kentcdodds

@z_4seven @grok @bot Here's a skill that tells your agent to bootstrap the Kody CLI through the Kody MCP and use Kody for everything: github.com/kentcdodds/kcd-skills/blob/main/skills…

The 60-Second Check Before Every npm install One wrong package name can run attacker code on your laptop or CI Honestly, I'd say npm install is the riskiest five seconds of your day now that typosqatting is so common. It's the potential moment a attacker's code gets a chance to run on your laptop or your CI runner. This is not theoretical anymore. It has happened several time, at a huge scale! Some incide 1. In 2017, The Slovak National Security Office flagged ten fake Python packages. One fake package was urllib,instead of urllib3. They also collected the system's data! news link 2. npm's official record listed 13 releases of a fake package called crossenv for the real pkg cross-env. Funfact if you today run npm view crossenv, it returns 0.0.2-security. This is apparantly a placeholder npm put in its place. 3. 19.7% AI generated code samples had package names that doesn't exist. Yes, in 2025 USENIX Security study checked 2.23 million AI-generated code samples. If I were an atatcker, I'd register those names and wait. This is called slopsquatting. After reading about these attacks, I'd the first thing is to have my own investigation. Here are my findings. Enjoy the blog further: How to confirm a package is the one you meant, step by step This is for developers, SREs, DevOps engineers, and the people who review their pull requests. Run these before you add a package you have not used before: 1. Exact spelling and ecosystem Read the name letter by letter against the project's own docs. Then ask the registry if it exists. npm view cross-env name version python3 -m pip index versions requests **A missing name returns E404 on npm, or No matching distribution found on pip. ** 2. Publisher and repo link Check who owns the package. Then check where it says its code lives. npm view cross-env maintainers repository.url # maintainers = 'kentcdodds <me@kentcdodds.com>' # repository.url = 'git+https://github.com/kentcdodds/cross-env.git' curl -s https://pypi.org/pypi/requests/json | python3 -c "import sys,json; i=json.load(sys.stdin)['info']; print(i['version'], i['project_urls'])" ** 3. The Package age and publish history ** You can use this to check about the package's record- npm view cross-env time.created time.modified # time.created = '2015-10-01T23:19:27.453Z' npm view cross-env time curl -s https://pypi.org/pypi/requests/json | python3 -c "import sys,json; r=json.load(sys.stdin)['releases']; print(min(f['upload_time_iso_8601'] for v in r.values() for f in v))" The red flags would be spotted if: (a) it's been created recently, but has a famous name (b)there's a new maintainer on an old package. 4. Weekly downloads vs. the real project Another interesting thing that you can do while patrolling is to compare the lookalike with the project it resembles. curl -s https://api.npmjs.org/downloads/point/last-week/cross-env curl -s https://pypistats.org/api/packages/requests/recent Low count, new package => normal. Low count, fake package for a famous name => suspicious. For your example: pypistats excludes known mirrors and updates once a day. (Ref: PyPI Stats API) 5. Install scripts Here's my observation. Many legitimate packages have a script. I understood this from the hidden install scripts are how the September 2025 Shai-Hulud worm ran its code. npm view esbuild scripts.postinstall # node install.js 6. Lockfile diff One new dependency can pull in many. As a developer, you must never skip reading what changed. git diff origin/main -- package-lock.json # only new install scripts git diff origin/main -- package-lock.json | grep -E '^\+.*"hasInstallScript"' # for a version bump, see what changed in the code npm diff --diff=pkg@1.0.0 --diff=pkg@1.0.1 --diff-name-only Look for names you did not expect, and any added "hasInstallScript": true. For Python, do the same with git diff requirements.txt. npm diff docs What are the limitations for these six checks They're merely the checks, but do not really make any install "safe". These are the following limitations: • A real package published by a real maintainer whose account was compromised will pass all six checks. • A lockfile poisoned before anyone noticed will look normal in a diff. • Malicious code that lives in a package's runtime JavaScript, not in an install script, is not stopped by ignore-scripts. Additional Resouces I came across this blog- What Is Typosquatting? Attacks, Examples, and AI Risks. by CleanStart. In this, you can checkout the for the org-level version of this checklist. It's also my first blog here. Please share your love in comments!❤️

Kody v2026.10.12 is out. Stable credential ids and grants keyed by id. Every org credential — secret entry, OAuth integration, MCP server connection, vault binding — now carries a stable id. Use, Write, and Delete grants are keyed by that id under… github.com/kentcdodds/kody/releases/tag/v2026.10.…

Kody v2026.10.11 is out. Every trigger runs as its enabler. Cron jobs, webhooks, subscriptions, and inbound email now execute with the permissions of the person who enabled them — checked live on every run, never falling back to org Owner… github.com/kentcdodds/kody/releases/tag/v2026.10.…

Kody v2026.10.10 is out. Organization management is now a first-class web experience. Head to /@slug/-/settings to rename your org, upload an avatar, or soft-delete a team org. The members page at /@slug/-/members lets you invite people, change… github.com/kentcdodds/kody/releases/tag/v2026.10.…

Love actor-based infra! can you compare/contrast this to cell.dev? celld.dev tlockney.github.io noite.now kentcdodds/kody-celld celld-operator.io ewhauser.github.io

> nothing like durable objects (with containers no less) really exists in other clouds fwiw, celld is seeing a rush of building around it: celld.dev tlockney.github.io noite.now kentcdodds/kody-celld celld-operator.io ewhauser.github.io

Kody v2026.10.05 is out. Focused /connect/secret-set page for agent secret links. When an agent sends someone a link to set a secret, they now land on a clean one-action page instead of the full secrets list. Prefilled /account/secrets/new?name=… links… github.com/kentcdodds/kody/releases/tag/v2026.10.…