# Prerequisites

Here is the list of prerequisites to start your journey with the Flashback platform:

* [Supported Browsers](#supported-browsers)
* [Vendors' Cloud Accounts](#vendors-cloud-accounts)
* [CLI and SDK Tools](#cli-and-sdk-tools)
* [Supported Platform Services](#platform-services)
* [Future Platform Capabilities](#future-platform-capabilities)

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## Supported Browsers

Latest stable Chrome, Firefox, or Safari (ensure JavaScript and cookies are enabled).

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## Vendors' Cloud Accounts

Flashback is a solution that connects you to your existing provider, such as Amazon Web Services, Google Cloud Platform, Microsoft Azure, OpenAI, Anthropic AI, StorJ or Filecoin's Akave.

<table><thead><tr><th width="225">Provider</th><th width="271.2000732421875">Account Creation</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>AWS</strong></td><td><a href="https://www.amazon.com/ap/register?_encoding=UTF8&#x26;openid.assoc_handle=usflex&#x26;openid.claimed_id=http://specs.openid.net/auth/2.0/identifier_select&#x26;openid.identity=http://specs.openid.net/auth/2.0/identifier_select&#x26;openid.mode=checkid_setup&#x26;openid.ns=http://specs.openid.net/auth/2.0&#x26;openid.ns.pape=http://specs.openid.net/extensions/pape/1.0&#x26;openid.pape.max_auth_age=0&#x26;openid.return_to=https://www.amazon.com/gp/yourstore/home?ie%3DUTF8%26ref_%3Dnav_newcust">Create account</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>GCP</strong></td><td><a href="https://console.cloud.google.com/freetrial/signup">Signup</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Azure</strong></td><td><a href="https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/purchase-options/azure-account">Build in the cloud with an Azure account</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>StorJ</strong></td><td><a href="https://us1.storj.io/signup">Signup</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Akave</strong></td><td><a href="https://akave.com/free-trial">Try Akave Cloud for free today</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>OpenAI</strong></td><td><a href="https://platform.openai.com/login">Welcome</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Anthropic AI</strong></td><td><a href="https://console.anthropic.com/">Start With</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

We recommend you to visit the documentation of your favorite cloud providers to learn how to set up efficiently your resource enabler (storage, AI LLMs, and more).

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## CLI and SDK Tools

You can use native CLI and SDK of providers to help you to configure your resources:

• Preferred post-2020 versions of programming language version for SDK integrations.

<table><thead><tr><th width="225">Provider</th><th width="271.2000732421875">Command Line Interface</th><th>Software Development Kit</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>AWS</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/cli/latest/userguide/cli-chap-welcome.html">What is the AWS Command Line Interface?</a></td><td><a href="https://aws.amazon.com/developer/tools/">Toolbox</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>GCP</strong></td><td><a href="https://cloud.google.com/cli?hl=en">Google Cloud Command Line Interface (gcloud CLI)</a></td><td><a href="https://cloud.google.com/appengine/downloads">Download and install Google Cloud SDK</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Azure</strong></td><td><a href="https://learn.microsoft.com/bs-latn-ba/cli/azure/?view=azure-cli-latest">Azure Command-Line Interface (CLI) documentation</a></td><td><a href="https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/downloads/">SDKs and tools for managing and interacting with Azure services</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>OpenAI</strong></td><td>Not found</td><td><a href="https://platform.openai.com/docs/libraries">Libraries</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Anthropic AI</strong></td><td><a href="https://code.claude.com/docs/en/cli-reference">CLI Reference</a></td><td><a href="https://platform.claude.com/docs/en/api/client-sdks">Client SDKs</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

For cloud storage, you can also use the S3-compatible APIs (non-exhaustive list):

<table><thead><tr><th width="325">Provider</th><th width="420.800048828125">S3-compatible APIs</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>StorJ</strong></td><td><a href="https://storj.dev/learn/concepts/s3-compatibility">S3 Compatibility</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Akave</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.akave.xyz/akave-o3/">Akave O3</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>MinIO (on-prem)</strong></td><td><a href="https://www.min.io/product/aistor/s3-compatibility">S3 Compatible Storage</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

#### Basic Cloud-Storage Knowledge

• Understanding buckets, objects, ACLs, IAM roles, signed URLs.\
• Familiarity with uploading/downloading via CLI or REST APIs.

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## Supported Platform Services

### Object Storage

Find and understand the different object storage solutions from the providers.

<table><thead><tr><th width="225">Provider</th><th>Object Storage Creation</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>AWS</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AmazonS3/latest/userguide/GetStartedWithS3.html">Getting started with Amazon S3</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>GCP</strong></td><td><a href="https://cloud.google.com/storage/docs/creating-buckets">Create a bucket</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Azure</strong></td><td><a href="https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-account-create?tabs=azure-portal">Create an Azure storage account</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>StorJ</strong></td><td><a href="https://storj.dev/learn/tutorials/quickstart-uplink-cli/uploading-your-first-object/create-a-bucket">Create a bucket</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Akave (Filecoin)</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.akave.xyz/akave-o3/bucket-management/create-list-delete-buckets/">Create a bucket</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

We recommend you to visit the documentation of your favorite cloud providers supporting S3-compatible APIs to learn how to set up efficiently your storage enabler.

### AI LLMs

Find and understand the different AI LLM solutions from the providers.

<table><thead><tr><th width="225">Provider</th><th>Start with AI LLMs</th></tr></thead><tbody><tr><td><strong>AWS</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.aws.amazon.com/bedrock/latest/userguide/getting-started.html">Getting started with Amazon Bedrock</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>GCP</strong></td><td><a href="https://cloud.google.com/vertex-ai/docs/generative-ai/learn/overview">Vertex AI generative AI overview</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Azure</strong></td><td><a href="https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/ai-services/openai/overview">Azure OpenAI Service overview</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>OpenAI</strong></td><td><a href="https://platform.openai.com/docs/quickstart">OpenAI API quickstart</a></td></tr><tr><td><strong>Anthropic AI</strong></td><td><a href="https://docs.anthropic.com/en/docs">Anthropic Claude documentation</a></td></tr></tbody></table>

Before using AI LLM features through Flashback, we recommend:

• Having at least one active AI provider account (e.g., OpenAI, Anthropic, AWS, GCP, or Azure).\
• Being able to create and manage API keys, secrets, and usage quotas.\
• Basic understanding of JSON, HTTP APIs, and prompt/response patterns.\
• Clarity on security practices (environment variables, key rotation, role-based access).

We recommend you to visit the documentation of your preferred AI providers to learn how to provision models, configure authentication, and monitor usage safely.

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## Future Platform Capabilities

The following sections describe the prerequisites that will help you prepare for upcoming Flashback features described in the “What’s Coming Next” roadmap.

### AI Engine Aggregation

Prerequisites to get value from unified AI engine aggregation:

• Accounts and API keys for two or more AI providers (e.g., OpenAI, Anthropic, AWS Bedrock, Vertex AI, Azure OpenAI).\
• A clear mapping between projects/teams and the AI providers they are allowed to use (for policy-based routing).\
• Basic familiarity with model families (chat, embeddings, vision, tools/function calling) and their typical use cases.\
• Centralized way to store secrets (e.g., secret manager, vault, or environment management in your CI/CD pipeline).

### Agentic Self-Management

Prerequisites to let agentic systems observe and optimize your workloads:

• Existing monitoring or logging setup for your applications (metrics, logs, traces), even if basic.\
• Clear SLOs or target KPIs for cost, latency, and reliability (e.g., max €/month, P95 latency, uptime %).\
• Permissions for Flashback to read observability data and, in controlled scopes, adjust policies or routing.\
• A staging/sandbox environment to safely test agent-driven changes before applying them to production.

### Multi-Cloud Compute & Serverless Functions

Prerequisites to extend from storage into cross-cloud compute:

• Cloud accounts with permissions to create and manage compute resources (VMs, containers, serverless functions) on at least one provider.\
• A container registry or build pipeline if you deploy containerized workloads (e.g., Docker images).\
• Basic understanding of networking concepts (VPC/VNet, subnets, security groups, egress rules) on your main cloud.\
• SSH or API-based access patterns already defined for your applications, so Flashback can orchestrate them consistently.

### Structured and Specialized Data Layers

Prerequisites to connect databases, warehouses, and analytics engines:

• At least one structured data system in use (e.g., PostgreSQL, MySQL, BigQuery, Snowflake, data warehouse, or OLAP engine).\
• Ability to create read-only and read-write roles on your databases or warehouses.\
• Network access patterns defined for data systems (e.g., private endpoints, IP allowlists, VPN/peering).\
• Basic understanding of SQL and/or analytical query patterns to define which workloads should be federated through Flashback.

### DePIN-Native Governance & Incentives

Prerequisites to participate in decentralized governance and incentive mechanisms:

• A secure, organization-managed wallet solution (custodial or non-custodial) to interact with supported blockchains.\
• Internal policies for who can sign on-chain transactions and how keys are backed up and rotated.\
• Basic familiarity with staking, delegation, and reward distributions, especially for infrastructure-related tokens.\
• Compliance review for your jurisdiction regarding the use of digital assets in operations and incentives.