manage-volumes - SKILL.md Agent Skill

name: manage-volumes description: "Manage Vast.ai persistent storage volumes — search, create, delete, clone, and attach volumes to instances. Use for persistent data across instance lifecycles." argument-hint: "[action or volume-id]" allowed-tools: Bash

Manage Vast.ai Volumes

Help the user manage persistent storage volumes on Vast.ai.

User Request

$ARGUMENTS

Available Actions

Search Volume Offers

vastai search volumes '<QUERY>' -o 'storage_cost' --raw

Key fields: disk_space, disk_bw, storage_cost, geolocation, reliability, duration

Create a Volume

vastai create volume <OFFER_ID> -s <SIZE_GB>     # Local volume
vastai create network-volume <OFFER_ID> -s <SIZE_GB>  # Network volume

Default size: 15 GB.

List User's Volumes

vastai show volumes                    # All volumes
vastai show volumes -t local           # Local only
vastai show volumes -t network         # Network only

Clone a Volume

vastai clone volume <SOURCE_VOLUME_ID> <DEST_OFFER_ID> -s <SIZE_GB>

Delete a Volume

vastai delete volume <ID>

Confirm with user first — this is irreversible and deletes all data.

Attach Volume When Creating Instance

# New volume
vastai create instance <OFFER_ID> --image <IMG> --ssh \
  --create-volume <VOLUME_OFFER_ID> --volume-size <GB> --mount-path /root/data

# Existing volume
vastai create instance <OFFER_ID> --image <IMG> --ssh \
  --link-volume <VOLUME_ID> --mount-path /root/data

File Transfer To/From Volumes

vastai copy local:./data V.<VOLUME_ID>:/data
vastai copy V.<VOLUME_ID>:/results local:./results

Tips

Volumes persist across instance destroy/recreate — use them for datasets and checkpoints
Local volumes must be on the same machine as the instance
Network volumes can be accessed from different machines but are slower
Always check vastai show volumes before creating to avoid duplicates