Concepts

Hierarchy

Level	Scope
Organization	Billing, team, apex domains
Project	Environments, access keys, hosted git, conversations
Environment	Isolated resources, keys, and quotas (space_id in APIs)
Stack	Desired state of one environment, declared in stack.json

Resources and keys in one environment are not visible in another. Switch or create environments with kernstack use [ENV].

Stacks

stack.json has five top-level sections: stack (identity), hooks and apps (CLI-only build steps), gateway (routes), and resources. See the IaC reference.

kernstack plan      # preview drift
kernstack deploy    # reconcile live state
kernstack inspect   # list live resources

Resources are managed only through stack.json. The console shows the same state and handles data operations (table items, bucket objects).

Deployment zones

A zone (for example eu-preview-2) is where resources run and data is stored. Data stays in its zone. The zone is set when the environment is created; in CI set KERNSTACK_DZONE.

Access keys

Every API request is signed with an access key pair (ID + secret), scoped to one environment. The CLI mints keys during init / use; create more in the console under Settings → Access keys. Never commit secrets — use secrets or .stack.env.

Domains

Register and verify the apex domain in the console under Settings → Domains, then bind hostnames on routes with gateway.routes[].domains[].

Limits

Quotas cap operations per environment and service. Exceeding a rate limit returns 429 Too Many Requests — retry with exponential backoff (the Go SDK does this for you).