> ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://docs.nika.sh/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Author a candidate workflow without running it (stateless · source-only) > The HTTP transport of the same Compile core as `nika compile`. Foundation scope: CREATE resolves an exact embedded skeleton name (or `hello`), EDIT changes one existing constant, answers are explicit JSON literals; any other intent is answered `incomplete` with no substitute workflow. Creates no job, run, approval or trace, writes no file, contacts no provider: ambient keys are never consent. `check_preview` is a REVIEW of the source only, never admission: POST /v1/jobs judges a candidate again. Questions carry stable keys; answering is a new request, not a session. ## OpenAPI ````yaml /api-reference/openapi.json post /v1/compile openapi: 3.1.0 info: description: >- Authenticated loopback remote execution, declarative schedules and stateless source-only authoring (POST /v1/compile never runs, admits or writes). Artifacts, schedule list/delete/trigger/backfill, /v1/arm, and POST /v1/run are absent. title: nika serve version: 0.123.0 servers: - url: http://127.0.0.1 security: - bearerAuth: [] paths: /v1/compile: post: summary: Author a candidate workflow without running it (stateless · source-only) description: >- The HTTP transport of the same Compile core as `nika compile`. Foundation scope: CREATE resolves an exact embedded skeleton name (or `hello`), EDIT changes one existing constant, answers are explicit JSON literals; any other intent is answered `incomplete` with no substitute workflow. Creates no job, run, approval or trace, writes no file, contacts no provider: ambient keys are never consent. `check_preview` is a REVIEW of the source only, never admission: POST /v1/jobs judges a candidate again. Questions carry stable keys; answering is a new request, not a session. requestBody: content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/CompileRequest' required: true responses: '200': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/CompileOutcome' description: Authoring outcome — ready, incomplete and refused are all data '401': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: Error envelope '408': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: Request deadline '413': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: Encoded body above the compile ceiling '415': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: Content-Type or Content-Encoding refused '422': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: >- malformed_compile_request · compile_version_unsupported · compile_mode_unsupported · compile_cognition_unsupported · compile_limit '500': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: Compiler machinery failure; nothing is echoed '503': content: application/json: schema: $ref: '#/components/schemas/Error' description: compile_busy — every compile slot is in use components: schemas: CompileRequest: additionalProperties: false description: >- Generation 1 of the compile request. The encoded body is limited by the listener's configured HTTP body ceiling; no smaller field-size or answer-count quota is imposed. Unknown fields, a present null, duplicate keys (including inside `answers`) and positional arrays are refused. No field names a host path: an EDIT base travels inline in `source`. properties: answers: additionalProperties: true description: >- Question key → one JSON literal with its type preserved, judged exactly as sent within the HTTP body envelope. type: object change: additionalProperties: false maxProperties: 1 minProperties: 1 properties: set_constant: additionalProperties: false properties: name: description: Bare constant name, not a path type: string value: description: >- One JSON literal, judged exactly as sent within the HTTP body envelope. required: - name - value type: object text: description: >- `Set const.NAME to JSON_LITERAL`, or `Set const.NAME` answered through `answers` type: string type: object cognition: const: deterministicOnly description: >- The only authoring cognition of this build. Any other value is refused; no authoring model is contacted type: string compile_version: const: 1 type: integer intent: type: string mode: description: >- create requires `intent` and forbids `source`/`change`; edit requires `source` and `change` and forbids `intent` enum: - create - edit type: string source: description: >- Accepted `.nika` source, inline. The caller owns source selection, revision checks and materialization type: string workflow_id: description: >- Names a created workflow. On edit the core refuses it as data: an edit cannot rename its accepted base type: string required: - compile_version - mode type: object CompileOutcome: description: >- The engine-owned machine document of one authoring result — the document `nika compile --json` prints, without the CLI-only `written`. No field grants authority, writes or executes source. properties: candidate: description: >- Ordinary `.nika` source. It is proposed only when `status` is `ready`; under any other status it is never proposed. Under `incomplete` it is a preview: it may still carry unfilled holes, or, when an `applied` diagnostic targets `verify_held`, it is a candidate the verifier held: it answered on these bytes against the request and did not accept them. A preview is not to be run or saved as an accepted result. Null when no candidate is shown, a withdrawn one included. type: - string - 'null' check_preview: description: >- The engine's pure Check report over the source only. No child file, skill, credential probe, access plan or admission was evaluated properties: report: additionalProperties: true type: object scope: const: sourceOnly type: string required: - scope - report type: - object - 'null' compile_version: const: 1 type: integer diagnostics: description: >- Findings, in order. `kind` and `target` are their machine-readable part; `message` is for a reader. `target` names what a finding concerns: a question key, a task, a source field, or one of the compiler's own targets, among them `semantic_verification`, a finding on the request against the candidate's bytes (a clause or the whole request that no admitted judgment of these bytes settled, a part a verifier judged missing with its reason, a part it left unsettled or contested, a verification stopped at a judge call that got no answer); `verify_held` (kind `applied`), the candidate is held: the verifier answered on these bytes against the request and did not accept them (it rejected them or abstained), so `candidate` is a preview only, no replayable round is kept, and that verifier is not asked about the same bytes again in this round; and `verify_resume` (kind `applied`), no admitted judgment of the candidate was made (the verifier's call failed or chose no offered answer): the candidate is withdrawn and the round's record kept, and a zero-call replay of that round asks no verifier. Each verification attempt is recorded in `provenance.decision.semantic_verification`. items: properties: kind: enum: - applied - missed - unknown - requiresHuman - refused type: string message: description: For a reader; never parsed to recover compiler state type: string target: type: string required: - kind - target - message type: object type: array provenance: description: Reproduction metadata; neither program identity nor run evidence properties: cognition: const: deterministicOnly type: string compiler_version: type: string decision: additionalProperties: true description: >- Bounded compiler decision evidence, including deterministic and replay outcomes; it grants no execution or spending authority. type: object plan: additionalProperties: true description: >- The compiler record retained in this outcome; a server replay uses its opaque token rather than accepting this object as authority. type: object skeleton: type: - string - 'null' spec_pin: type: string strategy: description: The compiler strategy that produced this outcome. type: string suggested_file: description: >- A suggested candidate file name, never a file written by compilation. type: - string - 'null' required: - compiler_version - spec_pin - skeleton - cognition type: object questions: items: properties: key: description: >- Stable semantic hole path such as `const.request`, never a session id type: string label: type: string mandatory: description: >- false: the value belongs to a binding outside the program (a schedule's timezone, missed-run and overlap policies, per-run ceiling) and never blocks a ready candidate type: boolean options: description: >- Present on a choice question only: the admissible answers, keys spelled by the owning grammar items: properties: key: type: string label: type: string required: - key - label type: object type: array type: description: >- text: a JSON string · literal: one JSON value · choice: a JSON string that is the `key` of one of `options` enum: - text - literal - choice type: string why: type: string required: - key - label - type - why - mandatory type: object type: array requested_boundary: additionalProperties: true description: >- The candidate's requested permits, derived by Check. Requested, never granted type: - object - 'null' requested_trigger: additionalProperties: true description: >- The trigger the request names (kind · source_hint · event_hint · cadence · at · payload_input · status · timezone · missed · overlap · ceiling · cron), stated beside the candidate whose bytes carry no cadence, host or event. A requirement the operator binds through the schedule contract, never a grant or a schedule row. timezone, missed, overlap and ceiling are the answered binding values (null until answered). cron is the exact five-field schedule projection when supported and fully specified, otherwise null; older engines omit it. It never supplies a missing time or timezone. type: - object - 'null' status: description: Completeness of authoring, never permission to execute enum: - ready - incomplete - refused type: string required: - compile_version - status - candidate - questions - diagnostics - requested_boundary - requested_trigger - check_preview - provenance type: object Error: additionalProperties: false properties: error: additionalProperties: false properties: code: type: string message: type: string required: - code - message type: object required: - error type: object securitySchemes: bearerAuth: description: 'Exactly one Authorization: Bearer value from the token file' scheme: bearer type: http ```` This documentation is built and hosted on [Mintlify](https://mintlify.com), a developer documentation platform.