Managing experiments

Once you’ve created an experiment, this page covers extending, archiving, and checking the status.

Every task below has an adsk-experiment command, for running it yourself in the CLI (command line interface), and a plain-English version for prompting an AI agent. Both get you the same result.

Check experiment status

All experiments

CLI commands:

adsk-experiment env list              # everything you have, soonest-to-archive first
adsk-experiment env list --all        # also includes archived environments
adsk-experiment env get myexp         # full detail on one environment

Or ask your AI agent: “Show me my experiments”

One experiment

CLI command:

adsk-experiment env get --environment myexp

Or ask your AI agent: “What’s the status of myexp?”

env get shows the status, exact archive time, component count, component status, web address, and message if something’s still pending.

Status	What it means
creating	The repository, CI project, and access grants are being created.
active	Normal working state. Register components, publish, and extend from here. Expiry warnings are sent during this phase.
failed	Setup did not complete. Read message for why.
archiving	Retirement is running: resources are being removed, the repository is being archived, and access to the link is being cut.
archived	Retirement finished. The link is gone and the repository is read-only. You can extend the experiment to regenerate a link.

Extend an experiment

CLI commands:

adsk-experiment env renew myexp

Or ask your AI agent: “Extend this experiment” or “When does this experiment archive?”

Each extension grants 14 days from the current archive date by default. No environment can live past 90 days from creation.

Extending is refused while an environment is being set up or torn down (creating, or archiving). Wait for that process to finish, then extend again.

Archive an experiment

Archiving retires an experiment. Resources are reclaimed, and the link is disabled. Your GitHub repository is archived (read-only), and all branches and history stay on git.autodesk.com. You can extend an archived environment to re-start the environment and link.

Archive early

CLI commands:

adsk-experiment env archive myexp          # asks you to confirm first
adsk-experiment env archive myexp --yes    # skips the confirmation

Or ask your AI agent: “Archive this experiment” or “Retire this experiment”.

Push or commit anything you need before you archive. Once the repository is archived, you cannot add new commits until you extend the environment.

Reclamation runs as a background workflow. If it stops part-way, env get shows archiving with a message — run the same command again to pick up where it left off.

Your quota slot frees as soon as archiving starts, so you can create a replacement while cleanup finishes. Archived environments do not count against your quota; they appear under env list --all.

Archival notifications

Every environment carries an archive date. You will be notified at the following times before archival:

When	What you get
7 days out	A warning notice: how much time is left, how to extend, and what persists
24 hours out	A final notice, with the same information and less time to act
At archiving	A notice saying what was reclaimed and what remains

Notices go to your email (and Slack, where set up).

When archiving finishes, your repository turns read-only and your push access is turned off.

Run more than one experiment

You can have up to 50 experiments at once. Starting a new one leaves the others untouched. adsk-experiment env list shows everything you own.

Resources and support

If something isn’t working, start with adsk-experiment doctor.

For additional help, join #experimental-environments on Slack.