Tangled’s new stack distributes the UI at the edge and runs read‑only indexers in over 11 regions for low‑latency collaboration.
TANGLED LAUNCHES FIRST FEDERATED CODE FORGE
*Tangled merges open‑protocol longevity with modern forge polish. Self‑hosted Git, CI and UI talk to any other node, promising true portability for code and its metadata.*
Centralized code forges have dominated the past two decades, offering convenience at the cost of control. Developers increasingly distrust reliance on a single provider for uptime, feature road‑maps and stewardship of their own code. Tangled’s response is a federated forge that blends the durability of open protocols with the polish of modern platforms. By anchoring Git and collaboration to the AT Protocol, Tangled promises that code, issues and pull requests travel together, no matter where they are hosted. The launch marks a decisive shift toward self‑ownership in software engineering.
What is a federated code forge?
A federated forge lets developers run Git hosting, CI runners, API servers or UI on their own hardware while still collaborating with anyone on the network. Tangled builds this on the AT Protocol, an open standard that powers email‑style communication for code. The model replaces the single‑point‑of‑failure of centralized services with a mesh of independent nodes that exchange data via the protocol’s firehose. Contributors keep full control of uptime, features and stewardship of their repositories. The design promises the same convenience of platforms like GitHub but without ceding ownership to a third party.
Tangled’s architectural overhaul
The legacy appview monolith combined Go backend, HTML templates and a SQLite database on a single Swedish server. Latency suffered for users beyond a 50–100 ms radius. Tangled now ships a Svelte frontend deployed at the edge, fed by a diskless, in‑memory Rust indexer called bobbin. Bobbins run in over 11+ global regions, delivering read‑only AT Protocol data with minimal lag. All mutable services—Git, SSH, CI—have been split into dedicated components, including the Rust‑based Knot2 server. This modular stack lets operators pick and choose which pieces to self‑host while preserving seamless cross‑node interaction.
Data model shift: COBs and Knot2
Tangled introduced a new lexicon under org.tangled.* and moved issues, pull requests, comments, reactions, labels and blocklists onto the knot itself as collaborative objects (COBs). A COB is simply a chain of Git objects stored inside the repository, giving code and its discussion history a single, portable home. Knot2, the Rust rewrite of the knot server, bundles a custom Git server and SSH server, handling these COBs directly. Every edit creates an org.tangled.graph.attestation record on the author’s personal data store (PDS), pointing to the exact version and enabling two‑way verification. Self‑hosters must upgrade to knot v1.20.0 to adopt the new model.
Organization accounts and upcoming features
Organizations on Tangled are full AT Protocol accounts with their own DID and handle, hosted on a Tranquil PDS instance. They are password‑less, delegated accounts created via the New Organization page, yielding a subdomain like
Frequently asked questions
What makes Tangled a federated code forge?
Tangled lets you host Git, CI runners, API servers or UI on your own servers while still collaborating with any other node via the AT Protocol, eliminating a single point of failure.
How does Tangled store issues and pull requests?
Issues, pull requests, comments and related data are stored as collaborative objects (COBs) directly in the repository, alongside the code, and are signed and synced via the AT Protocol firehose.
What new components did Tangled introduce in its latest release?
The release adds a Svelte edge‑deployed UI, a Rust in‑memory indexer called bobbin deployed in over 11 regions, and Knot2—a Rust‑based Git and SSH server that handles COBs.
If the open‑protocol model gains traction, the balance of power could tilt from corporate gatekeepers to independent developers and teams. Tangled’s modular, agent‑friendly design positions it to adapt as software engineering evolves. The coming weeks will test whether the promise of portability and self‑hosted collaboration can replace the entrenched convenience of legacy forges.
Sources: [Hacker News – The federated code forge, https://tangled.org/blog/forge/]