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Issue 087 is resolved: the mesh knows which host runs a machine

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The machine has reported its host version since ADR 0141, whose own
comment says why it must: without it nothing can say a machine is behind.
The controller's copy of the report did not have the field, so it
unmarshalled into nothing and was thrown away on arrival. Two structs
describe one message and only the sending side had it.

node show names it per machine, "not reported" where the mesh has not been
told. status names every machine running an older host than another does,
and which is newest.

Disagreement rather than staleness, deliberately: nothing delivers a host
version yet, so the mesh holds no canonical current one and "behind" has
no fixed point. What it can say is that the oldest host in the mesh is
what the mesh may send.

Two refusals to guess: a machine that reported nothing is not called
behind, and versions compare as strings — right for the timestamps this
mesh uses, wrong for a scheme where 10 sorts before 9, said at the place
that would have to learn.

107 gains the note that this is what makes its new field safe to consider,
and that one machine of four is behind today, so it is not free yet.
This commit is contained in:
jschoubben
2026-09-30 08:54:52 +02:00
parent 3ea9601904
commit 0a5006b366
3 changed files with 84 additions and 3 deletions
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04-ISSUES/107-a-declaration-carries-no-order/00-report.md
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@@ -40,3 +40,16 @@ exists there and is thrown away at the wire.
separate genesis-digest branch is needed on the host?
- Is a sequence enough, or does a mode change deserve its own marker, so a replayed converged
declaration is refused by mode as well as by order?
## What has since made this safer to do (2026-09-30)
Adding a `sequence` to a declaration is adding a field, and a host refuses a declaration carrying a
field it does not know — whole. That was
[issue 087](../087-the-controller-cannot-tell-a-host-is-too-old/00-report.md), and it is resolved: the
mesh now records which host each machine reports and `status` names every machine running an older one
than another does.
So the flag day is visible before it is walked into, which it was not when this was filed. It does not
make the field free: **the oldest host in the mesh is still what the mesh may send**, and one machine of
four is behind today. A sequence that an old host refuses takes that machine out of the mesh's reach
entirely — worse than the replay it prevents, which has never been observed.