⌜ J.A.R.V.I.S. // ONLINE ⌝

Building Nexus (Part 2): Unified Workspaces, Universal Inbox, and Folder Infrastructure

July 14, 2026 • 8 min read

Hook: In a fast-moving team, context switching is the silent productivity killer. Going from Slack to check a notification, to Notion to update a doc, to Google Drive to upload a asset, fractures focus. In Part 2 of the Nexus build, we examine how we created a cohesive operating system with unified workspaces, a multi-tenant command center, and custom file hierarchies.

In Part 1, we covered the underlying real-time communication and multiplayer canvas. Now, we dive into how Nexus structures and links these elements into a single workspace context.

1. The Atomic Workspace & Templates

In early mockups, workspace creation was loose. A user could create a workspace, but default channels like #general or introductory documents were created asynchronously, leading to database race conditions.

To solve this, we redesigned workspace creation to be atomic. When a user creates a new workspace, the client triggers a server action that:

  1. Provisions the Clerk Organization for the workspace.
  2. Writes the Firestore /workspaces/{workspaceId} document.
  3. Automatically applies a selected Workspace Template (e.g., Software Team, Design Agency, Blank) to build initial channels (#general, #announcements, #sprint-planning), seed a "Getting Started" document, and instantiate default folders.
// Seeding template folders and channels in Firestore
export async function seedWorkspaceTemplate(workspaceId: string, templateType: string) {
  const db = adminDb;
  const batch = db.batch();
  
  const templateConfig = TEMPLATES[templateType] || TEMPLATES.blank;
  
  // 1. Seed Channels
  templateConfig.channels.forEach((channel) => {
    const channelRef = db.collection(`workspaces/${workspaceId}/channels`).doc();
    batch.set(channelRef, {
      name: channel.name,
      description: channel.description,
      createdAt: admin.firestore.FieldValue.serverTimestamp(),
      isSystem: true
    });
  });
  
  // 2. Seed Default Document
  const docRef = db.collection(`workspaces/${workspaceId}/documents`).doc();
  batch.set(docRef, {
    title: "Welcome & Getting Started 🚀",
    content: templateConfig.welcomeDocContent,
    createdAt: admin.firestore.FieldValue.serverTimestamp()
  });

  await batch.commit();
}

2. Workspace Home: The Team Hub

Each workspace features a Workspace Home page, modeled after a Git repository landing view. Instead of loading directly into an empty chat channel, users land on an active dashboard containing:

  • Online Members: Real-time status widgets showing who is active.
  • Activity Timeline: A chronological history of occurrences within the workspace (e.g., "John updated Sprint Whiteboard 20m ago", "Design Discussion call started").
  • Recent Docs: Quick links to canvases or files the user was recently viewing.

3. Universal Inbox & "Continue Working"

Universal Inbox

A major challenge of multi-tenant apps is tracking alerts. If you are in Workspace A, how do you know you were tagged in Workspace B? We built the Universal Inbox—a unified notifications engine. Every mention, task assignment, or meeting invitation is piped into /users/{userId}/notifications with metadata indicating the source workspace. The Inbox filters and groups notifications chronologically ("Today", "Yesterday").

"Continue Working" Widget

When a user opens Nexus, we display a context recovery screen rather than a static list of directories. This widget tracks the user's latest sessions and displays cards linking directly back to their exact position in a document, whiteboard, or thread:

// Hook to track user's active context history
export function useActiveContextTrack(workspaceId: string, assetId: string, assetType: 'doc' | 'whiteboard' | 'chat') {
  useEffect(() => {
    if (!workspaceId || !assetId) return;
    
    // Update local state and sync with Firestore user activity history
    updateUserRecents(workspaceId, {
      assetId,
      assetType,
      lastVisited: new Date()
    });
  }, [workspaceId, assetId, assetType]);
}

4. Workspace File Infrastructure

A collaboration workspace must handle files cleanly. Instead of integrating third-party storage links, we built an integrated files explorer:

  • Workspace Isolation: Files are uploaded to Firebase Storage inside path structures mapped directly to the workspace ID (workspaces/{workspaceId}/files/{fileId}).
  • Drag-and-Drop Uploader: Fully integrated client component supporting drag events and multi-file queues.
  • Dynamic Previews: Custom components rendering inline previews for images, PDF documents, markdown files, and video uploads.
  • Structured Directories: Teams can organize files into dynamic folders, which are persisted as path structures in the Firestore metadata documents.

What's Next?

With dynamic workspaces, structured files, and unified tracking completed, the final step was securing this ecosystem and infusing it with intelligence. In Part 3, we will look at how we implemented Zero-Trust Firebase Storage Security using server-brokered signed URLs, integrated Pinecone Vector Search, and built a Context-Aware AI Assistant using the Vercel AI SDK.

Check out the GitHub Repository to see the folder infrastructure code!

↑ Back to top