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Research Program

Operator Architecture

Program
Operator Architecture
Publications
3
Systems
3
Latest
April 17, 2026

Research question

What is the durable unit that actually does machine work — and how should a person see and steer it?

Working thesis

The operator — identity, scoped permission, persistent state, execution responsibility, audit history — is durable; the model underneath is replaceable. Interfaces over that operator are projections of real runtime state, not decorative surfaces, and they fail the moment the projection diverges from what is actually running.

A thesis is the lab’s current position, not a result. What supports it is listed below; what remains unresolved is stated at the end of this page.

Publications

3 attributed

Apparatus

3 systems

Systems attached to this program are what the lab builds to investigate the question. Maturity, evidence level, and current activity are recorded separately on each system — a system attached here is not thereby claimed to be production-ready.

EXO

AI Workspace / Operator Product

A public AI-native desktop workspace for sustained work across models, agents, code, tools, projects, tasks, context, approvals, and connectors.

Controlled Research BetaEvidence: Pilot evidenceActive

GOC

Governed Operator Bridge

A governed bridge for controlled interaction with CLI-first, browser-based, legacy, and other non-API software surfaces.

Architecture DevelopmentEvidence: Architecture specifiedMaintained

AMR

Agent-Machine Runtime Research

A research program for connecting AI agents to controlled machine interfaces while preserving observability, permission boundaries, and recoverable execution.

Research PrototypeEvidence: Prototype implementedMaintained

Open questions

Published as open. These are the parts of the program the lab does not consider settled.

  • 01

    How much runtime state can be surfaced before the interface stops being usable?

  • 02

    Where does the boundary between operator and system belong as delegation deepens?

  • 03

    What does recovery look like when an operator has been running unattended for a long time?

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