The Browser Is The Database: Local Databases As The Query Engine
The correction review r001 asked for, in the founder's own words.
team/humans/dinis_cruz/briefs/07/12/architecture/v0.33.48__arch-brief__sg-send-browser-local-databases-query-engine-vault-source-of-truth-incremental-sync-no-backend.md
Commitb561fa6b14 · carried 23 August 2026
LicenceApache-2.0 (repository) · CC BY 4.0 stated in the file
Bytes13,722 · 2,229 words · SHA-256 553c7bac74a73aa0
Dated12 July 2026
Why it is here
Review r001 item 5 said the book's no databases line was wrong, and this is the document that settles it. The position is not that there are no databases: it is that the vault is the source of truth and the file system holds it, while the browser runs the query engine (IndexedDB natively, SQL via SQLite compiled to WebAssembly). The altitude ladder reached the same correction independently by compression, which is the most interesting thing that has happened on this site.
What it says
- The vault is the source of truth: no-database means the file system holds the truth, not that there are no databases.
- The data already exists as files; the missing piece was querying.
- The browser is the query engine: IndexedDB natively, and SQL via SQLite compiled to WebAssembly.
- Storing the vault commit id turns every later load into an incremental delta, not a rebuild.
- A SQLite database is a single file, so it can be dumped into the vault as a release snapshot.
Worth re-reading for. Read it beside the ladder's finding on the same contradiction. Two routes, one correction.
Where this document lands on the site
The document is the peak. Below it hang the concepts measured in its text and the places on this site that rest on it — and the two are different kinds of link, drawn differently: a measured edge is dashed and carries its count, an authored edge is solid. The method is stated in full on the hub.