Most AI products run the model for you behind a hosted key wall. Starlight works the other way around: your own coding agent does the work, on your machine, with your keys. Starlight supplies the verified context that agent reads and the methods it follows.

## Three layers [#three-layers]

| Layer | What it is | Who runs it |
|---|---|---|
| **Your agent** | Claude Code, Codex, Gemini CLI, Antigravity, Grok, or another harness with your credentials and permissions | You |
| **Public interfaces** | The [MCP endpoints](/starlight/mcp-tools) and [HTTP API](/starlight/http-api): catalogues, install plans, Atlas research, and verified docs | Starlight, read-only |
| **Methods & skills** | Skills and bounded loops such as the [build-fix loop](/starlight/build-fix-loop) that execute inside your agent | Your agent, under your rules |

## The authority boundary [#the-authority-boundary]

Every public tool is marked read-only, non-destructive, and idempotent. None of them can publish, purchase, read your credentials, or mutate an external system. When a tool returns a plan, the plan is structured data: nothing happens until you or your agent choose to execute it.

> **Why it is built this way:** Because Starlight never holds your keys, a mistake on our side cannot spend your money or touch your repositories. You keep every irreversible decision, and you can inspect every plan before it runs.

## How to read a capability badge [#how-to-read-a-capability-badge]

| Label | Meaning |
|---|---|
| **Live** | You can use it now from this site, the public MCP endpoint, or the named repository. |
| **Plans only** | It returns a deterministic plan or proposal and changes nothing. |
| **Preview** | It runs in our repositories and has test evidence, but is not yet packaged for public one-line install. |
| **Not available** | It does not exist yet. No date, price, or terms are claimed. |

Each page also states when its facts were last checked and which source files were inspected. If a page and the code ever disagree, the code wins and the page is a bug: [open an issue on GitHub](https://github.com/frankxai/Starlight-Intelligence-System/issues).