---

name: firecrawl-reliability-patterns description: | Implement FireCrawl reliability patterns including circuit breakers, idempotency, and graceful degradation. Use when building fault-tolerant FireCrawl integrations, implementing retry strategies, or adding resilience to production FireCrawl services. Trigger with phrases like "firecrawl reliability", "firecrawl circuit breaker", "firecrawl idempotent", "firecrawl resilience", "firecrawl fallback", "firecrawl bulkhead". allowed-tools: Read, Write, Edit version: 1.0.0 license: MIT author: Jeremy Longshore jeremy@intentsolutions.io

FireCrawl Reliability Patterns

Overview

Production-grade reliability patterns for FireCrawl integrations.

Prerequisites

• Understanding of circuit breaker pattern
• opossum or similar library installed
• Queue infrastructure for DLQ
• Caching layer for fallbacks

Circuit Breaker

Copyimport CircuitBreaker from 'opossum';

const firecrawlBreaker = new CircuitBreaker(
  async (operation: () => Promise<any>) => operation(),
  {
    timeout: 30000,
    errorThresholdPercentage: 50,
    resetTimeout: 30000,
    volumeThreshold: 10,
  }
);

// Events
firecrawlBreaker.on('open', () => {
  console.warn('FireCrawl circuit OPEN - requests failing fast');
  alertOps('FireCrawl circuit breaker opened');
});

firecrawlBreaker.on('halfOpen', () => {
  console.info('FireCrawl circuit HALF-OPEN - testing recovery');
});

firecrawlBreaker.on('close', () => {
  console.info('FireCrawl circuit CLOSED - normal operation');
});

// Usage
async function safeFireCrawlCall<T>(fn: () => Promise<T>): Promise<T> {
  return firecrawlBreaker.fire(fn);
}

Idempotency Keys

Copyimport { v4 as uuidv4 } from 'uuid';
import crypto from 'crypto';

// Generate deterministic idempotency key from input
function generateIdempotencyKey(
  operation: string,
  params: Record<string, any>
): string {
  const data = JSON.stringify({ operation, params });
  return crypto.createHash('sha256').update(data).digest('hex');
}

// Or use random key with storage
class IdempotencyManager {
  private store: Map<string, { key: string; expiresAt: Date }> = new Map();

  getOrCreate(operationId: string): string {
    const existing = this.store.get(operationId);
    if (existing && existing.expiresAt > new Date()) {
      return existing.key;
    }

    const key = uuidv4();
    this.store.set(operationId, {
      key,
      expiresAt: new Date(Date.now() + 24 * 60 * 60 * 1000),
    });
    return key;
  }
}

Bulkhead Pattern

Copyimport PQueue from 'p-queue';

// Separate queues for different operations
const firecrawlQueues = {
  critical: new PQueue({ concurrency: 10 }),
  normal: new PQueue({ concurrency: 5 }),
  bulk: new PQueue({ concurrency: 2 }),
};

async function prioritizedFireCrawlCall<T>(
  priority: 'critical' | 'normal' | 'bulk',
  fn: () => Promise<T>
): Promise<T> {
  return firecrawlQueues[priority].add(fn);
}

// Usage
await prioritizedFireCrawlCall('critical', () =>
  firecrawlClient.processPayment(order)
);

await prioritizedFireCrawlCall('bulk', () =>
  firecrawlClient.syncCatalog(products)
);

Timeout Hierarchy

Copyconst TIMEOUT_CONFIG = {
  connect: 5000,      // Initial connection
  request: 30000,     // Standard requests
  upload: 120000,     // File uploads
  longPoll: 300000,   // Webhook long-polling
};

async function timedoutFireCrawlCall<T>(
  operation: 'connect' | 'request' | 'upload' | 'longPoll',
  fn: () => Promise<T>
): Promise<T> {
  const timeout = TIMEOUT_CONFIG[operation];

  return Promise.race([
    fn(),
    new Promise<never>((_, reject) =>
      setTimeout(() => reject(new Error(`FireCrawl ${operation} timeout`)), timeout)
    ),
  ]);
}

Graceful Degradation

Copyinterface FireCrawlFallback {
  enabled: boolean;
  data: any;
  staleness: 'fresh' | 'stale' | 'very_stale';
}

async function withFireCrawlFallback<T>(
  fn: () => Promise<T>,
  fallbackFn: () => Promise<T>
): Promise<{ data: T; fallback: boolean }> {
  try {
    const data = await fn();
    // Update cache for future fallback
    await updateFallbackCache(data);
    return { data, fallback: false };
  } catch (error) {
    console.warn('FireCrawl failed, using fallback:', error.message);
    const data = await fallbackFn();
    return { data, fallback: true };
  }
}

Dead Letter Queue

Copyinterface DeadLetterEntry {
  id: string;
  operation: string;
  payload: any;
  error: string;
  attempts: number;
  lastAttempt: Date;
}

class FireCrawlDeadLetterQueue {
  private queue: DeadLetterEntry[] = [];

  add(entry: Omit<DeadLetterEntry, 'id' | 'lastAttempt'>): void {
    this.queue.push({
      ...entry,
      id: uuidv4(),
      lastAttempt: new Date(),
    });
  }

  async processOne(): Promise<boolean> {
    const entry = this.queue.shift();
    if (!entry) return false;

    try {
      await firecrawlClient[entry.operation](entry.payload);
      console.log(`DLQ: Successfully reprocessed ${entry.id}`);
      return true;
    } catch (error) {
      entry.attempts++;
      entry.lastAttempt = new Date();

      if (entry.attempts < 5) {
        this.queue.push(entry);
      } else {
        console.error(`DLQ: Giving up on ${entry.id} after 5 attempts`);
        await alertOnPermanentFailure(entry);
      }
      return false;
    }
  }
}

Health Check with Degraded State

Copytype HealthStatus = 'healthy' | 'degraded' | 'unhealthy';

async function firecrawlHealthCheck(): Promise<{
  status: HealthStatus;
  details: Record<string, any>;
}> {
  const checks = {
    api: await checkApiConnectivity(),
    circuitBreaker: firecrawlBreaker.stats(),
    dlqSize: deadLetterQueue.size(),
  };

  const status: HealthStatus =
    !checks.api.connected ? 'unhealthy' :
    checks.circuitBreaker.state === 'open' ? 'degraded' :
    checks.dlqSize > 100 ? 'degraded' :
    'healthy';

  return { status, details: checks };
}

Instructions

Step 1: Implement Circuit Breaker

Wrap FireCrawl calls with circuit breaker.

Step 2: Add Idempotency Keys

Generate deterministic keys for operations.

Step 3: Configure Bulkheads

Separate queues for different priorities.

Step 4: Set Up Dead Letter Queue

Handle permanent failures gracefully.

Output

• Circuit breaker protecting FireCrawl calls
• Idempotency preventing duplicates
• Bulkhead isolation implemented
• DLQ for failed operations

Error Handling

Examples

Quick Circuit Check

Copyconst state = firecrawlBreaker.stats().state;
console.log('FireCrawl circuit:', state);

Resources

• Circuit Breaker Pattern
• Opossum Documentation
• FireCrawl Reliability Guide

Next Steps

For policy enforcement, see firecrawl-policy-guardrails.