letta-guide

---
name: letta-guide
description: Read the official Letta documentation (docs.letta.com) through its cached, ETag-checked fetch route. Load before ANY docs.letta.com retrieval — answering how Letta works, what Letta (or you) can do, and looking up Letta API, Agent SDK, or Letta Code reference.
---

# Letta Guide

Do not use fetch_webpage or web_search on docs.letta.com; this skill's helper is the docs route.

You are running inside Letta, but your training data about Letta's commands,
flags, settings, UI, pricing, and providers is out of date. Users lose trust
fastest when an agent confidently invents product details. This skill defines
how to read the Letta docs correctly — both when answering questions about
Letta and when looking up API, Agent SDK, or Letta Code reference during
development. Guessing a docs URL and fetching it with `fetch_webpage` misses
pages that exist under a different path and can serve stale content; the
helper below fetches the live index first, so you pick a URL that exists.

## Source route (in order)

1. **Self-inspection first for questions about THIS agent.** "What model are
   you using?", "what tools do you have?", "what's in your memory?" are
   questions about the running session, not the docs. Load the
   `self-configuration` skill for model or settings questions and use its
   backend-aware active configuration report. Use the system prompt, agent
   info, tool schemas, and MemFS for the other live facts. Do not infer active
   state from recent/default preference lists, and do not fetch docs for these.
2. **Fetch the docs index directly.** For product questions, run:

   ```bash
   node <SKILL_DIR>/scripts/fetch-letta-docs.mjs
   ```

   The helper retrieves `https://docs.letta.com/llms.txt` from the docs host,
   verifies its ETag against the body, and prints the paths to a current local
   copy and heading outline. Read the outline, then read the relevant index
   lines and their applicability labels to pick a page matching the user's
   backend and interface (see below).
3. **Fetch the specific page directly.** Pass the exact canonical URL from the
   index back to the same helper, for example:

   ```bash
   node <SKILL_DIR>/scripts/fetch-letta-docs.mjs \
     --docs-url "https://docs.letta.com/configuration/models/index.md"
   ```

   Read the returned docs path, including its frontmatter, before applying its
   instructions or running the helper for another URL. The
   helper uses native HTTPS with a curl fallback; do not use `fetch_webpage`
   for the normal docs route because its upstream content cache may be stale.
   Cite the public doc URL so the user can go deeper.
4. **If direct retrieval fails**, use `fetch_webpage` only as a fallback with a
   fresh query parameter on the same official docs URL. Disclose that the
   fallback may be stale. If that also fails, say the docs are unreachable,
   give your best answer, and clearly mark it as possibly out of date with a
   link to https://docs.letta.com. Never silently fall back to memory.

## Match documentation to the user's setup

Read each page's `applies_to` frontmatter before using its instructions:

```yaml
applies_to:
  backends: [cloud, local]
  interfaces: [web, desktop, cli, sdk]
```

- **Backends describe agent state, not the computer running tools.** `cloud`
  means Letta Cloud; `local` means a user-managed backend.
- **Interfaces** refer to the user's current interface: chat.letta.com (`web`,
  cloud-only), CLI, Desktop, or SDK.
- Do NOT use context from files marked `status: legacy` unless providing
  historical context.

## Inspect or change your model from the CLI

- `letta model list [--byok | --hosted]` lists available models.
- `letta model set [model_handle] [--reasoning <reasoning-option>] [--default]` overrides the current conversation's model or reasoning; `--default` overrides the agent's default instead.
- `letta model get [--default]` gets the current model configuration; `--default` gets the agent's default configuration.

## Hard rules

- **Never invent CLI commands, flags, slash commands, settings keys, config
  file shapes, or UI paths.** If something is not in the fetched docs and you
  cannot verify it locally (`letta --help`, `/help`, reading the actual
  config file), say you are not sure or that it does not exist — do not
  guess a plausible-sounding name.
- **Distinguish surfaces.** The CLI, the desktop app, the web app
  (chat.letta.com), and the API/SDK have different affordances. Answer for
  the surface the user is actually on; say when a feature lives on a
  different surface.
- **Always fetch, never recall**, for anything volatile: pricing, rate
  limits, data policies, the provider/model catalog, channel setup steps,
  and integration instructions.
- **If the feature genuinely doesn't exist**, say so and point the user to
  https://github.com/letta-ai/letta-code/issues to request it.

## Support escalation

When the docs don't resolve the user's problem — setup issues you can't
debug, account/billing questions, suspected bugs, or anything needing a
human — point them to the right channel:

- **Discord** (https://discord.gg/letta): the primary support community,
  very active — best for setup help, troubleshooting, and quick questions.
  It's also where users can chat with **Ezra**, Letta's support agent.
- **GitHub issues** (https://github.com/letta-ai/letta-code/issues): bug
  reports and feature requests.

If the user reports errors, timeouts, or things suddenly not working, check
**https://status.letta.com** for an active incident before debugging — and
have the user check it too.

Offer these proactively when you've hit the end of what the docs cover,
rather than leaving the user stuck.

## Caching

The helper owns the cache. It uses the first writable temporary directory from
`TMPDIR`, `TEMP`, `TMP`, `/private/tmp`, or `/tmp`, and accepts `--cache-dir`
when an explicit location is needed. Every invocation checks the live ETag and
reuses the local document only when its body hash still matches. Do not create
or manage a second cache yourself.

From letta-ai/letta-code at c1033d9, shown as plain text under its license: Apache-2.0 (permissive). The license text is in LICENSE.

• SKILL.md6.1 KB · ee8de9c7f7ed
• scripts/
• fetch-letta-docs.mjs13 KB · 99273fed66b8

2 files, 19 KB in total. Each file has a sha256 in the pin's manifest; the first 12 characters are shown.