Blog
Engineering notes, platform updates, and thinking out loud.
Building a workflow engine that treats humans and agents the same
Most workflow engines bolt human steps on as a special case. We built one where approvals and agent decisions are the same type — same execution model, same state machine.
Read more →Merging 22 submodules into one monorepo — lessons from the migration
22 repos, 204 cross-repo link: dependencies, an 11-step mode-switching tool. We merged everything into one monorepo. Here's what died, what survived, and what surprised us.
Read more →Running your own release pipeline across 145 packages
Plan → snapshot → checks → build → verify → version → changelog → publish → git → report. How we built a release pipeline that catches broken exports before npm publish.
Read more →How we built a Go service manager (kb-dev) to replace docker-compose
Our bash script left orphan processes, lied about service health, and couldn't handle concurrent starts. We replaced it with a Go binary that tracks PIDs, kills process groups, and speaks JSON.
Read more →Two-tier memory for long-running agents: working memory vs persistent facts
The context window creates the illusion that memory is free. By turn 30, it's 80% noise. We built a two-tier system: sliding window for now, structured storage for forever.
Read more →Contract-based adapters: swap Kafka for NATS without touching business logic
12 core contracts, strict layer rules, and a dependency graph that physically prevents plugins from importing adapters. How we made infrastructure genuinely swappable.
Read more →Duck typing for plugins: why we killed the plugin interface
No base class. No implements. No runtime registration call. If a package has a manifest with schema: kb.plugin/3, it's a plugin. Here's why that works better than an interface.
Read more →Going from 10-minute builds to 15-second incremental rebuilds in a 125-package monorepo
We built a Go binary with content-addressable caching, DAG scheduling via Kahn's algorithm, and ordered categories that handle both TypeScript and Go packages.
Read more →KB Labs web bootstrap
The initial web monorepo includes three surfaces: website, docs, and app shell.
Read more →Open the closed: why vendor lock-in is a design choice, not a given
Every platform dependency is a bet. We explain why we think the only safe bet is a typed contract — and how 12 core contracts shape every architectural decision we make.
Read more →Why we chose self-hosted over SaaS-first
The default playbook is hosted service with a free tier. We went the other way — npm install, your infrastructure, your data. Here's why self-hosted first isn't a compromise.
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