Concepts

The words StackHangar uses, vault, project, account, item, environment, alert, playbook, run and agent, and how they fit together.

#How the pieces fit

Your vault holds everything. Inside it you have projects, one per product. Each item belongs to one project and to one provider account. Dates on items produce alerts. A playbook turns a job such as launching or rotating a key into steps, and one execution of it is a run. An agent is an AI tool you let work with your projects, without ever seeing a value.

#Vault

The vault is the encrypted store for everything you save. One key, made in your browser, encrypts every record. You open it with a passkey or, if you lose those, your recovery key. See the vault.

#Project

A project is one product you run. Its logins, keys, subscriptions and domains are grouped under it. You can have several. See projects.

#Account

An account is a login with a provider: for example your admin login at a hosting company, or a personal and a company login at the same provider. Every item points to the account that owns it, so you can tell which login to use to fix it. One account can serve several projects. See accounts.

#Item

An item is one stored thing. The types are:

TypeWhat it is
LoginThe sign-in for a provider account
API keyA key or token, with a value, scope, environment and expiry
DatabaseA database connection
SubscriptionA cost, how often it's billed and a renewal date
DomainA renewal date and whether it auto-renews
CertificateSomething with an expiry, such as a push or SAML certificate
MembershipA membership with a renewal date
Secure noteFree text you want encrypted

The secret part of an item is its value. See items.

#Environment

Each item is labelled Production, Staging or Development. The label tells you how much a problem matters: an expiring Production key breaks the live product.

#Alert

An alert is a reminder about a date: a key about to expire, a domain about to renew, a rotation that is due. Fixed rules decide what is urgent, not AI. Reminders arrive 30, 7 and 1 days before something is due. Alert emails never include names or secrets. See alerts.

#Playbook and run

A playbook is a reusable set of steps for a job, such as launching a product, rotating a key or responding to a leaked key. A run is one execution of a playbook, with its own progress. See playbooks and launch a product.

#Agent

An agent is an AI tool, such as Claude Code or Cursor, that connects to StackHangar. It can ask you for things, but it receives reference IDs and your answer, never a credential value. You can see and disconnect each agent. See agents.

#Locked and unlocked

You can be signed in but locked. Signing in proves who you are. Unlocking with a passkey opens the vault on your device. See signing in and unlocking.

For more definitions, see the glossary.