Set up AI coding agents with the GitLab Orbit skill

  • Tier: Free, Premium, Ultimate
  • Offering: GitLab.com, GitLab Self-Managed, GitLab Dedicated
  • Status: Beta

The GitLab Orbit skill gives AI coding agents structured guidance for querying the GitLab Orbit graph. It includes:

  • Query recipes - paste-ready JSON bodies for common questions (blast radius, pipeline history, contributor patterns).
  • DSL reference - the full query language so agents compose valid queries on the first attempt.
  • Troubleshooting - exit codes, empty-result diagnostics, and common pitfalls.
  • Repository map helpers - scripts that summarize codebase structure from a local checkout or from GitLab Orbit Remote.

The skill works with both GitLab Orbit Remote and GitLab Orbit Local.

Prerequisites

  • GitLab CLI (glab) v1.117.0 or later. It forwards glab orbit <command> to the GitLab Orbit binary it installs. If glab skills or glab orbit is not recognized, update glab first.

Install the skill

Install globally (available to every project):

shell
glab skills install --global orbit

This installs the skill to ~/.agents/skills/orbit.

Install for the current project only:

shell
glab skills install orbit

This installs the skill to .agents/skills/orbit in the project root.

If the skill is already installed, glab reports that SKILL.md exists and suggests --force to overwrite.

Claude Code does not scan .agents/skills. Link the skill into its own directory so it can find it:

shell
ln -s ../../.agents/skills/orbit ~/.claude/skills/orbit

orbit setup writes the local skill and this link for you.

Update the GitLab Orbit skill

To update to the latest version, re-run the install command with --force:

shell
glab skills install --global --force orbit