@inkandswitch.com
An independent research lab exploring the future of tools for thought. We envision a new computer that amplifies human intelligence. A system that helps you think more clearly, collaborate more effectively, and is available anywhere and anytime.
@inkandswitch.com PinnedToday we're officially sharing the "Introducing Patchwork-26" video from Lab Day at this year's @localfirstconf.com
We bring you the first look at Patchwork-26, the latest in our ongoing effort to realize Malleable Software, Universal Version Control, and Local-First Software.
@henryfellerhoff.comReposted by @inkandswitch.comInk & Switch's approach of being forward-looking while staying uncompromising on both the value of intention in what you make and the necessity of shaping the world to match your and your community'´s system of values is (in my opinion) the most essential message in software right now
@inkandswitch.comTen years in, the lab is taking on weirder problems than ever: versioning massive assets in games, programming with your hands and a pen, figuring out how AI could ever run safely inside a power grid. Bring us your weirdest problems. That's what we're here for.
@inkandswitch.comResearch can be an act of service. That's how we think about tools for thought: we want to help people in other fields do their best work. Sometimes with technology, like Automerge. Other times by giving a problem a name, like local-first, so that a community can form and flourish around it.
@inkandswitch.comHere it is—the final talk from our @localfirstconf.com Lab Day!
After 10 years of Ink & Switch, Peter van Hardenberg @pvh.ca takes the long view. Why do we do research? Who does it serve? And what now, as the world gets weirder?
@inkandswitch.comIvy gives a glimpse at how PlayBook lets you build dynamic behaviours from tangible materials — like "flux", which lets you paint a selection that grows and spreads like fluid, enveloping your ink strokes as you write and sketch. The research is ongoing; enjoy this preview, stay tuned for more!
@inkandswitch.comPlayBook is malleable software in a rather particular way. Everything in PlayBook — the pens, pages, UI panels, even the camera through which you view your notebook — is made of "materials" like Ink and Paper, designed to be modified from within PlayBook using just your hands and the pen.
@inkandswitch.comToday we bring you the second @localfirstconf.com Lab Day video.
Follow Ivy Reese @spiralganglion.com as she whirls through PlayBook: A Programmable Paper Notebook
It's a blank page in the truest sense, for pulling ideas out of your head so you can feel and think differently about them.
@alexwarth.bsky.socialReposted by @inkandswitch.comNearly every general-purpose programming language is Turing complete. So ask not what you can do with a language, but what a language makes worth the effort. A short note on "effective expressiveness": www.inkandswitch.com/malleable-so...
@andymatuschak.orgReposted by @inkandswitch.comOutstanding new work on a composable and collaborative malleable computing environment from @inkandswitch.com!! www.youtube.com/watch?v=4UxG...
* Same data, collaboratively edited in different tools!
* Same tools, themselves collaboratively edited!
(cont)
@alexwarth.bsky.socialReposted by @inkandswitch.comThis week in Livelymerge, Dan Ingalls gives us a tour of Morphic: the scene graph, halos, text editing, and programming tools of the live, malleable kernel that lives inside an Automerge document.
@automerge.orgReposted by @inkandswitch.com🗞️ The August 2026 edition of This Month in Automerge is out! Check out what's new in the core libraries the last days of summer, and a few projects from the community that caught our eye 👀 automerge.org/blog/2026-au...
@thegabriel.euReposted by @inkandswitch.comCan't say how exciting it is to see the Automerge ecosystem adopted for an incredible amount of usecases.
Such amazing engineering!!!
@inkandswitch.comThe @automerge.org community Discord chat is a good place to hang out with like-minded folks discord.gg/zKGe4DCfgR
We host online lab talks every once in a while as well.
@inkandswitch.comPresented live at Local-First Conf in Berlin. Patchwork is available now at patchwork.inkandswitch.com
You can follow along with lab notes about the Patchwork project www.inkandswitch.com/patchwork/no...
@inkandswitch.comEach member of the Patchwork team introduces a unique aspect of the project, from the core architecture that fuses the web platform and Automerge @automerge.org, to various wild experiments like a video editor, a music composition toolbox, and a remake of our travel planning prototype Embark.
@alexwarth.bsky.socialReposted by @inkandswitch.comWe put a live programming system's entire heap inside an Automerge document — every object, class, method shared + persistent. It all worked, but it was sloooow.
New lab note with Dan Ingalls and @pvh.ca on the optimizations that made Livelymerge 64× faster: www.inkandswitch.com/livelymerge/...
@automerge.orgReposted by @inkandswitch.com📅👀 The next set of community calls are posted to the Luma. Excited to see everyone there (and we'll also have This Month in Automerge in between)
Register here: luma.com/automerge
@alexwarth.bsky.socialReposted by @inkandswitch.comEverything in Livelymerge is persistent and shared — yay! Then I cmd-clicked a rectangle, and my halo popped up on your screen — whoops!
New lab note with Dan Ingalls and @pvh.ca on the need for local state, and the simple mechanism that supports it:
www.inkandswitch.com/livelymerge/...
@alexwarth.bsky.socialReposted by @inkandswitch.comWe put a program's entire heap inside an Automerge document. Every object is persistent and shared: you and I can live in the same running program — and change it while it runs.
New Livelymerge lab note, with Dan Ingalls and @pvh.ca:
www.inkandswitch.com/livelymerge/...
