The Docker CLI sends commands to dockerd, which pulls images and delegates to containerd for lifecycle management. containerd assembles an OCI bundle and calls runc to create Linux namespaces and cgroups, launching the container as an isolated process with a layered filesystem — no guest OS or hypervisor required. This architecture explains why container issues typically surface in image pulls, network namespace configuration, or cgroup resource limits.

git merge preserves branch topology with a merge commit, keeping commit IDs stable for shared branches. git rebase rewrites history by reapplying commits onto the latest main, producing a linear log but requiring force-pushes that disrupt collaborators. Teams typically rebase local feature branches before merging, then use merge for integration.

Vector database selection depends on scale and infrastructure: Pinecone and Weaviate offer managed hybrid search, Milvus and Qdrant target high-throughput production, while Chroma, LanceDB, and pgvector suit embedded or Postgres-native workflows. For large datasets, keyset pagination using indexed cursors outperforms offset-based paging, and continuation tokens decouple client logic from cursor mechanics.

Deep research systems decompose queries into sub-agent tasks — web search, code execution, data retrieval — coordinated by a planner. A Synthesizer Agent aggregates findings while a Citation Agent verifies sources, producing cited reports without a single monolithic model call.