A skill isn't "dead" if nobody types its slash command — it's dead only if no channel can fire it. Skills activate four ways: a user types /ork:x (direct), another skill chains it, a subagent is granted it, or it runs in the background. The goal isn't fewer skills — it's full channel coverage.
skill-tracker binds to the PreToolUse · Skill matcher in the main session — it logs only the direct channel. Subagent calls (isolated context), prose-chained steps, and headless/background runs are never counted. Read one channel and you see 20/31 "dead." Count all four and only 2 were truly orphaned — now 0, wired this session.This is the whole point. Turn off every channel except direct and you reproduce the scary number — 20 skills go dark. Switch the other three back on and they light up: they were firing all along, through channels the telemetry can't see. Counts reflect the AFTER state — flip the BEFORE/AFTER switch above to compare.
Cell number = strength of that channel (direct = invocations · chain = skills referencing it · subagent = agents granted it · bg = autonomous marker). Dashed cell = channel absent. The rightmost column is total coverage — the only honest "alive" metric. Sorted weakest-first: the gaps float to the top.
Each skill below got a new trigger, never a tombstone — via skills: frontmatter grants in src/agents/ and chain refs in src/skills/. The two orphans got a home; the rest got a second wire so a refactor of one parent can't dark them. Flip to ◀ BEFORE up top to watch them light up.