AfterPack
View as Markdown

Complexity

The single dial behind every preset: what rises as the number climbs, the one threshold that flips at medium, and which transformations config can turn off but not force on.

complexity is the single dial that decides how much protection the engine applies. A preset is a named point on it: light is 5, hard is 12. light renames identifiers, rewrites syntax and encodes strings, with no structural layers; from medium up, and for any value you set directly, every token is driven toward the target. Set complexity directly for a value in between or beyond — it is an unbounded non-negative number.

What rises with the number

Complexity is a budget, not a schedule. There is no fixed list of "this feature at this number". Above 0, the engine spends a larger budget as the value climbs and negotiates which transformations to apply, per build — so two builds at the same complexity are different shapes, and no single transformation is guaranteed at a given level. That per-build variation is the point: see how AfterPack works for why a fixed structure would be a fingerprint.

Three things are fixed:

complexityWhat is guaranteed
0 (minify)No obfuscation. Identifiers are renamed and the code is compressed; nothing below runs. Engine 0.2.2 also rewrote syntax at 0.
> 0Every string literal the engine can rewrite goes through a runtime decoder — the string floor.
≥ 7 (medium and up)Encoded strings and integers are keyed to a shared runtime value, and object literals are rebuilt in varied shapes.

Everything else — control-flow reshaping, opaque predicates, integer-expression interpretation, and the rest — is drawn from the budget as it grows, not switched on at a line. inflation.max does not change which of them apply: left unset, the target alone decides, and a build that would grow past a value you set fails.

Turning a transformation off, or on

You can turn any transformation kind off. You cannot force one on.

  • Off is reliable. transforms.<kind>.enabled = false removes that kind at any complexity. From engine 0.2.3, turning off scopeDeepen at 7 and up can leave part of a file short of its target, and the build then fails with DIAG_TARGET_NOT_REACHED, naming the lines.
  • On is a permission. true lets the engine use a kind; it still decides per build whether the complexity and budget call for it. Outside a region you raise, the only kinds a light build applies are string encoding and, on Pro, comparisonHardening. objectConstruction appears only at 7 (medium) and up, and the two Pro kinds need a Pro build.
  • At 0, none of it applies. minify runs no transformations, so every transforms flag is moot.

To make a transformation more likely, raise complexity rather than toggling a flag.

Next

  • Presets: the named levels and the size budget each one sets.
  • Configuration: every key, including the transforms.<kind>.enabled flags.
  • How AfterPack works: why the set of transformations changes every build.
  • Directives: a different complexity for one region (Pro).