Plugins in Cortex Code Desktop¶

Plugins are reusable packages that extend your agent’s capabilities. A single plugin can bundle together any combination of skills, MCP servers, hooks, and subagents — letting you install an entire workflow in one step.

What plugins contain¶

Each plugin is a folder with a manifest file (.cortex-plugin/plugin.json) and one or more of the following components:

Open the Agent Settings panel¶

Plugins are managed from the Agent Settings panel. To open it, click the Agent Settings tab in the left sidebar.

In the Agent Settings panel, select the Plugins category from the left sidebar. This is the recommended place to browse, install, enable/disable, sync, and remove plugins.

From here you can:

• Toggle plugins on or off using the switch on each card.
• Filter by source using the “Source” dropdown (All, User, Bundled, Project).
• Search by name or description using the search bar.
• Click a card to open the plugin detail view.

Plugin details¶

Clicking a plugin card opens its detail view, which shows the plugin’s description, source, version, status, and its components (skills, hooks, MCP servers, subagents).

For plugins imported from GitHub, the detail view displays the source repository path and a note explaining that syncing will re-clone the latest version and overwrite local edits.

Plugins Catalog¶

The Plugins Catalog is Snowflake’s built-in registry for sharing and discovering plugins across your organization. Plugins in the catalog are stored as versioned Cortex Extension objects, so access is governed by Snowflake roles and grants: no Git credentials or file sharing required.

Browse the catalog¶

Click the Browse Plugins Catalog link in the Plugins view. This opens the Skills & Plugins page in Snowsight, where you can search for published plugins, read their descriptions, and copy import links.

Catalog-sourced plugins appear in the Plugins grid with a CATALOG badge and a cloud icon. Use the Source dropdown and select Catalog to filter the grid to only catalog-imported plugins.

Import a plugin from the catalog¶

1. In Snowsight, find the plugin you want and copy its share link, a URI that starts with snow://skill_catalog/.

2. In Cortex Code Desktop, open the Agent Settings panel and select the Plugins category.

3. Click the + button and choose Add from Plugins Catalog.

   

4. Paste the snow:// link into the Import link field and click Import.

   

Cortex Code Desktop downloads the plugin files from Snowflake, parses the manifest, and registers the plugin. It appears in the grid with a CATALOG badge. The original share link is stored so you can sync to newer versions later.

Sync a catalog plugin¶

Catalog plugins can be updated to the latest published version without removing and reinstalling them.

Open the plugin’s detail page and click the Sync button (↻). Cortex Code Desktop queries Snowflake for the latest published version, downloads it, and overwrites the local cache.

The detail page also shows the plugin’s upstream URI: the snow:// link it was installed from. Click the pill to copy the URI to your clipboard.

Publish a plugin to the catalog¶

You can publish any locally created plugin to the Plugins Catalog so others in your organization can import it.

1. Open the Agent Settings panel and select the Plugins category.

2. Click the plugin you want to publish to open its detail view.

3. Click Publish to Plugins Catalog (cloud-upload icon).

   

A chat session opens and runs the publish workflow, which:

1. Creates a CORTEX EXTENSION object (TYPE=PLUGIN) in your Snowflake account.
2. Uploads the plugin files to Snowflake’s versioned storage.
3. Commits the version and grants read access (to PUBLIC, or to a role you specify).
4. Returns a snow://skill_catalog/... URI you can share with your team.

Remove a catalog plugin¶

To remove a catalog plugin, click Remove in the plugin’s detail view. This unregisters the plugin and deletes the local cache directory. The Cortex Extension object in your Snowflake account is not affected.

Importing plugins¶

Click the + button in the Plugins toolbar to import an existing plugin.

Add Local Plugin¶

Select a folder on your filesystem that contains a .cortex-plugin/plugin.json manifest. The plugin is registered by reference — it stays where it is on disk, and no files are copied.

Claude plugin format compatibility¶

Cortex Code Desktop recognizes both the native Cortex format and the Claude plugin format, so you can use plugins built for either tool without any manual conversion.

Workspace discovery: Cortex Code Desktop also scans <workspace>/.claude/plugins/ for project-scoped plugins, in addition to the native <workspace>/.cortex/plugins/ path. If you have an existing Claude Code project, any plugins committed under .claude/plugins/ are discovered and activated automatically when you open that workspace.

Converting a commands/-style plugin: Older Claude Code plugins store slash commands under a commands/ directory rather than skills/. Cortex Code Desktop cannot load these as-is because each command needs to become a skills/<name>/SKILL.md entry. To convert:

1. In the chat panel, type install local plugin or invoke the local-plugin-installer skill explicitly.
2. Point the skill at the plugin’s root directory.
3. The skill walks you through renaming each command to a skill and generates the required SKILL.md files.
4. Once complete, the plugin is registered and works like any other local plugin.

Add from GitHub¶

Provide a GitHub repository in the format owner/repo (optionally with a subpath and branch, for example, owner/repo/plugins/my-plugin#main). The repository is cloned into ~/.snowflake/cortex/plugins/ and registered as a GitHub-sourced plugin.

GitHub-sourced plugins support sync (see below) to pull updates from the remote repository. If the cloned repository uses the Claude plugin format (.claude-plugin/plugin.json or a commands/ directory), Cortex Code Desktop applies the same compatibility handling described above automatically during sync.

GitHub sync¶

Plugins imported from GitHub can be synced to pull the latest version from the remote repository. Click the sync icon on the plugin detail page to start a sync.

The sync process:

1. Re-clones the repository at the pinned ref (branch or commit).
2. Validates that the cloned content is a valid Cortex plugin.
3. Performs an atomic swap of the install directory — the old version is kept as a backup during the swap and restored if anything goes wrong.
4. Updates the registry with the sync timestamp.

Creating a plugin¶

Click the Create button in the Plugins toolbar to scaffold a new plugin. This creates a plugin folder with the required manifest file and directory structure.

Plugin manifest¶

Every plugin must have a .cortex-plugin/plugin.json file. Here is an example:

{
  "name": "my-plugin",
  "version": "1.0.0",
  "description": "A custom plugin for my workflow",
  "skills": ["skills"],
  "hooks": {},
  "mcpServers": {}
}

Directory structure¶

my-plugin/
  .cortex-plugin/
    plugin.json
  skills/
    my-skill/
      SKILL.md
  agents/
    my-agent.md
  .hooks.json        (optional)
  .mcp.json          (optional)

Refresh button¶

The circular-arrow icon (↻) in the Plugins toolbar forces a full reload of the plugin registry. It invalidates all caches, re-reads the registry file, and re-activates all enabled plugins.

Use the refresh button when:

• You have manually edited plugin files outside of Cortex Code and changes are not appearing.
• A plugin appears stale or is not activating as expected.
• You have modified the registry file directly.

Plugin storage locations¶