Deploy Doubles · spec v0.1 draft

Deployed is not the same as working.

An open standard and a set of reference apps for answering one question: did this deploy actually work?

A platform can report a deploy as successful while the app behind it is broken: the new release never took over, the queue worker is still running last week's code, the cache silently fell back to the filesystem, the scheduler never started. Deploy Doubles makes those failures visible, from the inside and from the outside, as one exit code.

Three steps

Pick a double that matches what you want to test, and read its double.json to see what it needs.
```
npx deploydoubles list --needs postgres,worker
```
Deploy it on any platform, the way you would deploy your own app.
Verify it. Exit 0 means every check passed on the release you deployed. Anything else comes with a hint for each failing check.
```
npx deploydoubles verify https://your-deploy.example --commit <deployed sha> --json
```

Meet Dub and Vera

Dub is the double: it stands in for your app and takes the falls. Vera is the verifier: watching from the outside, stopwatch and clipboard in hand.

Dub slumped in a doorway while Vera marks a fail — It deployed. It never stood up.The platform said success. The new release never took over.

Dub yanked back along a rewind trail — Back to the last release. Nobody saw a thing.A rollback should be just as verifiable as a deploy.

Dub standing with fists on hips while Vera ticks her clipboard — Deployed is not the same as working. This one is both.Every check passed, on the release you deployed.

The standard

The report an app serves about itself at /.well-known/deploy-report — report.md, schema report-v0.1.json
The manifest (double.json) of what an app needs — manifest.md, schema manifest-v0.1.json
Outside checks a verifier runs, and its exit codes — outside-checks.md
Security: the two tiers, the token, and what a report never contains — security.md

Any app can implement the report. In PHP use deploydoubles/checks-php; in Node use @deploydoubles/checks. The verifier is deploydoubles on npm.

The doubles

Small reference apps, one per framework and service combination, that implement the standard exactly and exist to be deployed. Each one is a plain repository any platform can deploy from. The full list is machine-readable at catalog.json.

Double	What it is
catalog.json

How this is built

Deploy Doubles is authored by Jan Peter Wiersma. Most of the code and text is drafted by AI agents under his direction and review: agent-written commits carry a Co-Authored-By trailer, and he is accountable for every line that is merged. A standard built for agents, built mostly by agents, with a human accountable for it. Agents can start at llms.txt.