What is Eddy?
Understanding Eddy's core concepts and the game engine metaphor
What is Eddy?
Source: This page is based on docs/REFLECTIONS/WHAT_IS_EDDY.md
Eddy is a platform for designing, executing, and improving structured business processes. It transforms complex, multi-person workflows from opaque, manual routines into clear, measurable, and automated digital experiences.
At its heart, Eddy can be understood as a game engine for work. This isn't just a cute analogy; it's the core architectural and philosophical model of the system.
The Core Idea: Orchestrating Work as a Game
A workflow in Eddy is a cooperative game, designed by a "Builder" to guide "Players" (participants) through a series of steps to achieve a business goal.
The Game Designer & The Level Editor
The Workflow Builder is the creative designer. They use a visual, graph-based editor to lay out the "game board"—the Pages (stages) and the Transitions (paths) that connect them. They place interactive Blocks on each page, creating the "puzzles" that participants must solve to proceed.
The Players & The Game Session
The Users are the players. A live Workflow Run (a "session") is a single playthrough of the game. Players navigate from stage to stage, interacting with blocks to provide data. The system automatically manages handoffs between different Roles (e.g., "Submitter" to "Approver"), telling each player whose turn it is.
The Game Master
The Eddy platform itself is the infallible "Game Master." It impartially enforces the rules defined by the builder. A player cannot move to the next stage until they've completed the required fields. A transition path will not open unless the data they've entered meets the predefined conditions. This guarantees compliance and data integrity.
The goal isn't entertainment; it's efficiency, clarity, and compliance. The "win" state is the successful, cooperative creation of a high-integrity data asset.
The Three Core Arenas of Eddy
The Eddy experience is divided into three distinct but interconnected arenas, each serving a different purpose in the lifecycle of a process.
1. The Builder (The Design Studio)
This is where processes are born. The Builder is a comprehensive visual environment for authoring workflows. Here, a designer:
- Maps the Process: Visually lays out pages and connects them with transitions on an infinite canvas
- Defines the Rules: Adds conditional logic to transitions, turning the map into a true flowchart (e.g., "If
Amount> $5,000, go to 'Manager Approval'; otherwise, go to 'Auto-Approval'") - Builds the UI: Populates each page with blocks—from simple text inputs and date pickers to rich content displays and file uploaders
- Defines the Cast: Creates the roles (like "Client," "Account Manager," "Legal Reviewer") who will participate in the process
Learn more: Workflow Builder Architecture
2. The Session (The Game Board)
This is where work gets done. The Session is the live, interactive experience for participants. When a workflow is started, users are dropped onto the "game board" where they can:
- See the Whole Picture: View the entire workflow map to understand where they are in the process and what comes next
- Interact with their Tasks: Open their assigned stage to view information and fill out the required blocks
- Collaborate Seamlessly: See which other users are online and where they are in the process. When they complete their stage, the system automatically notifies and assigns the task to the next person in line
Learn more: Session Architecture
3. The Sheet (The Trophy Room)
This is the destination for all the valuable data collected during the game.
- The Structured Database: Every piece of data captured by an input block in a session is saved to a Sheet. A Sheet is a powerful, workspace-level database table that is viewable and manageable through a familiar spreadsheet-like interface
- The Single Source of Truth: Each completed workflow run produces a structured Row in the target Sheet. This row is the "trophy"—the final, validated output of the entire process
- The Foundation for Analysis: By collecting clean, structured data from every run, Sheets become the foundation for analytics, reporting, and integration with other business systems
Learn more: Sheet Architecture
Why Eddy is More Than a Form Builder
While Eddy has forms, it is not a form builder. While it manages tasks, it is not a project management tool. Eddy's unique power comes from the synthesis of three core capabilities:
1. Process Orchestration
Eddy's primary function is to manage the flow of work between multiple people over time. Its visual graph, conditional logic, and role-based permissions are designed for complex, multi-stage handoffs, something simple forms cannot do.
2. High-Integrity Data Capture
The entire system is built to produce structured data with maximum integrity. By enforcing rules and validating inputs during the process, the data that lands in the Sheet is guaranteed to be clean, complete, and compliant. The process serves the data, not the other way around.
3. Process Intelligence
Eddy doesn't just run processes; it understands them. The platform automatically captures metadata about every run—how long each stage took, how long handoffs between people took, which paths were most common. This allows builders to move beyond guessing and use real data to answer critical questions:
- "Where is the biggest bottleneck in our client onboarding?"
- "Does it take longer to approve or reject a request?"
- "Is our team meeting its service-level agreements?"
In Summary
Eddy is a system for turning collaborative work into clear, measurable, and improvable digital experiences. It combines:
- The visual orchestration of a process mapper
- The data capture of a form builder
- The analytical power of a business intelligence tool
...into a single, cohesive platform.