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Arka Platform

Addons

An addon is a self-contained module that adds a capability to arka-deck: memory, Mission Control, artifact panel, squad, connector, etc. Addons subscribe to chat events and enrich the experience without modifying the core.

Pre-installed (first-party) addons

Section titled “Pre-installed (first-party) addons”

arka-deck ships its foundational addons. No third-party installation is needed to start.

AddonRoleStatus
cortex-actionsCortex artifact panel and runtime action cards in chatbeta
cortex-liteLocal Cortex runtime sidecar (SurrealDB project graph, agent context, arka_runtime MCP)stable
memory-localPer-project agentic memory (capture, consolidation, augmentation)beta
mission-guardianMission state, Mission Control, leader and QA gates, evidencebeta
squad-leaderSquad composition and coordinationbeta
squad-orchestrationMulti-agent LangGraph orchestration (mission, report, verdict)beta
notion-connectNotion connector (pages, blocks, OAuth)beta
gmailGmail connector through a user-managed API token or gatewaybeta
google-driveGoogle Drive connector through a user-managed API token or gatewaybeta
@arkalabs/addon-expert-panelExpert Pack infrastructurenot exposed in release

Gmail and Google Drive do not use a global arka-deck Google OAuth app. The user brings the runtime credential or gateway for the installation and may attach a user-managed MCP endpoint. If no MCP endpoint is configured, no fake endpoint is exposed.

External MCP servers are then attached to the project from External sources → Project MCP. An attached MCP becomes available only to agents of that project, under a connector_* runtime name. Secrets are not copied into the MCP configuration: they remain carried by the connector installation or by a dedicated secret policy.

Modules, Addons and Packs

Section titled “Modules, Addons and Packs”

Not every visible element in the application is an addon.

  • ArkaDoc is a native document module.
  • Cortex Lite is the local runtime and project graph.
  • Mission Guardian is the addon that administers and applies governance packs.
  • Deck Guardian is the default first-party governance pack.
  • Expert Panel is the infrastructure intended to enable Expert Packs, but no first-party Expert Pack ships in this release.

See the full map: Modules and Packs.

Enable an addon

Section titled “Enable an addon”

The Addons view lists available modules. Some addons can be enabled or disabled per project (e.g. you can disable memory-local on a project that doesn’t need persistent memory).

For always-active addons (cortex-actions, cortex-lite), activation is managed by arka-deck.

Expert Panel

Section titled “Expert Panel”

Expert Panel remains internal Expert Pack infrastructure, but it is not exposed in this public release.

Reason: Expert Packs must carry their own dedicated guardian pack. Until that dedicated governance is validated end-to-end, arka-deck ships no first-party Expert Pack and does not offer Expert Pack activation in the UI.

Release consequence:

  1. no marketing, sales, training or client Expert Pack is published;
  2. the Expert Panel runtime catalog is empty by default;
  3. the project view does not offer Expert Pack activation;
  4. private packs stay outside the public repository and outside the tarball.

The standard frame remains Deck Guardian through Mission Guardian.

Current public limits

Section titled “Current public limits”
  • The addon contract is stabilized to eventually allow external extensions.
  • For today, all production addons stay first-party and explicitly wired in arka-deck.
  • There is no active third-party marketplace loading. This possibility remains a product trajectory, not a current promise.

This posture is intentional: until third-party addon sandboxing and signing are mature, we prefer a controlled perimeter.

For contributors

Section titled “For contributors”

If you want to write an addon:

What next?

Section titled “What next?”