The part that doesn't sleep
The box our models run on — every product's generation happens here, one private tunnel from the serving machine.
keel is the machine that answers the model requests every strata→signal project makes — a rules question in RuleSage, a street question in the amble guide, a line of prose in RealKeep. More boxes are planned. Until they're assembled, this one is the whole of our own fleet.
- always on
- one address
- one machine
- boring on purpose
- as of 2026-08-14
Every product sends its model calls to the same machine. A keel is the one beam the rest of the boat is built onto — that's the name, and that's the arrangement.
Generation happens on demand, so the box stays powered and loaded rather than starting cold for each request. amble's public guide reaches it over a tunnel held open from this end, so the walking tour answers even though the box isn't on the open internet. You notice a keel only when it's gone; this one is built so you rarely have to.
Each project points its generation at this same machine, so no app carries its own idea of where answers come from or what is answering. Changing what runs underneath doesn't touch the apps.
Today
One machine, several roles.
Today keel and brain are the same physical machine — the card that does the heaviest work sits in this box, so one computer performs several of the roles at once. As the other boxes get built, those roles move off; the name keel stays with this one.
It is one machine, so it handles a small number of requests at a time. Callers are written to wait or to say plainly that the box is busy — a slow answer or an honest “not right now”, never a silent failure.