ace runs a Conduit homeserver (matrix.zurag.be, 5.4 GB of RocksDB, federating)
and Element Web under HAL, configured by environment with the domain
templated in, and Element's config.json carrying matrix.zurag.be literally.
A homeserver's server_name is its permanent identity - every user id, room id
and signature in the database carries it - and it is the name the module is
served under. So it comes from ${bound:route:name-homeserver} (mesh-controller
#149), rendered into a conduit.toml the container reads through CONDUIT_CONFIG,
and into Element's config.json (base_url, default_server_name, the room
directory). Without #149 the render is refused ("name-homeserver"), never
written empty. Two routes, one per endpoint: homeserver (label matrix, 6167)
and element (label element, 80).
Federation needs no 8448: Conduit answers /.well-known/matrix/server with
<name>:443, so peers federate through the route. HAL published 8448 on all
interfaces, but the router never forwarded it; checked from outside, the
well-known, federation version and client versions all answer on 443.
Registration defaults to off. HAL ran with CONDUIT_ALLOW_REGISTRATION=true,
which on ace means anyone on the internet can create an account with the
dummy flow (seen: /register offers m.login.dummy) - on 0.10.13, whose
successor 0.10.14 fixes an account-takeover by any local user. Existing
accounts are unaffected; the operator decides whether to reopen it.
Element's config.json is the one merge:json file (it tolerates `endpoints`),
so a machine can add keys. HAL's map_style_url is not carried: it embedded
a map-tile API key, which belongs in an assignment if wanted.
Images are the digests ace runs (Conduit 0.10.13, Element 1.12.28).
Verified: catalogue tests with MESH_CATALOGUE pointed here on mesh-controller
main and #149; a resolution on #149 renders both names (matrix.zurag.be,
element.zurag.be) into both files and both contributions; throwaway
containers of both pinned digests with the rendered files (root 0644, :ro):
client versions 200, well-known says matrix.zurag.be:443, register refused
M_FORBIDDEN, Element 200 serving the rendered config.json.
mesh-catalog
The Novox Mesh catalogue. The modules the mesh builds, provisions and runs — as manifests, one
per module under modules/.
This is data, not a control-plane concern. The manifests describe what a module is: what it
provides, what it requires, the seats it claims, the resources the host applies for it. The
engine that reads them — parsing, eligibility resolution, sealing, declaration emission — lives
in the control plane (novox/mesh-controller, internal/catalogue), which consumes this repository
as a build source. The host (novox/mesh-host) applies the declarations the control plane emits.
Neither is here.
What a module is, and is not
A module is one thing the mesh can run, named once, described completely by its manifest. A
manifest names its image (pinned by digest), the resources the host owns for it (directories,
files, the container, the private network it joins), what it requires from a provider and what
it provides to consumers, and the sealed secrets it needs filled on the machine.
- Core mesh components are not modules. The node host, the foundation, the control-plane
contexts and the surfaces are the mesh itself; they ship as their own repositories
(
mesh-host,mesh-foundation,mesh-controller,mesh-surfaces,mesh-sdk), not from here. - Standalone applications are not here either. A larger application lives in its own repository with its manifest at the root, registered with the mesh as a build source (novox/hq ADR 0010). This repository holds the modules the mesh maintains as its shared catalogue; an application the mesh merely hosts keeps its manifest beside its own code.
So there is one home for the catalogue the mesh owns, and every application that runs on the mesh rather than being of it carries its own — both reach the pipeline the same way, as a registered source.
Layout
modules/<name>.json one manifest per module
Flat, because the catalogue's shape carries no meaning: a module is found by its name and described by its manifest, and what relates two modules — a shared seat, a claim, a provider/consumer edge — is data inside the manifests, not a directory the tree encodes (novox/hq, the domain-grouping question closed in favour of seats, claims and tags).
The manifest contract
The shape a manifest must satisfy is owned by the control plane's catalogue engine and is what
validates a manifest before a machine ever sees it — a stray key, a consumer contributing the
wrong provision field, an image that nothing builds. That validation belongs with this
repository and is being re-homed here from mesh-controller; until it is, the pipeline is the
gate — it builds each module and refuses a manifest it cannot resolve.
Where the reasoning lives
Design and decisions are in novox/hq:
02-DECISIONS/0002-everything-is-a-module.md— one unit, no second mechanism02-DECISIONS/0010-applications-live-in-their-own-repository.md— why applications are not here02-DECISIONS/0030-the-repository-structure.md— the repositories, and the open tier-4 question this repository answers03-DESIGN/00-as-is/10-module-catalogue.md— the catalogue's shape, and what it records