Cromus AI Skills Governance — VS Code Extension

Score, validate, and enforce policy on AI skills (SKILL.md, ETHOS.md, AGENTS.md, MEMORY.md) directly in VS Code.

Features

CROMS score in the status bar

Open a SKILL.md and the extension scores it with the Cromus engine on save. The CROMS score (0–1000) and severity appear in the status bar — no context switching to the browser.

Inline diagnostics on save

Validation errors and warnings appear as squiggles in the editor and in the Problems panel for all four governance file types:

SKILL.md — Agent Skills spec conformance + policy gate
ETHOS.md — behavioral governance scoring
AGENTS.md — role attribution and attestation
MEMORY.md — memory format validation

Policy-as-code enforcement

If a cromus.policy.yml exists in your workspace root, the extension runs it against every SKILL.md on save and shows violations inline. Any min_croms, max_cost_per_run, require_ethos, or provider restriction that fails shows as a red squiggle with the rule name.

Model pricing on hover

Hover over any model: provider:model-name line to see the current input/output pricing from the Cromus model registry, context window size, and active/retired status — without leaving the editor.

Quick-fix suggestions

Click the lightbulb on a Cromus diagnostic to:

Insert an ethos: governance block skeleton
Insert an agents: block skeleton
Open the Cromus web validator for the current file

Install

Search for Cromus in the VS Code Marketplace, or:

code --install-extension CromusAI.cromus

Setup

Open VS Code Settings (Cmd/Ctrl+,)
Search for Cromus
Set Cromus: Api Key to your API key

Get an API key at cromus.ai/connect → API Keys.

Settings

Setting	Default	Description
`cromus.apiKey`	`""`	Your API key (`cromus_ci_...` or `mcp_...`)
`cromus.apiUrl`	`https://cromus.ai`	Override for self-hosted instances
`cromus.validateOnSave`	`true`	Run validation automatically on save
`cromus.showScoreInStatusBar`	`true`	Show CROMS score in the status bar
`cromus.policyFile`	`cromus.policy.yml`	Policy file path relative to workspace root

Policy-as-code

Add a cromus.policy.yml to your repo root to enforce governance rules in both the editor and CI:

version: 1
rules:
  min_croms: 700
  max_cost_per_run: 0.05
  require_ethos: true
  require_agents: true
  allowed_providers:
    - anthropic
    - openai

The same policy file is read by the Cromus Compile GitHub Action to block PRs that violate the rules.

Commands

Command	Description
`Cromus: Score Current SKILL.md`	Score the open SKILL.md and refresh the status bar
`Cromus: Validate Current File`	Run validation and update the Problems panel
`Cromus: Open Connect Page`	Open cromus.ai/connect in the browser

License

MIT

Cromus AI Skills Governance

Alva Cardona