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POOKA defines an architectural style for Human–AI Information Architecture. This site publishes the POOKA Design Paper, which is written and maintained in the open.

Version 0.3Status DraftDate July 2026Author Maarten Meijer

What this paper is

POOKA is an architectural philosophy emerging from practical experimentation with Human–AI collaboration.

It is not a scientific theory, formal standard or industry specification. The concepts presented are design proposals derived from practical observation, iterative refinement and architectural reasoning. They have not been empirically validated through controlled scientific research and should therefore not be interpreted as established facts.

POOKA intentionally builds upon existing knowledge from information architecture, software architecture, knowledge management, object-oriented design, graph-based modeling, identity management and AI-assisted knowledge work. Where existing concepts adequately describe a problem, they are adopted rather than reinvented.

This paper should be read as a design paper: an invitation to discussion, implementation, validation and further evolution.

Read Chapter 3: Status

What this paper is not

POOKA addresses a specific class of architectural problems and should not be regarded as a universal solution for every Human–AI scenario. In particular, POOKA is:

  • not an AI framework. It does not prescribe language models, prompting techniques, reasoning methods, machine learning algorithms or agent implementations.
  • not a software architecture. It does not prescribe programming languages, APIs, databases, cloud platforms or deployment models.
  • not a knowledge model. It defines how knowledge is organized rather than what knowledge should contain, and avoids prescribing domain vocabularies, ontologies or taxonomies.

POOKA supports collaboration between humans and AI but does not transfer responsibility from humans to AI systems. Accountability for decisions remains with the responsible human or organization.

Read Chapter 4: Scope · Read Chapter 12: Limitations

Author

The POOKA Design Paper is written by Maarten Meijer.

How the paper is written

The chapter files under paper/ in the repository are the source of truth. This website is generated from them: every chapter, the glossary and the bibliography are copied verbatim on each build, and the Core Concepts, Design Principles and Related Work pages are derived from the canonical chapters rather than maintained by hand. The website can therefore never say something the paper does not.

The editorial rules are deliberately strict:

  • Work chapter by chapter. Never rewrite the complete paper.
  • One concept has exactly one definition. A concept is defined once and referenced elsewhere.
  • One paragraph has one purpose.
  • Architecture before implementation.
  • No marketing language, no hype, no unsupported claims.

These rules are recorded in AUTHORING_GUIDE.md and POOKA_STYLE_GUIDE.md.

How the paper is reviewed

Reviews are performed chapter by chapter, in Pull Request style. Every recommendation is explained, and editorial remarks are kept separate from architectural concerns. Findings and decisions are recorded in reviews/, with a running log in reviews/review-log.md.

Architectural choices are recorded as Architecture Decision Records in decisions/, for example the rationale for the choice of Core Concepts (ADR-001) and the treatment of Identity as coexistence rather than ownership (ADR-002).

Versions and evolution

The concepts described represent the current state of the architectural style. Future experience, technological developments and community feedback may lead to refinement, extension or replacement of individual concepts while preserving the overall architectural philosophy.

POOKA should therefore be regarded as an evolving architectural style rather than a fixed specification. Version history is recorded in CHANGELOG.md, and the original monolithic draft is preserved unchanged at archive/POOKA_v0.1.md.

Read Chapter 14: Future Evolution

Contributing

The long-term development of POOKA depends on practical application, critical discussion and contributions from a broader community of practitioners, architects and researchers.

If you would like to challenge a concept, propose a refinement or discuss an implementation, please open an issue or a pull request on GitHub. The editing workflow is described in CONTRIBUTING.md.

Licensing

Licensing terms are still to be determined; see LICENSE.md in the repository. Until a licence is set, no rights to reuse are granted beyond reading the material.