Inngest Platform Reference

inngest — platform reference (v3, as Carbon runs it)

Distilled from Inngest's official skill set, corrected to the v3 API Carbon uses (inngest@^3.52.7 in packages/jobs, 3.54.0 in packages/lib; the client is packages/lib/src/inngest/client.ts). Repo wiring (where functions live, registration, PGMQ event system) is in packages/jobs/AGENTS.md and .ai/rules/event-system.md — this skill is the platform semantics.

The one mental model that prevents most bugs

Each step.run is a separate HTTP invocation. The handler re-runs from the top on every step; completed steps return memoized results instead of re-executing. Therefore ALL non-determinism — API/DB calls, Date.now(), Math.random(), UUIDs, logging you don't want duplicated — must live inside a step. Code outside steps executes again on every invocation.

v3 vs v4 — Carbon is v3; most internet examples are v4

Function config (all keys go in the first argument)

inngest.createFunction(
  {
    id: "assembly-convert",            // permanent; changing it = new function
    retries: 2,                        // per-STEP retries (2 retries = 3 attempts)
    concurrency: [{ limit: 4 }, { key: "event.data.companyId", limit: 2 }],
    onFailure: async ({ event, error }) => { /* after ALL retries exhausted */ },
  },
  { event: "carbon/assembly-convert" }, // or { cron: "*/2 * * * *" } or { event, if: "<CEL>" }
  async ({ event, step, logger, attempt }) => { /* ... */ }
);

Other config keys, all optional: idempotency: "event.data.cartId" (one run per key per 24h), cancelOn: [{ event, if }], timeouts: { start, finish }, and the flow-control table below. Real examples: packages/jobs/src/inngest/functions/tasks/*.ts.

Steps

• CEL convention (waitForEvent.if, cancelOn.if): event = the original triggering event, async = the incoming event being matched. if: 'event.data.jobId == async.data.jobId'.
• Parallel: create steps unawaited, then await Promise.all([...]).
• Wrap in a step: anything non-deterministic or independently retriable. Don't wrap: pure computation, validation, branching — and don't over-granularize (each step ≈ one HTTP round trip; step count is the real budget, see limits).
• Limits: 1000 steps/run, 4MB per step output, 32MB total run state. Approaching them → split with step.invoke / step.sendEvent. (This is why Carbon's assembly-plan pipeline is event-driven submit/finalize, not a poll loop.)

Events

• Payload: { name, data, id?, ts?, v? }. Send with inngest.send(...) → { ids }; batch ≤512KB.
• id = 24h dedupe key. id: plan-done-${jobId}`` — one processing per id per event name. Make it instance+type specific, never a bare entity id.
• ts (Unix ms) in the future = delayed delivery; also fixes ordering in a batch.
• Naming: domain/noun.verb, past tense. Carbon's house style is the flatter carbon/<task-name> — follow the codebase, and register the type in the Events type (packages/lib/src/events.ts) so functions are typed.
• Fan-out: N functions may trigger on one event; they run/fail/replay independently.
• System events you can subscribe to: inngest/function.failed (data has function_id, run_id, error), inngest/function.finished, inngest/function.cancelled.

Flow control — pick by what happens to excess work

Memorize: throttle delays, rateLimit drops, debounce keeps-last; concurrency caps execution, throttle caps starts. Combine mechanisms (e.g. Carbon's assembly jobs: global + per-company concurrency).

Error handling

• A thrown error retries that step (exponential backoff + jitter, independent per step). retries: N = N+1 attempts.
• throw new NonRetriableError("msg") (import { NonRetriableError } from "inngest") — permanent failures: validation, not-found, auth, "the service is down and retrying just holds rows in Processing" (see the fail-fast pattern in assembly-convert.ts).
• throw new RetryAfterError("msg", "30s" | date) — honor upstream 429/503 backoff.
• A step that exhausts retries throws into the handler — try/catch it to run fallback steps; uncaught, the function fails → onFailure runs and inngest/function.failed is emitted.

Local dev

• Dev server runs in the Carbon stack (crbn up; INNGEST_BASE_URL in .env.local, UI at that port). Standalone: npx inngest-cli@latest dev.
• Send a test event by hand: curl -X POST $INNGEST_BASE_URL/e/dev -H 'content-type: application/json' -d '{"name":"carbon/x","data":{}}' (any event-key segment works locally).
• Services outside the JS app (e.g. the Rust assembler) push events to the same ingest URL — that's INNGEST_EVENT_KEY/INNGEST_EVENT_URL on the assembler.

Middleware (only when a concern is truly cross-cutting)

new Inngest({ middleware: [...] }). Useful ones: dependencyInjectionMiddleware (inject shared clients into handler ctx), @inngest/middleware-encryption, @inngest/middleware-sentry. Custom middleware hook signatures on the internet are usually the v4 rewrite — verify against installed v3 types before copying.