insta

name	insta
description	Operate InstaCloud infrastructure with the `insta` CLI: create projects, add postgres/storage/compute services, deploy apps, create disposable branch environments (isolated DB + storage + compute per branch), wire `insta secrets` into `.env`, run multiple agents each in their own branch, handle governance approvals, check metrics/logs/usage, and promote branches to main. Use this skill when working in an InstaCloud-managed project (a `.insta/` dir or the `insta` CLI), when the user mentions InstaCloud or insta, AND when they ask to deploy an app, need a database/backend/object storage, want preview or per-agent sandbox environments, want branchable infrastructure, or mention agent setup or MCP — even if they don't say "InstaCloud" explicitly. Also covers the insta-cloud remote MCP server (insta_* tools) and the self-hosted insta-oss runtime (same CLI, local daemon).
allowed-tools	Bash(insta:*), Bash(npx:*), Bash(curl:*), Bash(command:*), Bash(git:*), Bash(npm:*)

InstaCloud

InstaCloud provisions and governs a project's cloud services behind one CLI and one credential seam. The insta CLI talks only to the InstaCloud control plane — you never configure a cloud backend directly. A project can have any number of services, added on demand — there are three service types you build directly against:

• postgres — relational DB (autoscaling compute + read replicas).
• storage — S3-compatible object/blob storage.
• compute — your container(s) at a public URL. A project can have several compute services (e.g. api, worker).

A new project starts empty — no services are created automatically. Add what you need: insta services add postgres <name>, insta services add compute <name>, insta services add storage <name>. A project may have multiple services of every type (up to 5 per type). Credentials are named per service: DATABASE_URL_<NAME>, BUCKET_NAME_<NAME>, … (service name upper-snaked); the oldest service of each type also gets the plain names (DATABASE_URL, BUCKET_NAME, …), so single-service projects work unchanged. Use insta services rename <type> <name> <new-name> to rename a service; platform-managed credential names are re-keyed to the new suffix.

Install & upgrade the CLI

If command -v insta finds nothing, install it (never assume it's present):

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/InsForge/insta-cli/main/install.sh | sh  # native binary, no Node
npm install -g insta                                    # npm alternative
npx insta@latest <cmd>                                  # one-shot, always newest (slow per call)

The CLI is pre-1.0 and ships often. If a command misbehaves or is unrecognized, update first: insta upgrade (CLIs that have it; auto-update is on by default pre-1.0 — insta autoupdate off to disable), else re-run the installer (idempotent) or npm update -g insta.

Two targets, one CLI

The same commands drive both. Resolve which one you're on from insta status (api: line):

• InstaCloud (managed cloud) — requires insta login (agents: --email/--password or an API token; humans: --oauth github|google, opens a browser).
• insta-oss (self-hosted local daemon) — INSTA_API_URL=http://127.0.0.1:8080 (its default). No login exists or is needed (localhost trust, builtin local user); billing/usage/metrics return clear "cloud-only" errors — don't retry them.

Tool routing: MCP vs CLI

InstaCloud has two agent-facing operation paths. Choose in this order:

1. CLI for anything that needs local machine state: auth (insta login), pulling secret values (insta secrets / insta run), source-directory deploys (insta deploy <dir>), the observe hook, and repo-linked context (.insta/project.json).
2. Remote MCP (insta_* tools, when connected) as the default for platform-scoped operations that don't need local files: discovery, services, branches, image deploys, metrics/logs/usage, governance. Structured JSON, same governance gates, same audit trail.
3. No MCP connected → the CLI covers everything.

MCP tools take explicit projectId/branch args — never assume the CLI's linked context carries over; resolve IDs first (e.g. insta_project_list, or insta status --json locally) and pass them explicitly. Full mapping + connection guide: mcp.md.

Self-heal: if the insta skill or the insta_* MCP tools are expected but missing, run insta setup agent -y (installs the skill + registers MCP for Claude Code and every detected agent), then tell the user to restart their coding tool — a running session never picks up newly registered MCP servers or tools. One specific agent: insta mcp install --agent <slug>.

Intent-based routing

Route by intent before running preflight ceremony:

"Ship / deploy this app" (from zero): don't interrogate state first — run the chain and announce it: insta status (logged in? linked?) → if unauthenticated on cloud, insta login → if unlinked, insta project create <dir-name> → insta services add postgres db (if the app needs a DB) + insta services add compute app → insta secrets → insta deploy . --port <the port the app listens on> → verify the printed URL serves (below). The app reads process.env creds.

"Set up / onboard / sign up": cloud → insta login --oauth github (browser) or --email/--password; then insta project create. Local/oss → nothing to set up beyond the daemon.

A unit of work on an existing project (feature, fix, experiment, agent task): one branch per unit of work — see the core principle below and branching.md. Never develop on main.

Anything else (configure, debug, inspect): light preflight, then the matching reference below.

Preflight & context (before mutations)

command -v insta                 # installed? (else: Install section)
insta status --json              # target api, login, linked project, current branch

Skip this ceremony for the ship-from-zero chain above — status is its first step already.

Context rules (multi-agent safety):

• The link (./.insta/project.json) is per directory and includes the current branch.
• Prefer explicit --branch <name> on commands that accept it (secrets, deploy, metrics, logs, events) over insta branch switch when acting on a branch you don't own — switch mutates the shared per-directory link and races parallel agents in the same checkout.
• For parallel agents, the rule is 1:1:1 — task ↔ git worktree ↔ insta branch (each worktree has its own link, so switch is safe there). See branching.md.

Core principle

One unit of work = one branch = one isolated environment. insta branch create <name> materializes the parent branch's current services onto the new branch — a Neon DB branch (CoW copy of the parent's data), a CoW-forked storage bucket, and a clone of every compute service (own URL each), created at branch-create, so a branch is a complete runnable environment from the start. Branches run fully in parallel; nothing one does touches another. ≤10 branches per project (hard limit). Don't develop on main; don't pile multiple features on one branch.

Multiple independent features (or agent tasks) at once? Give each its own branch and its own subagent — isolated DB + storage + compute + URLs mean zero collision. See branching.md → Parallel agents.

Verify before reporting (deploys)

Never report a deploy as successful from the command exiting alone. insta deploy prints the branch URL on success — that means the platform accepted and rolled the machine, not that the app serves:

1. Poll the printed URL (curl -s -o /dev/null -w '%{http_code}') every ~3s for up to ~60s. Scale-to-zero branches cold-start on the first request — allow a slow first hit.
2. 200 (or the app's expected status) → deployed; report the URL.
3. Still failing → the ordered triage list in operate.md (port mismatch and migration-gated startup account for most failures).
4. Report the exact failing state — never claim success you didn't observe.

Approval relay (CRITICAL — gated actions)

Sensitive actions are gated at the credential boundary (secrets.read, secrets.write, deploy, project.delete, branch.delete, service.add/remove/scale/upgrade; policy per action: allow/deny/approve — project.delete requires approval by default). When a command returns "approval required" with an approval id:

• Relay it to the human immediately and verbatim — the exact line to run: insta approvals approve <id> (add --always to also stop future prompts for that action). Don't summarize it away, don't retry the command, and don't report the task as failed without surfacing the approval first. Only an admin can approve.
• Grants are single-use: after approval, re-run the original command; the next occurrence prompts again unless policy was set to allow (--always / insta policy set <action> allow).
• Never work around a gate (e.g. by hand-editing state or bypassing the CLI) — the gate is the product's safety model. A deny policy is a hard no: report it, don't circumvent it.

Common quick operations

insta status --json                          # target, login, link, current branch
insta manifest --json                        # agent-legible env view: every branch's services + URLs
insta services list --json                   # what exists on this project
insta run -- <cmd>                           # run with the branch bundle injected (NOTHING on disk; --branch <b>)
insta secrets --print                        # credential bundle for the current branch (--branch <b>)
insta secrets set NAME value                 # user config (project-wide; --branch for overrides)
insta deploy . --port 8080                   # build (Dockerfile) + deploy to the current branch
insta deploy --image <ref> --port 8080       # prebuilt image instead
insta branch create feat && insta branch list --json
insta logs compute --limit 100 --json        # runtime logs (--branch <b>; db is provider-limited)
insta metrics compute --json                 # service metrics
insta events --limit 50 --json               # audit + agent-event timeline
insta usage --json                           # cloud only (insta billing --json likewise)
insta approvals list --status pending        # outstanding gates

Use --json wherever you parse output.

Routing

For anything beyond the quick operations, load the reference that matches the intent — one is usually enough, two at most:

Intent	Reference	Covers
Create or connect things ("set up", "new project", "add a database/compute")	setup.md	CLI install/upgrade, cloud vs oss target, auth, project, services, ship-from-zero
Ship code or manage releases	deploy.md · framework recipes: frameworks.md	image vs source (remote build), --port semantics, secrets at runtime, verify procedure, Dockerfile templates, custom domains
Branch environments, parallel agents, promotion ("preview env", "sandbox per task", "merge to main")	branching.md	the data-forking env model (what actually clones), branch loop, 1:1:1 worktree pattern + dispatch brief, promotion, migration discipline
Approvals, policy, audit, credential scanning	governance.md	gates catalog, the approval relay, events timeline, observe hook, agent audit patterns
Check health or debug failures	operate.md	status/manifest triage, ordered deploy-failure list, metrics/logs, cloud-vs-oss differences
Command lookup	cli-reference.md	the full CLI catalog with flags and gates
Remote MCP tools ("connect a connector", insta_* tools available)	mcp.md	connecting clients, tool ↔ CLI mapping, what stays CLI-only

If a request spans two areas ("deploy and check it's healthy"), load both and answer once.

Two non-negotiables (wherever you are)

• Prefer insta run -- <cmd> — the bundle is fetched per invocation and injected into the child environment only; nothing is written to disk, so nothing can leak or be committed.
• When a file is genuinely needed, treat ./.env (from insta secrets; auto-gitignored in git repos) as the only credential source — never hardcode or print secret values. DATABASE_URL + compute + storage (AWS_* / BUCKET_NAME) are all per-branch (each branch copy-on-write-forks its parent's bucket; a legacy bucket created without snapshots stays shared — no isolation). User-set config belongs in insta secrets set <NAME> (project-wide) / --branch for branch overrides — never hand-edit .env values you want to persist; a redeploy re-injects the platform's view.
• Track every schema change as a file under migrations/ so it replays on a branch DB and again on main after a merge. InstaCloud never merges databases — only migration files carry schema forward.

Governance & audit (this is the platform's core differentiator)

The gate mechanics and the relay procedure are above; the observe credential-audit hook, the events timeline, and agent audit patterns are in governance.md.

Scaling & billing (cloud, paid plans): insta services scale/upgrade (free plans get 403 — insta billing upgrade first); insta usage / insta billing show cycle usage and cost. One free org per user. Full flags in cli-reference.md.

Response format

For operational work, report: what was done (action + scope: project/branch/service), the result (URLs, IDs, observed status — not assumed), and what's next (or that it's complete). Include command output only where it helps.