Policies

Definition

A policy scopes the filesystem. A filesystem profile sets what an activity can read and modify, and global deny rules apply on top.

An activity selects a named profile with fsProfile. If it names none, Orbit resolves an implicit unrestricted profile, and the global denies still apply.

Platform support. Spawned agent CLIs run inside an OS sandbox scoped by the resolved fsProfile: sandbox-exec on macOS, Bubblewrap on Linux. See Platform support for what each one enforces.

Tool access is a separate check. A task’s required_tools (fixed at creation; see Transition rules) extend the activity’s tools, but never bypass caller-role or host-capability checks, tool-specific policy, filesystem profiles, subprocess allowlists, or external authentication. Any of these can still deny an included tool at execution time.

Shape

schemaVersion: 2
kind: Policy
metadata:
  name: default
spec:
  denyRead:
    - "**/*.env"
  denyModify:
    - .orbit/**
    - "**/*.env"
  fsProfiles:
    reviewer:
      read: [./**]
      modify: []

The full format is in Policy Format.

Use

Use narrow profiles for review and summarization. Use broader profiles only when an agent is expected to edit code.