Configuration files are data: JSON and JSONC read as text, c12 dropped

• Status: accepted
• Date: 2026-10-03

Context and problem statement

The kernel merges ~/.bytebureau/config.json, <project>/bytebureau.json, <project>/bytebureau.local.json, BYTEBUREAU_* variables and flags, and a project file comes from a repository the user has just cloned. The first loader was c12. With its RC files, dotenv, environment-specific keys, package.json, extends and giget switched off it was still a code loader and a normaliser: it imported the target of a symbolic link, turned a scalar root into {} and dropped top-level null sections and $meta before validation, so a file the schema would have rejected passed.

Decision

The kernel reads bytebureau.json or .jsonc, bytebureau.local.json or .jsonc and ~/.bytebureau/config.json or .jsonc as text and parses it with jsonc-parser@3.3.1 (comments and trailing commas allowed); nothing is imported or run. Of the two extensions at most one may exist per layer, and only a regular file counts: a link to a file is read, a link to nowhere is an error, a directory of that name is ignored. A syntax error names its code, line and column, and a root that is not an object is an error of its file. The merged layers are validated with effect/Schema (unknown keys are errors), and every issue carries a JSON pointer and the layer that holds it: the file, env:<NAME> for a BYTEBUREAU_* variable or flag:<key> for a flag. The extends of team presets from the spec is deferred to a later phase as a kernel-native feature: JSON or JSONC presets by relative path, merged as the lowest project layer, with cycle detection. The binaries are built with --no-compile-autoload-dotenv and --no-compile-autoload-bunfig for the same reason: Bun would otherwise read a .env and run a bunfig.toml preload from the directory the binary starts in.

Consequences

A configuration file can never run code, and a file that does not fit the schema is reported where it is wrong instead of being repaired silently. There are no .ts or .js config files, no dotenv loading and no remote presets, and until presets return extends is an unknown key. The loader is a small module the project owns and tests (packages/kernel/src/config) instead of a dependency to configure away.