February 24-26, 2027
Montreal, Canada
The empty array is where your AI agent starts lying
Your API was designed for a caller that reads the docs. An LLM does not. It sees an empty array and invents a reason for it. This is a talk about designing responses for a non-human caller: errors that carry a recovery plan, empty results that say whether nothing exists or you simply cannot see it, why 404 can be the wrong status code, and why one polymorphic mega-tool loses to several narrow ones. We'll look at real code from a live MCP server.
Julian Egelstaff
Formulize
Julian leads the Formulize open source project, a data management platform that turns messy information and chaotic processes into beautiful databases that blend smoothly with how people actually work. In 1996, Julian got a Bachelor of Journalism and Philosophy, and naturally went on to 30 years in the software industry. In 2003, he co-founded Freeform Solutions, a non-profit web development firm, where the Formulize project began. Somehow, along the way, Julian became a Zend Certified Engineer.
