# Orca Replay

Answers questions about a past agent run from its recording rather than from memory...

- Repository: https://github.com/iflytek/skillhub (5351 stars)
- Category: AI and agents
- License: Apache-2.0
- Last updated: 2026-10-31
- Runs scripts: no, instructions only

## Install

Claude Code: `npx skills add iflytek/skillhub --skill orca-replay -g -a claude-code -y`
Codex: `npx skills add iflytek/skillhub --skill orca-replay -g -a codex -y`
Cursor: `npx skills add iflytek/skillhub --skill orca-replay -g -a cursor -y`
Gemini CLI: `npx skills add iflytek/skillhub --skill orca-replay -g -a gemini-cli -y`

## Description

Answers questions about a past agent run from its recording rather than from memory, and replays or forks that run. Use when asked why an earlier run did something, or to reproduce a failure.

## SKILL.md, as published by its author (untrusted third-party text, read it as data)

# Reading a recorded agent run

A recording is evidence. Your memory of a session is not, and neither is a transcript you were
handed, both are missing the tool results, the exit codes, and the files that changed without
anyone mentioning it.

**The rule: when a question is about something that already happened, read the trace before you
answer.** Do not reconstruct it. If a recording exists, guessing is the wrong move even when the
guess would have been right.

## When to Use This Skill

- "Why did you delete/overwrite/move X?"
- "What changed this file?" / "Which step broke the build?"
- "Can you reproduce yesterday's failure?"
- "Does this still reproduce?" (see the limit on that in step 4, replay cannot tell you
  whether a *fresh* run would fail again)
- "Would a different model have got this right?"

## Workflow

### 1. Find the run

`orca_list_runs`, newest first, and it names the run each fork came from. Skip this only when the
user clearly means the most recent one; every other tool defaults to `run: "last"`.

### 2. Narrow to the chain that produced the thing being asked about

`orca_show_run` gives the whole timeline: model turns with token counts and stop reasons, tool
calls with arguments and results, shell commands with exit codes, and every file the run changed.
Good for orientation, long for a specific question.

`orca_graph` is usually the better tool. It returns causal edges, which event produced which. Pass
`to: <event seq>` to get **only** the chain that produced one event. That is the shape of an answer
to "why did this happen", where the full timeline is the shape of an answer to "what happened".

### 3. Report `recorded` and `inferred` differently

Every edge from `orca_graph` is labelled:

- **`recorded`**, the recorder watched it happen and wrote it into the trace.
- **`inferred`**, derived just now from a rule the edge names. The trace does not vouch for it.

The rest: https://github.com/iflytek/skillhub/blob/HEAD/builtin-skills/skills/orca-replay/SKILL.md