Policies

Sandbox Policy

Last updated November 9, 2026 · Markdown

A sandbox lets you publish lexicons under garden.lexicon so they resolve and validate like any published lexicon, without owning a domain. Use one for code generation, tests, and trying out a design before you publish it under a name you control.

1. Sandbox names

A sandbox name is two words and a six-digit number, like sly-fox-123456, under garden.lexicon. The builder suggests one, and you can ask for another before you publish.

A name is assigned to you at its first publish, permanently. It's never given to anyone else: not when it expires, and not when it's taken down. Code generated against your sandbox's NSIDs can only ever resolve to your schemas.

Every other name under garden.lexicon is reserved for Lexicon Garden, including the legacy subdomains in section 8.

2. How many you can claim

You can claim 3 new names in any rolling 90 days. A name counts when it's first published. Picking names, republishing a sandbox you already own, and renewing one don't count.

Moving a workspace that already lives in one of your sandboxes to a new name uses one of your new names, and the builder asks you to confirm it first.

3. What publishing does

Publishing to a sandbox writes each schema to your own PDS as a com.atproto.lexicon.schema record, under its sandbox name, with the permission you granted when you signed in. References between the lexicons you publish together are renamed with them.

Lexicon Garden then creates a _lexicon TXT record reading did=<your DID> for the sandbox's name and for each subdomain your lexicons use, in the lexicon.garden DNS zone. Those records are what make your NSIDs resolve, for anyone.

Your schemas show up across Lexicon Garden like any other lexicon: in search, browse, and on your identity page, with a badge showing how long the sandbox resolves.

4. Depth and subdomain limits

• Lexicon names can go up to **4 levels below lexicon.garden**, counting the sandbox's name and not counting the final name segment. garden.lexicon.sly-fox-123456.recipe.card is 2 levels below lexicon.garden: the sandbox's name and recipe.
• A sandbox gets at most 10 subdomains, including its top-level name. Past 10, only the first 10 in alphabetical NSID order are created, so the top-level name always is. NSIDs under a subdomain past the tenth don't resolve.

5. How long a sandbox resolves

Each publish keeps the sandbox's DNS records for 90 days. Publishing again, or renewing from your account settings, starts a new 90 days. Renewing reads the sandbox's current schemas back from your PDS and checks them again, without rewriting them.

A subdomain a later publish no longer uses keeps its record until 90 days after the last publish that used it, and doesn't count toward the 10.

When a sandbox expires, every DNS record for it, for its name and every subdomain under it, is removed, and its NSIDs stop resolving. Its schemas stay in your PDS and stay listed on Lexicon Garden, and the name stays yours. Republish or renew to make it resolve again.

6. Acceptable use

Sandboxes are for building and testing lexicons. Their names expire if they aren't renewed, so don't depend on one where resolution must never lapse; publish under a name you control instead.

Don't use sandboxes to:

• claim names you don't use, or claim them to keep them from others;
• impersonate another publisher, or copy someone's lexicons to pass them off as theirs; or
• host abusive, hateful, deceptive, or illegal content in schema names, descriptions, or documentation.

The Terms of Service apply to sandboxes like everything else.

7. Takedowns

If a sandbox breaks these rules, we may take it down. A takedown removes the sandbox's lexicons from Lexicon Garden, deletes its DNS records at once, and stops it from being republished or renewed. The name stays assigned to you and is never given to anyone else. Your records stay in your PDS. The Moderation Policy explains how we decide, and how to ask us to look again.

8. Legacy subdomains

Before sandboxes, Lexicon Garden's lexicon management gave some accounts a two-word subdomain under garden.lexicon. Those names aren't sandboxes. Their DNS records will be removed on a date announced on the holder's identity page and account settings at least 90 days ahead. After that, NSIDs under them stop resolving. Their schemas stay in their owners' PDSes, and the names stay reserved. To keep a lexicon resolving, publish it to a sandbox or under a domain you control before the date.

9. Changes to this policy

We may change these limits. A change is a new version of this site, and you'll be asked to accept it the next time you sign in. When we make a major change, we'll announce it from @lexicon.garden on Bluesky at least 30 days before it takes effect, unless the law or an urgent safety or security problem requires a faster change. A change never takes back a name already assigned to you.