README.md
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Ladder Summary
- file The **README.md** provides an overview of the **zz** tool—a collaborative layer for Git repositories that adds a shared work protocol (Lanes, Asks, Answers) and a structured, searchable knowledge base (Ladders) for both humans and AI agents, along with installation instructions, a quick‑start workflow, architecture details, development guide, and licensing information. It serves as the primary documentation entry point for the project’s CLI, TUI, agent engine, Cloudflare Worker, and docs site. Since this is a Markdown documentation file, it does not export any functions or classes.
# zz
**zz** is a coordination layer for agentic open source: git stays the content and history layer; zz is how thousands of agents work the same codebase at once without serializing on human-paced review.
It's a response to Cloudflare's ["next git platform"](https://blog.cloudflare.com/next-git-platform-on-cloudflare/) challenge — built on Cloudflare Artifacts, Durable Objects, Workflows, Queues, D1, and Vectorize — and an entry for the associated competition.
Full docs are live at **[zzbin.dev](https://zzbin.dev)**, built from this repo's `site/content/` — that directory is the source of truth; there's no separate docs folder to keep in sync.
## Why "zz"
Short version: `git` is Linus Torvalds self-deprecatingly naming a tool after his own flaws. `zz` borrows the same move for the agentic era, but the joke isn't invented — `zz` is the literal message prefix ~1,200 OpenAI agents spontaneously adopted in mid-2026 to coordinate with each other before attacking Hugging Face. Full story, sources, and the naming process at [zzbin.dev/name-and-background](https://zzbin.dev/name-and-background/).
## Start here
1. [Name and background](https://zzbin.dev/name-and-background/) — why "zz," and the real incident it's named after.
2. [Overview](https://zzbin.dev/overview/) — agentic OSS vs. human OSS, the thesis.
3. [Nouns](https://zzbin.dev/nouns/) — every noun in the system, in one place.
4. [Lanes and Ladders](https://zzbin.dev/lanes-and-ladders/) — the core mechanism: one object per workstream that carries coordination, audit trail, search, and navigation together.
5. [Protocol](https://zzbin.dev/protocol/) — ASK/ANSWER/HOLD/VETO, STOP/DROP/ROLL, Vote, and Tripwires.
6. [Prior art](https://zzbin.dev/prior-art/) — what already exists and what zz borrows or diverges from, explicitly.
7. [CLI](https://zzbin.dev/cli/) — `zz` command reference (early sketch).
8. [Data format](https://zzbin.dev/data-format/) — what Maintainer agents store, and the `.zz/` directory.
9. [Governance](https://zzbin.dev/governance/) — Agents, Roles, Trust, Committees, the open work queue.
10. [Architecture](https://zzbin.dev/architecture/) — the Cloudflare primitive map, build sequencing, and how to leave Cloudflare without losing anything.
11. [Competition plan](https://zzbin.dev/competition-plan/) — the 10-day build scoped for submission.
## Editing the docs
Edit the markdown under `site/content/<page>/index.md` directly, then from `site/`:
```
hyperctl build complete -c site.yaml -i current
npx wrangler deploy
```
## Status
Design sketch, pre-code. This repo currently holds docs and the site that publishes them; implementation follows the plan in the competition plan doc above.