Microsoft Engineering Patterns
Thirteen hard-won pattern guides for building tools and services, behind one catalog entry. Each guide is a reference file — read only the one that matches the problem in front of you, not the whole set.
Pick the reference
| If you are... | Read |
|---|---|
Packaging a CLI — one-line install via uv/npm, subcommand dispatch, 3-tier config resolution |
references/cli-packaging-patterns.md |
Writing a curl-piped installer for a stack that can't use uv tool install/npm publish |
references/one-line-installer-patterns.md |
| Persisting config and state — defaults merging, atomic crash-safe writes, XDG locations | references/config-state-patterns.md |
| Building an HTTP service — FastAPI lifecycle, background poll loops, SPA + API proxy, WebSocket relay, SSE | references/http-service-patterns.md |
| Adding auth or TLS — localhost bypass, token auth with auto-generation, automatic certificates | references/auth-tls-patterns.md |
| Making processes talk through the filesystem — JSONL event logs, atomic snapshots, async request/response, SSE from file tailing | references/file-ipc-patterns.md |
| Making a system extensible — Python entry points, file-based plugin registry, multi-backend providers, schema validation | references/plugin-discovery-patterns.md |
| Managing many concurrent instances/sessions — isolated storage dirs, per-instance locking, prepare-once/create-many factories | references/instance-storage-patterns.md |
| Running work in Docker — safety limits, watchdog resource enforcement, orphan recovery, sidecars, reproducible dev stacks | references/container-orchestration-patterns.md |
| Building a React frontend that loads independent bundles sharing one React instance — import maps, frecency autocomplete, dynamic forms, Zustand | references/react-microfrontend-patterns.md |
| Integrating Microsoft Graph / Teams / MSAL.js — probe methodology, OData quirks, consent sequencing, CSP, retry/pagination, auth-redirect loops | references/msgraph-integration-patterns.md |
Making a CLI manage itself — doctor diagnostics, self-update, systemd/launchd service install, post-upgrade verification |
references/self-managing-tool-patterns.md |
Deciding how to expose an Amplifier workflow — .dot attractor pipeline, Python lib, tool module, or CLI |
references/amplifier-tool-leverage-patterns.md |
How to use this
- Match the problem to a row above.
read_file(skill_directory + "/references/<file>.md")for that one row.- Read a second reference only if the work genuinely spans two topics.
Each reference is the original standalone skill, moved here unchanged — its frontmatter is retained at the top of the file as provenance. Nothing was rewritten or dropped in the fold.