Future Debrief

Rebuilding a 30-year-old maritime analysis platform for the next generation of analysts.

The Vision

Debrief has served maritime analysts for over 30 years. But the technology landscape has changed dramatically. Eclipse RCP investment is waning, Java desktop expertise is shrinking, and modern analysts expect browser-based, collaborative tools.

Three problems we're solving:

Problem 1

Platform Decline

Eclipse RCP is no longer actively developed. Finding Java/SWT developers is increasingly difficult.

Problem 2

Contractor Dependency

Domain scientists can't build their own tools. Every enhancement requires specialist Java developers.

Problem 3

Data Silos

Each exercise lives in isolation. There's no way to query across historical archives for aggregate analysis.

Technical Approach

We're following a "thick services, thin frontends" architecture. 90% of the logic lives in Python services; frontends handle orchestration and display only.

Foundation

Schema-First

LinkML defines the master schema, generating Pydantic models, JSON Schema, and TypeScript types automatically.

Storage

STAC Catalogs

Plots stored as GeoJSON in Spatiotemporal Asset Catalogs. Open standard, queryable, portable.

Integration

MCP Protocol

Services exposed via Model Context Protocol, enabling AI assistants to orchestrate analysis workflows.

Frontends

Multiple Clients

VS Code extension, Electron app, Jupyter notebooks, and browser SPA. Same services, your choice of interface.

Read the full Architecture document →

Core Principles

The Constitution defines immutable principles that guide every decision:

Offline First

Core functionality works without network. Always.

Provenance Always

Every transformation is recorded. Full audit trail.

No Silent Failures

Operations succeed completely or fail explicitly.

Data Sovereignty

Your data stays on your machine. No cloud required.

Schema Integrity

All data validated against schemas. No exceptions.

Test Coverage

Every feature has tests. Specs before implementation.

Roadmap

We're following a tracer bullet approach: building thin slices through the full stack to validate the architecture early.

All specification stages are now complete:

Stage	Component	Purpose	Status
0	Schemas	LinkML models, generators, test fixtures	✓ Complete
1	STAC Operations	Local catalog management	✓ Complete
2	File I/O	REP file parsing to GeoJSON	✓ Complete
3	Config	Cross-platform user state	✓ Complete
4	Loader App	Electron mini-app for file loading	✓ Complete
5	Analysis Tools	Context-aware calculations	✓ Complete
6	VS Code Extension	Full display and interaction	✓ Complete

View all specifications on GitHub →

What's Happening

With specifications complete, we're now in the implementation phase. Follow the blog to track progress as we build each component.

Three Tracks

Blog content is organised into three tracks:

Track 1