ADR 0175: the found front end is uninstalled once a machine is converged; design 08 note

Another session's 0169 landed first. The collision check from issue 155
covered issue folders only; it covers decision records now, and would have
refused this.

00-META/checks/cycle.py

@@ -131,6 +131,22 @@ def main():
         else:
             seen[number] = name
 
+    # And decision records, which 155's fix left out: on 2026-10-02 two ADRs numbered 0169 landed
+    # on main from two sessions within the hour, and every check passed.
+    seen_records = {}
+    for path in sorted(glob.glob(os.path.join(ROOT, "02-DECISIONS", "[0-9]*.md"))):
+        name = os.path.basename(path)
+        number = name.split("-", 1)[0]
+        if not number.isdigit():
+            continue
+        if number in seen_records:
+            bad(os.path.join("02-DECISIONS", name),
+                "is numbered %s, and so is %s -- a record's number is how it is cited. Take the next "
+                "free number across main AND every open pull request; the branch that lands last "
+                "renumbers" % (number, seen_records[number]))
+        else:
+            seen_records[number] = name
+
     for path in sorted(glob.glob(os.path.join(ROOT, "04-ISSUES", "*", "00-report.md"))):
         front = frontmatter(path)
         if front is None:

02-DECISIONS/0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md

@@ -113,6 +113,22 @@ That is a difference a take shows, not a fault, and is decided when it bites.
 | `node show` lists filters with owners; `status` names a converged machine something else filters and is not well; the preview lists filters and fates | controller tests over a fixture report |
 | Live | the home server's record names the predecessor's chain in the runtime's user chain as *other*; `status` names the machine; after the operator removes the chain, the next report drops it and `status` is well |
 
+## Built and proven live, 2026-10-02
+
+> **Progressive insight — 2026-10-02.** The decision stands; these are the facts of its building.
+
+Built in mesh-host 67 (every refusing table and legacy chain classified with an owner, reported with
+every apply; the found firewall retired on every converged apply, *found inactive* kept apart from
+*disabled by the mesh*, a skipped step said) and mesh-controller 211 (kept per node, shown on `node
+show`, named by `status` and not well, previewed with fates). The live row was read at 10:10Z: the home
+server's record named the predecessor's chain in the legacy filter's user chain as *other*, beside two
+chains a retired front end left in the IPv6 legacy filter; the control node's record named the same two
+leftovers; the laptop and the workstation read *the mesh alone*; `status` named both machines. The five
+rule sets were removed at 12:46Z through the packet filter seat's `remove` verb
+([ADR 0170](0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md)), and the next report read *the mesh alone* on
+all four machines. The control node's record still says the mesh retired its front end, which issue 143
+records as a hand's work: the host trusts its record, and from this build on the distinction is kept.
+
 ## References
 
 - [ADR 0100](0100-a-node-in-use-is-adopted-before-it-is-converged.md), [ADR 0103](0103-what-an-adopted-node-holds-and-what-its-guard-refuses.md), [ADR 0140](0140-the-filter-constrains-what-arrives-from-outside.md), [ADR 0102](0102-the-mesh-writes-into-a-shared-file-never-over-it.md), [ADR 0163](0163-taking-a-module-over-is-a-comparison.md)

02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md

@@ -7,7 +7,7 @@ reconstructed: false
 extends: 02-DECISIONS/0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md
 ---
 
-# 169. The firewall seat serves its verbs, and a foreign rule set is removed through one of them
+# 170. The firewall seat serves its verbs, and a foreign rule set is removed through one of them
 
 ## Context
 
@@ -78,6 +78,25 @@ how the act reaches the machine, recorded on the bus like every other, instead o
 | A container's capabilities reach the runtime and its spec; an unknown name is refused | host tests |
 | Live | `node-packet-filter.remove@<node>` on the home server and the control node; `node show` reads *the mesh alone* on both; `status` is well |
 
+## Built and proven live, 2026-10-02
+
+> **Progressive insight — 2026-10-02.** The decision stands; these are the facts of its building.
+> Written as 0169 for three hours and renumbered to 0170: another record took 0169 on main first,
+> and the check that refuses a shared number covered issues only (now records too).
+
+Built in mesh-host 68 (`capabilities` on a container), mesh-controller 212 (the seat's three verbs)
+and 213 (the filter file a module names under `filtering.into` counts as declared for a mount — the
+module's first build was refused without it), mesh-catalog 216 (the nftables module's runtime and
+verbs) and mesh-tools 27 (the console lists a node-scoped seat's verbs with their scope and carries the
+machine; before it, the verbs were live on four machines and unreachable from the console —
+[issue 199](../04-ISSUES/199-a-node-scoped-seats-verb-could-not-be-called-through-the-console/00-report.md)).
+Each machine's holder was issued its bus account with `mesh-controller.issue`, the broker node pushed
+first. At 12:46Z the five rule sets ADR 0168 had named were removed through
+`node-packet-filter.remove`, three on the home server and two on the control node, each answering
+with the commands it ran; the next report read *the mesh alone* on all four machines and `status`
+listed nothing under `filtered`. The live row is read. What it cost on the way is
+[issue 200](../04-ISSUES/200-the-controllers-answer-to-the-console-is-refused-by-the-bus/00-report.md).
+
 ## References
 
 - [ADR 0168](0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md), [ADR 0154](0154-the-meshs-own-verbs-are-the-controller-seats-tools.md), [ADR 0159](0159-a-tool-call-names-the-machine-and-a-holder-serves-its-seats-verbs.md), [ADR 0121](0121-a-system-seat-is-named-for-its-scope-and-modules-define-their-own.md)

02-DECISIONS/0172-the-lab-is-a-module-and-runs-a-bed-when-the-mesh-asks.md

@@ -0,0 +1,59 @@
+---
+topic: the mesh
+status: accepted
+date: 2026-10-02
+deciders: jochen
+reconstructed: false
+extends: 02-DECISIONS/0016-the-lab.md
+---
+
+# 172. The lab is a module, and runs a bed when the mesh asks
+
+## Context
+
+The lab raises virtual machines and runs the mesh on them, end to end, before a change reaches a real
+machine ([ADR 0016](0016-the-lab.md)). It runs on one machine of the mesh, the one with the
+virtualisation it needs. Until now the only way to start a bed there was to sign in to that machine and
+run the lab's command line by hand, with a dozen environment variables pointing at sibling checkouts.
+
+Nothing in the mesh could ask for it. An agent working through the mesh's own tools could build,
+merge and push a change, and could not prove it in the lab first. The operator's direction on
+2026-10-02: work on another machine goes through a mesh tool, not a shell on it.
+
+## Considered Options
+
+1. **Keep the lab a command line on one machine.** Every run is a person, or an agent with a shell on
+   that machine, outside the mesh.
+2. **The lab is a module.** Assigned to the machine that can run it, serving tools that run a bed
+   against named branches and say how it went.
+
+## Decision
+
+**Option 2.**
+
+- **A `lab` module, assigned where the lab can run**, serves five tools: whether this machine can run
+  beds, run beds against a branch per repository, a run's state, its log, and stopping it.
+- **A run is the lab's own suite**, against fresh checkouts of the named branches from the mesh's forge,
+  side by side as the lab expects them. It builds what the beds place from those checkouts, as the suite
+  already does. It answers at once with an id, like a build: a bed takes minutes, and a call does not.
+- **Only branches on the forge are run**, never code handed to the tool. What a run tested is what the
+  forge holds at the commit it names.
+- **The lab is reached over the mesh only.** Its tools travel the bus, and the module opens no port.
+- **No grant beyond the mesh's own.** Running a bed is root on the lab's machine, but anyone who can call
+  the mesh's tools can already do worse. The operator's judgement on 2026-10-02.
+
+## Consequences
+
+- An agent proves a change in the lab through the mesh, the same way it builds and pushes one.
+- The lab's machine carries a module whose runtime holds the virtualisation's and the container
+  runtime's sockets, and a toolchain to build the mesh with.
+- A run's checkouts are its own, so two runs never build from each other's tree. Old ones are removed
+  when their run ends.
+
+## How this is checked
+
+| Rule | Checked by |
+|---|---|
+| A run checks out exactly the named branches, and reports the commits it tested | the module's tests over a forge fixture, and each run's answer |
+| A run answers at once, and its state and log follow it to the end | by hand, the first run |
+| The module opens no port | the composed filter of the lab's machine |

02-DECISIONS/0175-the-found-front-end-is-uninstalled-once-a-machine-is-converged.md

@@ -0,0 +1,66 @@
+---
+topic: the mesh
+status: accepted
+date: 2026-10-02
+deciders: jochen
+reconstructed: false
+extends: 02-DECISIONS/0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md
+---
+
+# 175. The found front end is uninstalled once a machine is converged
+
+## Context
+
+[ADR 0100](0100-a-node-in-use-is-adopted-before-it-is-converged.md) retires the firewall a machine
+was found with by disabling it, never flushing it, and keeps its configuration on disk so that
+returning the node to adopted can enable it again. [ADR 0168](0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md)
+made the host keep it retired and say so. Both machines of this mesh that had a front end have been
+converged for days; neither is going back. What remained of the front end on each — its package,
+its unit enabled for boot on one, its empty chains still wired into the kernel's hooks, a chain of
+its container integration still dropping traffic on the IPv6 path until the day before this record
+— was not a rollback path. It was software nobody runs, left where a reader finds it and asks
+whether the machine has two firewalls.
+
+The operator asked on 2026-10-02 that it be disabled and uninstalled. Disabled it already was. For
+uninstalled, the host had no word: a package could be declared present and not absent.
+
+## Decision
+
+**1. A package may be declared absent.** `absent: true` on a package resource has the host remove
+the package when it is installed and leave alone a machine that never had it, through the machine's
+own package manager, dependencies untouched. A declaration that stops saying a package is absent
+installs nothing: there is nothing to undo.
+
+**2. The module that holds the packet filter seat declares the front end it replaced absent**, after
+its own filter is loaded, so the mesh's table is in force before the front end's package goes. On a
+converged machine the front end is therefore gone, not merely off; on an adopted machine nothing of
+this runs, because the filter module is assigned by the flip and not before.
+
+**3. Returning such a machine to adopted enables nothing.** A machine with no firewall needs no
+openings ([ADR 0100](0100-a-node-in-use-is-adopted-before-it-is-converged.md)); the host records the
+front end as *removed*, says so once, and asks nothing of a command that is not there. What
+ADR 0100 kept on disk for a return is kept only as far as the package manager keeps a changed
+configuration file; the rollback path it described is given up on purpose.
+
+## Consequences
+
+- The host's vocabulary grows by `absent` on a package; an older host refuses a declaration
+  carrying it, so the host rolls before the module.
+- The nftables module's declaration gains one resource; on the two machines of this mesh that were
+  found with ufw, the next push removes it.
+- `node show` reads *found firewall: ufw, removed* on those machines from then on.
+- ADR 0100's sentence about a return to adopted restoring the found firewall holds only while the
+  front end is installed, which after this record it is not on a converged machine.
+
+## How this is checked
+
+| Rule | Checked by |
+|---|---|
+| An absent package is removed when present, left when not, and read back | host tests over a fake package manager |
+| An uninstalled front end is recorded as removed and nothing is asked of it | a host test with ufw missing on a converged apply |
+| Live | the two machines report ufw gone: `pacman -Q ufw` has no answer, `node show` says removed, `status` is well |
+
+## References
+
+- [ADR 0100](0100-a-node-in-use-is-adopted-before-it-is-converged.md), [ADR 0168](0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md), [ADR 0170](0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md)
+- [Design 08 — Connectivity](../03-DESIGN/01-to-be/08-connectivity.md)

02-DECISIONS/README.md

@@ -180,7 +180,9 @@ python3 00-META/checks/index.py            fail if stale
 - **0167** — [A membership carries what its module receives, and who the mesh is](0167-a-membership-carries-what-its-module-receives-and-who-the-mesh-is.md)
 - **0168** — [A converged machine is filtered by the mesh alone, and the host says what else refuses](0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md)
 - **0169** — [A machine joins through the tunnel, and the bus is never public](0169-a-machine-joins-through-the-tunnel-and-the-bus-is-never-public.md)
-- **0169** — [The firewall seat serves its verbs, and a foreign rule set is removed through one of them](0169-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md)
+- **0170** — [The firewall seat serves its verbs, and a foreign rule set is removed through one of them](0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md)
+- **0172** — [The lab is a module, and runs a bed when the mesh asks](0172-the-lab-is-a-module-and-runs-a-bed-when-the-mesh-asks.md)
+- **0175** — [The found front end is uninstalled once a machine is converged](0175-the-found-front-end-is-uninstalled-once-a-machine-is-converged.md)
 
 ### Its tiers, from the bottom up
 

03-DESIGN/01-to-be/04-lab-installation.md

@@ -1,9 +1,10 @@
 ---
 layer: to-be
 status: in-progress
-code: [mesh-lab]
-updated: 2026-09-11
+code: [mesh-lab, mesh-catalog modules/lab]
+updated: 2026-10-02
 decisions:
+  - 02-DECISIONS/0172-the-lab-is-a-module-and-runs-a-bed-when-the-mesh-asks.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0016-the-lab.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0010-delivery.md
 ---
@@ -119,7 +120,25 @@ In order, on a machine with nothing:
 
 6. **Verification**, as above, before anything is raised.
 
-## Open
+## The lab answers the mesh
+
+*2026-10-02* ([ADR 0172](../../02-DECISIONS/0172-the-lab-is-a-module-and-runs-a-bed-when-the-mesh-asks.md)).
+Once installed, the lab is also a module: `lab`, assigned to the machine that passed `check`. Its
+tools run there and nowhere else:
+
+| tool | does |
+|---|---|
+| `lab_check` | the lab's `check`, on this machine |
+| `lab_run` | fresh checkouts of the named branches from the forge, side by side, then the suite on the named beds; answers with an id |
+| `lab_status` | where a run is, and how it ended: the commits it tested, passed and failed |
+| `lab_log` | the run's output so far |
+| `lab_stop` | ends a run |
+
+The runtime is a container holding the toolchain the suite builds with. It reaches the
+virtualisation daemon and the container runtime through their sockets on the machine, so what it
+raises is what a hand run raises. The prerequisites above stay installed by hand. The module uses
+them, and never installs them.
+
 
 - **Whether the lab's bootstrap may install packages at all**, given that the mesh's rules
   forbid installing by hand. The resolution is probably that the lab's bootstrap *is* the

03-DESIGN/01-to-be/08-connectivity.md

@@ -9,7 +9,8 @@ code:
   - mesh-host internal/apply (the service that reflects a rule set)
 updated: 2026-10-02
 decisions:
-  - 02-DECISIONS/0169-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md
+  - 02-DECISIONS/0175-the-found-front-end-is-uninstalled-once-a-machine-is-converged.md
+  - 02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0169-a-machine-joins-through-the-tunnel-and-the-bus-is-never-public.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0168-a-converged-machine-is-filtered-by-the-mesh-alone.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0167-a-membership-carries-what-its-module-receives-and-who-the-mesh-is.md
@@ -767,11 +768,16 @@ tests over a fixture report check the recording, the preview's fates, the status
 predicate. Live: the home server's record names the predecessor's chain as *other* and `status`
 names the machine until the chain is removed by hand.
 
-*2026-10-02, [ADR 0169](../../02-DECISIONS/0169-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md):* removing what
+*2026-10-02, [ADR 0170](../../02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md):* removing what
 the host reports as *other* is reached through the packet filter seat's `remove` verb, an operator's act
 by name on the bus; the seat also serves `rules` and `reload`, and its holder's runtime declares the
 `NET_ADMIN` capability on the machine's network. See design 33.
 
+*2026-10-02, [ADR 0175](../../02-DECISIONS/0175-the-found-front-end-is-uninstalled-once-a-machine-is-converged.md):*
+once a machine is converged, the front end it was found with is uninstalled, not merely disabled — the
+packet filter's holder declares its package absent after the mesh's filter is loaded, and a return to
+adopted then enables nothing. The rollback path ADR 0100 kept on disk is given up on purpose.
+
 ## 5 — Certificates
 
 **Two authorities, kept separate on purpose.**

03-DESIGN/01-to-be/33-the-tools-the-mesh-answers.md

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ status: implemented
 code: [mesh-controller, mesh-tools]
 updated: 2026-10-02
 decisions:
-  - 02-DECISIONS/0169-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md
+  - 02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0160-the-mesh-issues-an-assignments-subjects-and-a-runtime-serves-what-it-is-issued.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0159-a-tool-call-names-the-machine-and-a-holder-serves-its-seats-verbs.md
   - 02-DECISIONS/0154-the-meshs-own-verbs-are-the-controller-seats-tools.md
@@ -172,7 +172,7 @@ seats' schemas beyond the names their manifests already list.
 
 ## The firewall seat's verbs, 2026-10-02
 
-[ADR 0169](../../02-DECISIONS/0169-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md). The first node-scoped seat
+[ADR 0170](../../02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md). The first node-scoped seat
 to carry verbs: `node-packet-filter` serves `rules` (the filter as the machine enforces it, nftables
 and legacy), `reload` (the mesh's own filter from its file) and `remove` (one rule set the mesh did
 not write, named as the host reports it under ADR 0168; refusing the mesh's tables, the runtime's

04-ISSUES/199-a-node-scoped-seats-verb-could-not-be-called-through-the-console/00-report.md

@@ -0,0 +1,35 @@
+---
+status: resolved
+opened: 2026-10-02
+located-in: [mesh-tools src/client.ts (toolsOn left node-scoped seats out of the listing), mesh-tools src/mcp.ts (the call resolved the key against that listing)]
+fixed-by: mesh-tools 27 — node-scoped seats are listed with their scope, the verb requires the machine, and the call carries it in the subject
+amended-design:
+---
+
+# 199 — A node-scoped seat's verb could not be called through the console
+
+## What was observed
+
+2026-10-02, the first time a node-scoped seat declared verbs
+([ADR 0170](../../02-DECISIONS/0170-the-firewall-seat-serves-its-verbs.md)). The packet filter's
+holder on every machine served `rules`, `reload` and `remove` on the seat's per-machine subjects, and
+the bus admitted them. The console answered every call with *nothing serves
+node-packet-filter.rules@<machine>*.
+
+[Design 33 §4](../../03-DESIGN/01-to-be/33-the-tools-the-mesh-answers.md) says a node-scoped seat's
+tool carries the node it is asked of, as `<seat>.<verb>@<node>`. The console's listing left
+node-scoped seats out — the comment said they *wait for a caller naming the node* — but the roles map
+the console resolves a name against is built from that same listing. So the name never resolved as a
+seat's verb, fell through to a module's subject nobody served, and the refusal named the wrong cause.
+
+## Why it matters beyond this instance
+
+A stated behaviour that did not happen, with a refusal that pointed elsewhere: the seat's verbs were
+live on four machines and unreachable from the one surface a person uses. It could only be found by a
+node-scoped seat declaring verbs, which none had.
+
+## Resolved, 2026-10-02
+
+mesh-tools 27: node-scoped seats are listed with their scope, their verbs take a required `node`, the
+call carries it in the subject, and a call without one is refused in words. Tested with a round trip
+asking one machine's holder and being refused without a machine.

04-ISSUES/200-the-controllers-answer-to-the-console-is-refused-by-the-bus/00-report.md

@@ -0,0 +1,36 @@
+---
+status: open
+opened: 2026-10-02
+located-in: []
+fixed-by:
+amended-design:
+---
+
+# 200 — The controller's answer to a long console call is refused by the bus
+
+## What was observed
+
+2026-10-02. A `push` of the control node asked through the console came back as *mesh-controller.push
+did not answer in time. Something is serving it, so this is the tool being slow rather than absent.*
+The push had run; the machine applied. The bus's log on the control node, at the same moment:
+
+```
+[ERR] 10.10.0.1:56030 - cid:4015 - Publish Violation - User "controller",
+      Subject "_INBOX.shanks.mesh-console.WRNO5V9IJ1FX35AU5NRBEB.WRNO5V9IJ1FX35AU5PN1UW"
+```
+
+The controller's reply to the console's request was refused: the controller's bus account may not
+publish to the console's reply inbox. Shorter calls (`status`, `node`, `nodes`) answer; the long ones
+(`push` of a large machine, `issue`) time out on the console's side although they succeed.
+
+## Why it matters beyond this instance
+
+A call that succeeds and is reported as a timeout sends a person to retry what already happened — a
+second push, a second issue — and reads as the mesh being slow when it is the mesh refusing itself.
+Whether the inbox prefix the console uses is the one the controller's account is allowed to answer, or
+the request outlives the inbox subscription, is what a diagnosis has to tell apart.
+
+## Open questions
+
+- Which reply inboxes may the controller's account publish to, and which does the console request on?
+- Does a reply after the requester's timeout count as a violation, or is the prefix itself refused?