Knowledge Base
Practical, opinionated guidance for shipping, debugging, and operating Loom workflows. Use this when you need an answer, a pattern, or a checklist — not a spec.
Quick navigation
| Section | What's inside | Start here |
|---|---|---|
| FAQs | Short answers to common questions | "How do I install Loom?" / "Is remote execution supported?" |
| Patterns | Recommended approaches with trade-offs | "How should I structure templates?" |
| Playbooks | Step-by-step procedures for specific situations | "My run just failed — now what?" |
Patterns
Recommended approaches for common workflow design decisions. Each pattern explains when to use it, what trade-offs you're making, and links to the canonical reference.
- Templates — reusable job configuration with
extendsandinclude.local - Caching strategies — speed up iteration while staying deterministic
- Secrets for local development — set up
env://andkeepass://for local workflows
Playbooks
Step-by-step procedures you can follow under pressure. Each playbook is a checklist, not a discussion.
- Diagnose a failing run — pointer-first triage from "it failed" to the exact failing unit
- Triage secret failures — diagnose
SECRETS_*errors step by step
If you're mid-incident, also keep the Diagnostics ladder open.
When to use the KB vs Docs vs Reference
| You want... | Go to |
|---|---|
| A fast answer ("what should I do next?") | KB — FAQs |
| A recommended approach with trade-offs | KB — Patterns (above) |
| A procedural checklist under pressure | KB — Playbooks (above) |
| Conceptual onboarding and the happy path | Docs — Hello Loom |
| Exact CLI behavior and flags | Reference — CLI overview |
| Schema rules and validation constraints | Reference — Workflow schema v1 |
When the KB conflicts with Reference, Reference wins. Treat the mismatch as a bug — fix the KB and link the relevant reference section.
Contribute
If you keep answering the same question or repeating the same runbook, capture it once:
- Add a Playbook (procedural checklist) or Pattern (recommended approach + trade-offs).
- Link it from this page.
- Follow the docs contribution guide: Docs contribution.