Files
hq/03-DESIGN/01-to-be
jschoubben aeea2a9f9a Resolve the host lifecycle's open items, and say how the host is delivered
The upgrade question turned out to be a delivery question, so 0058 answers
both.

Today's third silo runs once per node and sends each one a command to install
and start. That is where the as-is records a package install that 404ed from
every mirror while the job went green, an image pull failure that did not fail
the deploy, and a verify stage that was built and never scheduled because it
was missing from a list.

The shape underneath all of those is that the thing reporting success was not
the thing doing the work. Meanwhile ADR 0037 has given every node a component
that applies state, reads back and reports -- so two mechanisms now change a
node and only one checks its work.

0058: a pipeline ends when the declaration is updated. Deploy stops sending
commands to nodes and becomes one write. The host applies it on its next
reconcile, and the host cannot report success it did not verify. The verify
stage disappears as a stage, which is the point -- verification stops being a
step that can be left off a list.

A pipeline result now means "the declaration is updated, and here is which
nodes have applied it". It does not wait for every node, because a node may be
legitimately switched off for a week. Outstanding is reported separately from
failed, since conflating them is how the old system produced a stall with no
error anywhere.

The host is delivered by exactly this path and needs no new resource type: a
`file` writes the package manager's config pointing at the mesh's repository, a
`package` names the version. Added a step I had missed -- before exiting for a
restart, the host runs the new binary once. A package can install something
that does not execute here, and that turns "the node never came back" into "the
apply failed and said why".

Six open items resolved: re-enrolment is decided when the token is issued and
revokes the previous identity; the mesh keeps a recovery copy of what each node
reports it owns, which un-strands the orphans; last-contact is reported with no
threshold, because a laptop off for three weeks is doing nothing wrong;
adoption always completes but a failed line makes a node ineligible for
assignment; a briefing is a structured document whose outcome is computed from
its lines; and the token is printed once and carried by hand, which is the
property that makes it worth anything.

Still open and named: automatic rollback of a host version that will not start.

0057 and 0058 are both proposed.
2026-08-27 21:53:38 +02:00
..
2026-08-27 21:16:44 +02:00

03-DESIGN / 01-to-be

The mesh being built toward. Every statement here traces to a record in 02-DECISIONS/; nothing arrives by drafting.

A document here describes an intention. What currently runs is in 00-as-is/, and the two are never merged — when something ships, the as-is document is written and this one's status becomes implemented.

Document Covers Rests on
00-work-breakdown.md How the decomposition gets built, in what order, and where a human must look ADR 0015
01-end-to-end-testing.md The lab: a real mesh a change can be run against before it reaches nodes ADR 0016, 0029
02-scenario-declaration.md What a scenario declares — the underlay, and what to place on it ADR 0031
03-scenario-lifecycle.md What happens to a scenario — raise, snapshot, restore, move, destroy ADR 0032
04-lab-installation.md Getting the lab onto a clean machine, and why it verifies capability rather than installation ADR 0008
05-the-node-host.md Tier 0 — the one thing installed by hand, and the only thing that changes a machine ADR 0037
06-the-control-plane.md Tier 2 — what the term means, and the test for what belongs in it ADR 0037
07-the-substrate.md Tier 1 — what the control plane consumes and cannot grant itself ADR 0038, 0048
08-connectivity.md One context in full — overlay, resolution, exposure, filtering, certificates ADR 0049, 0050, 0051, 0055
09-the-node-lifecycle.md How a machine becomes a node, stays one, and stops being one ADR 0038, 0051

Not yet written

  • The remaining six contexts. ADR 0055 settles the list at seven; connectivity is the first written in full (08) and the other six do not exist yet. The work breakdown says in what order they are needed.
  • Domain grouping outside the core. Not needed. ADR 0017 is superseded by ADR 0044: there is no domain module to group into, so there is no domain list to settle. Relationships are edges, and grouping is a tag and a query.