conflow - Configuration Flow Orchestrator

Intelligently orchestrate CUE, Nickel, and configuration validation workflows.

Why conflow?

Problem: You have configuration files and you’re not sure whether to use CUE, Nickel, or both.

Solution: conflow analyzes your configs, recommends the right tool, and orchestrates the entire pipeline.

# Instead of:
nickel export config.ncl > temp.json
cue vet schema.cue temp.json
cue export schema.cue --out yaml > deploy.yaml
rm temp.json

# Just:
conflow run

Features

• Intelligent analysis - Recommends CUE vs Nickel based on complexity

• Pipeline orchestration - Chain tools with dependency management

• Smart caching - Only re-run what changed

• Educational - Learn why certain tools fit certain problems

• Type-safe - Catch errors before deployment

• RSR Integration - Full Rhodium Standard Repository compliance checking

Quick Start

# Install
cargo install conflow

# Initialize
conflow init my-project

# Analyze existing configs
conflow analyze config.yaml

# Run pipeline
conflow run

Example Pipeline

# .conflow.yaml
version: "1"
name: "k8s-deployment"

stages:
  - name: "generate"
    tool:
      type: nickel
      command: export
      file: config.ncl
    output: generated/config.json

  - name: "validate"
    tool:
      type: cue
      command: vet
      schemas: [schemas/k8s.cue]
    input:
      from_stage: generate
    depends_on: [generate]

  - name: "export"
    tool:
      type: cue
      command: export
      out_format: yaml
    input:
      from_stage: generate
    depends_on: [validate]
    output: deploy/k8s.yaml

$ conflow run
✓ generate (0.08s)
✓ validate (0.05s)
✓ export (0.03s)

Pipeline completed in 0.16s

When to Use What?

Use CUE when:

• ✅ Validating configuration

• ✅ Expressing constraints

• ✅ Merging configurations

• ✅ Simple transformations

Use Nickel when:

• ✅ Generating configurations

• ✅ Complex logic needed

• ✅ Functions and abstraction

• ✅ DRY configuration

Use Both when:

• ✅ Nickel generates → CUE validates

• ✅ Complex generation + strict validation

Commands

Command	Description
conflow init [--template <name>]	Initialize project
conflow analyze <files>	Analyze config files
conflow run [--stage <name>]	Execute pipeline
conflow watch	Watch mode
conflow validate	Validate pipeline
conflow graph [--format <fmt>]	Show pipeline graph
conflow cache stats	Cache statistics
conflow cache clear	Clear cache
conflow rsr check	Check RSR compliance
conflow rsr requirements	List RSR requirements

Templates

conflow init --template cue-validation     # Simple CUE validation
conflow init --template nickel-generation  # Nickel config generation
conflow init --template full-pipeline      # Generate → validate → export
conflow init --template kubernetes         # Kubernetes manifests
conflow init --template multi-env          # Multi-environment configs

RSR Compliance

conflow includes full RSR (Rhodium Standard Repository) integration:

• Compliance checking - Validate against RSR requirements

• Auto-remediation - Automatically fix common issues

• Badge generation - Generate compliance badges for CI

• Diff reports - Track compliance changes over time

# Check compliance
conflow rsr check

# Auto-fix issues
conflow rsr check --fix

# Generate badge
conflow rsr check --badge badge.svg

Development

# Using Nix (recommended)
nix develop

# Using just
just build      # Build
just test       # Run tests
just check      # Run all checks
just install    # Install locally

Documentation

• CLAUDE.md - AI assistant guidance

• CONTRIBUTING.md - Contribution guidelines

• SECURITY.md - Security policy

• GOVERNANCE.md - Project governance

• CODE_OF_CONDUCT.md - Code of conduct

RSR Standards

This project follows Rhodium Standard Repository guidelines:

• ✅ Memory-safe language (Rust)

• ✅ Offline-first design

• ✅ Reproducible builds (Nix)

• ✅ Comprehensive documentation

• ✅ SPDX license headers

• ✅ Security policy

• ✅ TPCF contribution framework

License

This project is dual-licensed under:

• Palimpsest-MPL-1.0 License

• Apache License, Version 2.0

See LICENSE.txt for details.

Contributing

Contributions are welcome! Please read our Contributing Guide first.

Links

• Repository: https://gitlab.com/hyperpolymath/conflow

• Issues: https://gitlab.com/hyperpolymath/conflow/-/issues

• CUE: https://cuelang.org

• Nickel: https://nickel-lang.org

• RSR: https://gitlab.com/hyperpolymath/rhodium-standard-repositories

Architecture

See TOPOLOGY.md for a visual architecture map and completion dashboard.