Context Packs Overview
Context packs are curated bundles of documents with agent instructions. They let you define named collections of context that agents can request by name.
Why packs?
Instead of agents guessing which documents are relevant, packs provide opinionated, curated context with instructions on how to use it.
A pack says: "Here are the 5 documents you need, and here's how to interpret them."
Example
# packs/engineering-essentials.yml
id: engineering-essentials
label: Engineering Essentials
description: Core engineering docs — architecture, API, and dev setup
includes:
- nodes/architecture-overview
- nodes/api-reference
- nodes/development-setup
agent_instructions: >
Use these documents to understand the system architecture, API surface,
and development environment. Reference them when answering engineering
questions or making technical decisions.
Using packs
# Query all documents in a pack
ctx query "pack:engineering-essentials"
# View pack details
ctx pack show engineering-essentials
# List all packs
ctx pack list
Packs with source nodes
Packs can include both static documents and source nodes. When a pack includes source nodes, the resolver hydrates them according to their depends_on ordering.
includes:
- nodes/architecture-overview
- sources/current-sprint-tickets
- sources/recent-pr-activity
agent_instructions: >
Start with the architecture overview for context, then review
the live sprint data and recent PRs.
Related pages
- Cloud PacksCloud packs will be hosted on the PromptOwl platform and queryable without downloading source files.
- Pack FormatContext packs are YAML files stored in the packs/ directory. Static packs use includes to list specific documents:
- Core ConceptsContext Nest is built on a small set of composable concepts. Understanding these gives you the full picture of how vaults work.
- Addressing OverviewContext Nest uses the contextnest:// URI scheme to address documents, sections, tags, and folders within a vault.
- Context IndexThe context.yaml file is the machine-readable manifest of a Context Nest vault. It is auto-generated by the CLI and serves as the primary entry point for…