Overview
bids is an open-source data skill for Claude Code and compatible agents, published by K-Dense-AI. Its author describes it as: “Use this skill when working with Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) datasets: organizing neuroscience and biomedical data (MRI, EEG, MEG, iEEG, PET, microscopy, NIRS, motion capture, EMG, MR spectroscopy, behavioral)…”. The project has 46k stars on GitHub and is available under the MIT license. Add it to your setup with `git clone https://github.com/K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills ~/.claude/skills/bids`.
What bids does
The Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) is a community standard for organizing and describing neuroscience and biomedical research datasets. It defines a consistent file naming convention, directory hierarchy, and metadata schema so that datasets are immediately understandable by humans and software tools alike. BIDS is governed by the BIDS Specification (currently v1.11.x) and is maintained by the community via the BIDS-Standard GitHub organization.
What’s inside
The SKILL.md for bids is organised into these sections:
- Overview
- When to Use This Skill
- Installation
- Core Workflows
- Reference Materials
- Common Issues and Solutions
- 1. Validator reports "Not a BIDS dataset"
- 2. Inconsistent subjects warning
- 3. Missing SliceTiming
- 4. Phase encoding direction confusion
- 5. PyBIDS is slow on large datasets
- 6. Derivatives not found by PyBIDS
Installation
Add bids to your agent with:
git clone https://github.com/K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills ~/.claude/skills/bidsReview a skill’s source before installing it — skills can instruct your agent to run commands. This command comes from the skill’s public repository, which is the source of truth for setup steps. New to skills? Read how to install Claude Code skills.
Supported agents
Neither the skill nor its repository names a specific agent. It uses the SKILL.md format, which several agents can load — check the repository for any agent-specific requirements.
License
bids is published under the MIT license.
Strengths
- Clear MIT license — safe to read and adapt within its terms
- Ships in K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills, an established project with 45,887 GitHub stars
- Actively maintained — repository updated in the last 30 days
- Its repository gained 12,066 GitHub stars over the last 34 days
Author
Topics
Frequently asked questions
- What does bids do?
- Use this skill when working with Brain Imaging Data Structure (BIDS) datasets: organizing neuroscience and biomedical data (MRI, EEG, MEG, iEEG, PET, microscopy, NIRS, motion capture, EMG, MR spectroscopy, behavioral), querying BIDS layouts, validating compliance, converting DICOM to BIDS, writing metadata sidecars, or creating BIDS derivatives.
- How do I install bids?
- Run git clone https://github.com/K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills ~/.claude/skills/bids in your agent, then reload your skills. Review the source at https://github.com/K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills before installing.
- Is bids free to use?
- Yes. bids is free and open source under the MIT license, so you can read, run, and adapt it within that license's terms.
- Where does bids come from?
- bids ships inside K-Dense-AI/scientific-agent-skills, a repository that contains 42 catalogued skills in total. The repository's 45,887 GitHub stars apply to that whole collection, not to this skill on its own.