2. Explain

Read the quickstarter code (main.py or notebook) and competition's SKILL.md/README.md. Provide walkthrough covering: Goal, Interface, Data flow, Approach, Scoring, Constraints, Limitations, Improvement ideas.

3. Propose Improvements

Analyze current approach, cross-reference competition docs (SKILL.md, LITERATURE.md, PACKAGES.md), generate concrete code suggestions:

• Model: mixture densities, NGBoost, quantile regression, ensembles
• Features: volatility regimes, cross-asset correlation, seasonality
• Architecture: online learning, Bayesian updating, horizon-specific models

4. Test

crunch test                    # Test solution locally

5. Submit

crunch test                    # Always test first
crunch push -m "Description"   # Submit

Phrase Mapping

User says	Action
what competitions are available	crunch list
show quickstarters for <name>	Fetch from GitHub API
set up <competition>	Full workspace setup
download the data	crunch download
get the <name> quickstarter	crunch quickstarter --name
explain this quickstarter	Structured code walkthrough
propose improvements	Analyze and suggest code improvements
test my solution	crunch test
compare with baseline	Run both, side-by-side results
submit my solution	crunch push

Important Rules

• Entrypoint must be main.py (default for crunch push/crunch test)
• Model files go in resources/ directory
• Respect competition interface and constraints (time limits, output format)
• Ask before installing new packages

Reference

• CLI commands: references/cli-reference.md
• Setup examples: references/competition-setup.md