drift Docs
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What is Drift?
The tour, if you are new here.
Why Drift?
The case for a smaller cloud.
Getting started
Nothing to deployed, in one command.
Architecture
How a slice is put together.
What it costs
The free grant, five unit prices, two rules.
Build
Atomic
Serverless functions.
Write a function
The handler shape, and what you pay for.
The directive
Trigger, route, auth and secrets on one line.
Six languages
Go, Python, Node, Ruby, PHP, Rust.
Runtime versions
Which interpreter version your function runs on.
Authentication
The auth= gate, and per-route API keys.
Request headers
What reaches your handler, and what does not.
Triggers
Queue-triggered and scheduled functions.
Streaming
SSE and WebSocket from one function.
Outbound egress
What a slice may dial.
Limits and alerts
Timeout, memory and rate, and being told.
Elements
One language, one manifest, many functions.
The CLI surface
Every drift atomic command.
Backbone
Secrets, data, blobs, queues.
NoSQL
JSON collections, upserted on _id.
SQL
Per-slice SQLite, with transactions.
Blobs
Files and uploads, organised by bucket.
Secrets
Encrypted config a function declares.
Queues
FIFO messages that trigger functions.
Cache
Key/value strings with a TTL.
Locks
Stop two workers doing one job.
Realtime
In-slice pub/sub over WebSocket.
Canvas
Static sites, same origin as your API.
Deed
Identity, devices and wallets.
KeyAuth
Passwordless login with device keys.
JWT
Sign and verify with the slice's own key.
Vault
Ciphertext the slice cannot read.
Link
Enroll a second device by attestation.
Pocket
E2EE app data that follows an identity.
Tools
CLI
One binary, every noun.
Reference
The binary, and every noun.
account
Sign up, log in, delete.
slice
Create, resize, snapshot, domains.
project
Deploy, diff, run locally.
file
Lint and explain a Driftfile.
atomic
One function at a time.
backbone
Reach into the data plane.
deed
One read-only status command.
canvas
Deploy a static site.
migrate
Move off another cloud.
Dashboard
What bare drift opens.
SDK
Six languages, zero dependencies.
Writing a handler
Arguments, request, return.
API reference
Both namespaces, every call.
NoSQL
Documents, by _id or storage key.
SQL
Queries and transactions.
Cache
Strings with a TTL.
Secrets
Read what the function declared.
Blobs
Bytes, addressed bucket/key.
Queues
Push, and pull if you must.
Locks
A token you hand back.
Realtime
Publish, and count who heard.
Deed
KeyAuth, JWT, Vault, Link, Pocket.
Utilities
Logs, egress, cross-slice calls.
Languages
The same handler, six ways.
Driftfile
One file that describes your app.
Anatomy
Every top-level key, and the name rules.
A worked example
One app with every section written out.
Atomic
Function limits, schedules, alerts, egress.
Backbone
Collections, databases, buckets, secrets.
Canvas
Sites, and the route each mounts on.
Domains
Custom hostnames the slice answers on.
Environments
One project, several slices, one file.
Deploying
Lint it, hook a build on, read its errors.
Operate
Auth
Accounts, tokens and scopes.
Security
Boundaries, sandboxing and hardening.

CLI

The CLI is the product. Create a slice, deploy an application, read its logs and roll it back without leaving the terminal. There is no dashboard to open and no console to configure. Every command is drift <noun> <verb>, and the nouns are the platform's own: a slice, a project, a function, your data.

Where to go

One binary

Three commands are the binary talking about itself rather than about your account. They need no login and, apart from upgrade, no network.

Command Description
driftWith no arguments in a terminal, opens a full-screen interactive dashboard (a btop/k9s-style TUI) over your slices, functions, and Backbone data; see The dashboard. In a pipe or CI (no TTY) it prints --help instead.
drift --versionTwo numbers, offline: this binary's version, and the Driftfile schema version it has cached. They move independently, so a Driftfile the platform accepts and this CLI rejects is visible here.
drift upgrade [version]Update the CLI. It detects how this copy was installed: a Homebrew binary is upgraded with brew upgrade drift, a go install one is reinstalled in place. Pass a version to pin or roll back.

Installing it for the first time is the first step of Getting started.

Nothing here needs a browser.

The one exception is the slice configurator, which opens once when you size a paid slice. Everything else (signup, deploys, secrets, snapshots, rollbacks) is a command.