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Amends 0151: decision 3 (the native driver is named the Postgres-journal driver and works on-prem and air-gapped), decision 4 (the Temporal driver integrates the TypeScript SDK directly) and the enforcement line (the conformance suite runs on each driver). Amends 0152: the semantics it fixes are the contract of every driver, not only of the two drivers it named.

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Context

0151 put the workflow engine behind a WorkflowEngine port, with a native driver and a Temporal driver. The engine is now written fresh (0291 decision 5), and on 2026-10-22 the owner settled the drivers it will ship with. The default has to run on-prem and air-gapped, and Encore’s own Temporal guide covers Go only, so the Temporal integration has to be done directly against the TypeScript SDK.

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Decision

  1. A driver port, with one set of workflows. @stackra/workflow sits behind the WorkflowEngine port of 0151 decision 2. Drivers implement the port. Workflows are written once, with @Workflow and @Step as 0151 decision 1 says.
  2. The Postgres-journal driver is the default (PT5). The built-in durable driver records runs in a Postgres journal. It is the default, it costs nothing, and it works on-prem and air-gapped as well as in SaaS. This is the native driver of 0151 decision 3, named for what it is.
  3. A Temporal driver on the TypeScript SDK (PT5). The Temporal driver integrates the Temporal TypeScript SDK directly, because Encore’s Temporal guide covers Go only. It runs on Temporal Cloud or self-hosted, and it is chosen per environment, as 0151 decision 4 says. The driver is part of Pro, as 0151 decision 4 says, and this record keeps that placement.
  4. Trigger.dev is to be evaluated (PT5). A Trigger.dev driver is evaluated before any decision. This record neither accepts nor rejects it. It becomes a driver only through a later ADR, after the evaluation.
  5. One contract for every driver. The semantics of 0152 are the contract every driver meets: timeouts and waits, the version pin of a run, the operations, and one graph format. The conformance suite of 0152 runs on each driver in the port, not only on the two named in 0151.
  6. Authoring does not change. Workflows stay declarative graphs, and the purity lint of 0151 decision 5 applies to every driver. The decorator rule of 0094 stands.

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Consequences

  • An on-prem or air-gapped install runs workflows with no extra infrastructure, because the default is Postgres.
  • Temporal is one driver among several, and its integration is a project of its own, against the TypeScript SDK.
  • Trigger.dev stays an open evaluation, and adopting it needs a new ADR.
  • Each new driver costs a full conformance run before it ships.

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Enforcement

planned — the conformance suite of 0152, run on every driver of the port, and the purity lint of 0151 decision 5. A driver is not listed in a release until this ADR, or a later one, names it. Neither check is built yet.

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Follow-ups

  1. Trigger.dev. The evaluation sets its own criteria. Adopting the driver needs a later ADR (decision 4).

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Supersedes and sources

Supersedes: none. Amends 0151 (decisions 3 and 4, and the enforcement line) and 0152 (the contract of the drivers). Related: 0094, 0102, 0291. Sources: owner decisions of 2026-10-22 (PT5, with its driver port); Linear STA-328.