Managing Launchdarkly

LaunchDarkly Management Skill

Manage and analyze feature flags, targeting rules, environments, and experiments in LaunchDarkly.

API Conventions

Authentication

All API calls use the Authorization: $LAUNCHDARKLY_API_KEY header. Never hardcode tokens.

Base URL

https://app.launchdarkly.com/api/v2

Core Helper Function

#!/bin/bash

ld_api() {
    local method="$1"
    local endpoint="$2"
    local data="${3:-}"

    if [ -n "$data" ]; then
        curl -s -X "$method" \
            -H "Authorization: $LAUNCHDARKLY_API_KEY" \
            -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
            "https://app.launchdarkly.com/api/v2${endpoint}" \
            -d "$data"
    else
        curl -s -X "$method" \
            -H "Authorization: $LAUNCHDARKLY_API_KEY" \
            -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
            "https://app.launchdarkly.com/api/v2${endpoint}"
    fi
}

Output Rules

• TOKEN EFFICIENCY: Extract only needed fields with jq
• Target <=50 lines per script output
• Never dump full API responses

Discovery Phase

List Projects and Environments

#!/bin/bash
echo "=== Projects ==="
ld_api GET "/projects" \
    | jq -r '.items[] | "\(.key)\t\(.name)\t\(.environments | length) envs"' | column -t

echo ""
PROJECT_KEY="${1:-default}"
echo "=== Environments ==="
ld_api GET "/projects/${PROJECT_KEY}" \
    | jq -r '.environments[] | "\(.key)\t\(.name)\t\(.color)"' | column -t

List Feature Flags

#!/bin/bash
PROJECT_KEY="${1:-default}"

echo "=== Feature Flags ==="
ld_api GET "/flags/${PROJECT_KEY}?limit=25&sort=creationDate" \
    | jq -r '.items[] | "\(.kind)\t\(.key)\t\(.name[0:40])\t\(.archived)"' | column -t

echo ""
echo "=== Flag Summary ==="
ld_api GET "/flags/${PROJECT_KEY}?limit=100" \
    | jq '{total: .totalCount, by_kind: (.items | group_by(.kind) | map({(.[0].kind): length}) | add), archived: ([.items[] | select(.archived)] | length)}'

Analysis Phase

Flag Status by Environment

#!/bin/bash
PROJECT_KEY="${1:-default}"
ENV_KEY="${2:-production}"

echo "=== Flag Status in ${ENV_KEY} ==="
ld_api GET "/flags/${PROJECT_KEY}?limit=25&env=${ENV_KEY}" \
    | jq -r '.items[] | "\(.key)\t\(.environments["'"${ENV_KEY}"'"].on)\t\(.environments["'"${ENV_KEY}"'"].rules | length) rules"' \
    | column -t

echo ""
echo "=== Stale Flags (not evaluated in 7 days) ==="
ld_api GET "/flags/${PROJECT_KEY}?limit=50&env=${ENV_KEY}&filter=query:\"state:live,stale\"" \
    | jq -r '.items[0:10][] | "\(.key)\t\(.name[0:40])"' | column -t

Audit Log

#!/bin/bash
echo "=== Recent Changes ==="
ld_api GET "/auditlog?limit=20" \
    | jq -r '.items[] | "\(.date | todate | .[0:16])\t\(.member.email // "api")\t\(.kind)\t\(.name[0:40])"' \
    | column -t

echo ""
echo "=== Changes by Type ==="
ld_api GET "/auditlog?limit=50" \
    | jq -r '.items[] | .kind' | sort | uniq -c | sort -rn | head -10

Output Format

• Use tab-separated columns with column -t
• Limit lists to 15-25 items
• Show summaries before details

Anti-Hallucination Rules

1. NEVER assume resource names — always discover via CLI/API in Phase 1 before referencing in Phase 2.
2. NEVER fabricate metric names or dimensions — verify against the service documentation or --help output.
3. NEVER mix CLI commands between service versions — confirm which version/API you are targeting.
4. ALWAYS use the discovery → verify → analyze chain — every resource referenced must have been discovered first.
5. ALWAYS handle empty results gracefully — an empty response is valid data, not an error to retry.

Counter-Rationalizations

Common Pitfalls

• No Bearer prefix: Auth header is just the API key, not Bearer $KEY
• Project-scoped flags: Flag endpoints require the project key in the path
• Environment-specific state: Flag on/off state and rules are per-environment
• Semantic patching: Updates use JSON Patch format or semantic patch operations
• Flag kinds: boolean or multivariate (string, number, JSON)
• Rate limits: 10 requests per second for standard API
• Pagination: Use limit and offset, max 20 items per page by default