Engineering Philosophy¶
GE's approach to building software. These are strategic choices, not technical preferences.
Enterprise-Grade From Day One¶
Build costs are equivalent for bootstrap vs enterprise in agentic engineering. An AI agent takes the same number of turns to set up autoscaling as it does to hardcode a single instance. But migration costs are catastrophic — rebuilding under load, with live data, is 10x the original build.
Decision: Every project starts with enterprise architecture. No prototype-then-migrate. No "we'll add that later." Designed for 100k users from line 1 without a single migration.
European Data Sovereignty¶
- Primary infrastructure: UpCloud Frankfurt
- DR: UpCloud Amsterdam
- CDN: Bunny.net (EU-based)
- All data stays in the EU
- GDPR compliance by design, not by retrofit
Decision: European infrastructure, European CDN, European compliance. Not a Silicon Valley company with an EU checkbox.
No Build and Disappear¶
12-month lifecycle guarantee on every project. GE doesn't build and leave — the same team that built it maintains it.
- Team assignment is permanent (Alpha or Beta stays with the client)
- Context retention across the full lifecycle
- Bugs before features, always
Config Is Authority, Wiki Is Knowledge, Code Is Implementation¶
Three layers of truth, clearly separated:
| Layer | Contains | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Config files | Operational values | Ports, routes, limits, API keys |
| Wiki | Knowledge | How things work, why decisions were made, pitfalls |
| Code | Implementation | The actual behavior |
If they disagree: config wins for values, wiki wins for knowledge, code wins for behavior. Fix the disagreement, don't ignore it.
Quality Gates Enforce Behavior¶
Don't trust AI promises. Verify through the system (Constitution Principle 2: Real Over Simulated). Every feature needs Proof of Life — evidence it works through its actual production path.
Quality gates are mechanical, not advisory: - Cost gate blocks execution when limits exceeded - HALT flags stop all work when integrity is compromised - Hook isolation prevents monitoring agent feedback loops - Consumer group dedup prevents double execution
Bugs Before Features¶
A regression is always higher priority than a new feature (Constitution Principle 9: Regression Is The Enemy). The test suite must pass before new work proceeds.
Compound Learning¶
Every project makes the next one faster. The learning pipeline extracts patterns from agent sessions, validates them through use, and graduates proven patterns to standards. See Pattern Library.