Topos Node
Topos Node is your personal AI node that runs on your own device. It helps you process and organize your data locally, then connect to Topos and 3rd-party services with explicit user-controlled access.
- Product: topos.dialogues.ai
- Company: dialogues.ai
- Topos Apps/Sources: sheaf.dialogues.ai
Why Topos Node
- Runs locally on your machine
- Keeps your node data under your control
- Supports source ingestion, local processing, and controlled sharing flows
- Installs as a single command-line tool via
uv
How Topos Works (in product terms)
Topos Node has two core parts that work together to give you control:
Your Apps/Data -> Topos Database -> Topos Engine -> Safe Responses
| Part | What it is | What it does for you |
|---|---|---|
| 🗂️ Topos Database | Your private memory layer on your device | Stores your records, keeps your history, and makes your personal context searchable |
| 🧠 Topos Engine | Your decision and processing layer | Understands requests, runs AI workflows, and returns the right answer based on your permissions |
🛡️ Cognitive Firewall (user control first)
The Topos Engine acts as a Cognitive Firewall: it helps ensure only the right information is used and shared.
| Cognitive Firewall principle | What that means in practice |
|---|---|
| 🔒 Permission-aware | Requests are evaluated against your access rules before data is returned |
| 🎯 Precision over data dumps | The engine is designed to return only what is needed, not your entire history |
| 👁️ Transparent behavior | Boundaries and limits are explicit so sharing stays understandable and controllable |
🤖 Core ML tools in the Engine
Topos Engine uses both local and model-hub paths so users can choose flexibility and control:
| ML tool | Role in the workflow | User-facing benefit |
|---|---|---|
| 🦙 Ollama | Local model execution path | Keep more processing on-device and reduce external dependency |
| 🤗 Hugging Face | Model and backend integration path | Access broad model capabilities for enrichment and analysis tasks |
Why this split matters
- 🏠 Your data lives in one durable place (Database)
- ⚙️ Intelligence and policy decisions happen in a separate runtime (Engine)
- 🛡️ The Cognitive Firewall model helps protect context while still enabling useful AI actions
- 🔄 You can evolve processing/model strategy without changing your core stored memory
Shared runtime contracts
The shared/ package in this repo is part of the node runtime contract. It contains common schema and filtering definitions used by both API and engine paths.
Quick Start
1) Install
uv tool install topos-node
2) Configure
Topos Node requires a TOPOS_KEY.
topos-node --set-topos-key "<YOUR_TOPOS_KEY>"
This stores your key in:
~/.topos/.env
Optional:
TOPOS_CONTROL_PLANE_URLif you need a non-default endpoint
3) Run
topos-node --host 0.0.0.0 --port 8676
4) Verify
curl http://localhost:8676/health
Common Commands
# Start node
topos-node
# Save your TOPOS_KEY for future runs
topos-node --set-topos-key "<YOUR_TOPOS_KEY>"
# Discover available local databases and exit
topos-node --discover
# Use custom database path
topos-node --db-path /path/to/topos.sqlite
# Bind custom host and port
topos-node --host 127.0.0.1 --port 9100
Upgrade or Uninstall
# Upgrade to latest
uv tool upgrade topos-node
# Remove
uv tool uninstall topos-node
Security and Privacy Notes
- Do not commit
topos/.envor any real credentials. - Keep your
TOPOS_KEYprivate. - Review
env.examplefor available configuration options.
Developing Locally
uv sync --extra engine
just run
Engine memory (local dev)
ML models are cached inside the Engine with LRU eviction. For lighter local runs (especially inside Cursor's integrated terminal), see Engine memory management.
# Default: ENGINE_MAX_RESIDENT_MODELS=3; pipeline flush is automatic
# Override only if needed, e.g. lower RAM: export ENGINE_MAX_RESIDENT_MODELS=2
export PRIVACY_FILTER_DEVICE=cpu
Run tests:
pip install -e ".[dev,engine]"
pytest tests -q
The default lane is hermetic — temp databases only. Tests that read your own
~/.topos database or drive a running node are deselected unless you ask for
them by marker; see docs/testing/TEST_LANES.md.
Plugins
Topos Node supports optional plugins: separate Python packages installed alongside
topos-node that register handlers, connectors, or other runtime hooks. The core node
does not hardcode plugin names — discovery is entirely via setuptools entry points.
Contract: topos.extensions
| Rule | Detail |
|---|---|
| Entry-point group | topos.extensions |
| Entry-point target | A callable, e.g. my_plugin:register |
| When it runs | At process startup, before the server accepts traffic (topos/extensions.py) |
| Failure mode | A broken plugin is logged and skipped; the node keeps running |
| Dependencies | Your plugin declares topos-node (or topos-node[local]) in its own pyproject.toml |
Minimal plugin
pyproject.toml:
[project]
name = "my-topos-plugin"
dependencies = ["topos-node[local]"]
[project.entry-points."topos.extensions"]
my_plugin = "my_topos_plugin:register"
my_topos_plugin/__init__.py:
def register() -> None:
from my_topos_plugin.handlers import example # noqa: F401 — registers @handles
my_topos_plugin/handlers/example.py:
from typing import Any, Dict, Optional
from topos.core.handlers.registry import handles
@handles("my_message_type")
async def handle_my_message(message: Dict[str, Any]) -> Optional[Dict[str, Any]]:
return {"status": "ok", "payload": {"received": message.get("type")}}
Install and run
pip install topos-node my-topos-plugin
topos-node
Handlers registered in register() are available to the control-plane WebSocket
and local API paths that dispatch through topos.core.handlers.
Starter template
Fork dialoguesai/topos-plugin-template
for a working package with tests and CI. It registers a sample plugin_template_ping
handler you can copy and rename.
Guidelines
- Use unique message type names (prefix with your project) to avoid colliding with core handlers.
- Keep plugins in separate repositories — do not add proprietary logic to this repo.
- Message types your plugin handles do not need to appear in the public engine protocol snapshot unless the hosted control plane will send them to all nodes.
Contributing
See CONTRIBUTING.md for:
- public vs private test lanes
- where deployment scripts now live
- contribution scope and security expectations
License
Apache License 2.0. See LICENSE.
1 maintainer
Release files for topos-node 1.3.52
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