Files
mesh-controller/internal/catalogue/manifest.go
T
jschoubben c4782ae2fd An app is told where its database is
Knowing that a machine needs the anchor's database is useless to the
program that needs it unless the program is told. It knew; nothing was
written anywhere it could read.

Two fields, mirroring contributes/receives in the other direction:

  serves: {database: {port: 5432, driver: postgres}}   on the provider
  binds:  {database: /etc/app/database.json}           on the consumer

The provider says what a consumer needs to know; the mesh adds the half
only it has — which machine, and what that machine is called on the
private network. The file says, in itself, that it carries no credential
and why. A missing field looks like a bug; a stated absence looks like a
boundary.

Binding something answered on this machine writes nothing. A file saying
"it is on this node" is a fact nobody needs and one more thing to keep
true.

And two machines that share no private network are refused rather than
wired together. An app here and a database there with no path between
them is a mesh that reports itself configured and does not work — the
failure surfaces as a connection timing out, which is the slowest place
to find it. This is checkable now only because the network became
something a machine is given rather than something it has by having an
address.

One fault, found by running it: working out who is on the private network
resolved the mesh, and resolving the mesh asks who is on the private
network. It hung for two minutes. The comment above the function said not
to do that and the function did it anyway; it now resolves each node
locally, which is the right answer to the question regardless — whether a
machine is on the network depends on what it was assigned, not on what it
takes from others.
2026-08-30 00:02:18 +02:00

379 lines
14 KiB
Go

// Package catalogue is what modules are, and what a node gets when it is assigned some.
//
// novox/hq ADR 0009: everything is a module, a module declares what it provides and requires,
// and a module declares what it claims. This turns a set of assignments into the one declaration
// a node is sent — which is the first thing the control plane decides rather than relays.
package catalogue
import (
"encoding/json"
"fmt"
"regexp"
"sort"
"strings"
)
// Scopes a claim can have.
//
// Not everything singular is singular per machine: a seat is one per node, a DHCP server is one
// per segment, and the hub is one per mesh. Scope says which, and it is the same idea the mesh
// already enforces by hand for the hub.
const (
ScopeNode = "node"
ScopeSite = "site"
ScopeMesh = "mesh"
)
// name is what a module, a provision or a claim may be called.
//
// Constrained because these become resource identities, permission patterns and error messages,
// and a name that is valid in one and not the others is a fault found late.
var name = regexp.MustCompile(`^[a-z0-9][a-z0-9-]*(\.[a-z0-9][a-z0-9-]*)*$`)
// Claim is a singular resource a module takes over.
type Claim struct {
Name string `json:"name"`
// Scope defaults to the node, which is where nearly everything singular is singular.
Scope string `json:"scope,omitempty"`
}
// At is this claim's scope, with the default applied.
func (c Claim) At() string {
if c.Scope == "" {
return ScopeNode
}
return c.Scope
}
// Offer is something a module provides, and where the answer to it may live.
//
// **The distinction this exists for:** a shell, a display server and a private network have to be
// on the machine that needs them. A database, an object store and an identity provider do not —
// they run somewhere in the mesh and are reached over it. Treating the second as the first
// installs PostgreSQL on every machine that runs a web application, which is what happened until
// this field existed.
//
// Written as a bare string in the ordinary case, because nearly everything is node-scoped and
// making every manifest say so would bury the few that are not:
//
// "provides": ["shell"]
// "provides": [{"name": "database", "scope": "mesh"}]
type Offer struct {
Name string `json:"name"`
// Scope defaults to the node, which is where most things must be to be usable.
Scope string `json:"scope,omitempty"`
}
// At is this offer's scope, with the default applied.
func (o Offer) At() string {
if o.Scope == "" {
return ScopeNode
}
return o.Scope
}
// UnmarshalJSON accepts a plain name as well as an object.
func (o *Offer) UnmarshalJSON(raw []byte) error {
var plain string
if err := json.Unmarshal(raw, &plain); err == nil {
o.Name, o.Scope = plain, ""
return nil
}
var full struct {
Name string `json:"name"`
Scope string `json:"scope,omitempty"`
}
if err := json.Unmarshal(raw, &full); err != nil {
return fmt.Errorf("a provided name is either a string or {name, scope}: %w", err)
}
o.Name, o.Scope = full.Name, full.Scope
return nil
}
// MarshalJSON writes back the short form when there is nothing else to say, so a manifest that
// went through the mesh comes out looking like the one that went in.
func (o Offer) MarshalJSON() ([]byte, error) {
if o.Scope == "" {
return json.Marshal(o.Name)
}
return json.Marshal(struct {
Name string `json:"name"`
Scope string `json:"scope"`
}{o.Name, o.Scope})
}
// Manifest is everything a module says about itself.
type Manifest struct {
Module string `json:"module"`
Version string `json:"version,omitempty"`
// Provides are the names other modules may require. A module always provides its own name;
// this is for the rest — `zsh` provides `shell`, `xorg` provides `display-server`.
Provides []Offer `json:"provides,omitempty"`
// Requires are names that must be provided by something assigned to the same node.
Requires []string `json:"requires,omitempty"`
// Claims are singular resources. Two modules claiming one thing within a scope cannot both
// be assigned there — which is how exclusivity is expressed, rather than as a list of rivals
// that every new module would force its predecessors to update.
Claims []Claim `json:"claims,omitempty"`
// Capabilities the machine must have. A different field from Requires because the remedy
// differs: a missing module can be assigned, and a missing capability means the wrong
// machine.
Capabilities []string `json:"capabilities,omitempty"`
// Resources are what this module puts on a node, in the host's own vocabulary.
Resources []map[string]any `json:"resources,omitempty"`
// Computed names something in the control plane that works this module's resources out per
// node, instead of them being fixed here.
//
// Because some files cannot be written in advance. A machine's peer list on the private
// network is derived from every other machine, so it differs on each one and changes when any
// of them changes — there is nothing to put in a manifest.
//
// Being a module anyway is the point: it is assigned like anything else, so a machine that
// should not be on the private network simply is not given it, and the network is worked out
// over the machines that have it. Before this, connectivity was code beside the module system
// doing the same job, and every machine with an address was on the network whether or not
// anybody wanted it there.
Computed string `json:"computed,omitempty"`
// Contributes is what this module tells whatever answers a requirement.
//
// The other half of an edge. `requires` says a thing must be there; this says what to do with
// it — a web application requiring a reverse proxy has to say *which name, which port*, and
// until now there was nowhere to put that. Every module that needed it was reduced to
// reaching into the control plane's database directly, which is how two of them came to hold
// a credential to it permanently.
//
// Keyed by the requirement, because that is what the contribution is *about*. Contributing to
// something is requiring it: asking to be published means a publisher must exist, and a
// module that had to say both would eventually say one.
Contributes map[string]map[string]any `json:"contributes,omitempty"`
// Receives is where this module wants its consumers' contributions written, per requirement
// it provides.
//
// A file, in the mesh's own shape, replaced whenever the set changes. **The control plane
// does not know what a reverse proxy is** and does not write one's configuration — it
// delivers the facts, and the module turns them into whatever it runs. That boundary is why
// swapping the proxy does not touch a single module that publishes through it.
Receives map[string]string `json:"receives,omitempty"`
// Serves is what a consumer needs to know in order to use something this module provides — a
// port, a path, a realm. The module's half of the answer; the mesh adds the other half, which
// is *which machine* and *where it is on the private network*.
//
// It does not carry a credential and cannot: a manifest is the same on every mesh, and a
// secret is the one thing that must not be.
Serves map[string]map[string]any `json:"serves,omitempty"`
// Binds is where this module wants to be told about something it requires, per requirement.
//
// Because "this machine needs a database from the anchor" is useless to the program that
// needs it unless the program is told. A file, like everything else — the host writes files
// and knows nothing about provisions, which is what keeps this from needing anything new
// down there.
Binds map[string]string `json:"binds,omitempty"`
}
// BoundID is the resource identity of the file a module is told about a provision in.
func BoundID(requirement string) string { return "bound-" + requirement }
// Wants is everything that must be provided on the same node: what this module requires, and what
// it contributes to.
func (m Manifest) Wants() []string {
out := append([]string{}, m.Requires...)
for to := range m.Contributes {
var already bool
for _, r := range m.Requires {
if r == to {
already = true
}
}
if !already {
out = append(out, to)
}
}
sort.Strings(out)
return out
}
// ReceivedID is the resource identity of the file a provider is given its contributions in.
//
// Named rather than positional so a module can point `restart-on` at it: a proxy that got a new
// route and did not reload is a route that silently does not work, which is the same fault the
// overlay had when a peer list changed under a running interface.
func ReceivedID(requirement string) string { return "received-" + requirement }
// ParseManifest reads a module manifest, refusing anything it cannot act on.
//
// Every problem is reported rather than the first, because somebody writing a manifest fixes
// them in one pass or in four.
func ParseManifest(raw []byte) (Manifest, error) {
var m Manifest
if err := json.Unmarshal(raw, &m); err != nil {
return Manifest{}, fmt.Errorf("this is not a module manifest: %w", err)
}
var problems []string
if !name.MatchString(m.Module) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%q is not a usable module name: lower-case letters, digits, dashes and dots", m.Module))
}
for _, offer := range m.Provides {
p := offer.Name
if !name.MatchString(p) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%q is not a usable name to provide", p))
}
if s := offer.At(); s != ScopeNode && s != ScopeMesh {
// Site scope is meaningful for a claim — one DHCP server per segment — and is not
// yet meaningful for a provision, because nothing knows how to reach "the one at my
// site". Refused rather than silently treated as mesh-wide.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s provides %q at scope %q; a provision is %q or %q",
m.Module, p, s, ScopeNode, ScopeMesh))
}
if p == m.Module {
// Harmless and worth saying: a module always provides its own name, so writing it
// suggests the author expected it not to.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s provides its own name already; listing it says nothing", m.Module))
}
}
for _, r := range m.Requires {
if !name.MatchString(r) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%q is not a usable name to require", r))
}
if r == m.Module {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%s requires itself", m.Module))
}
}
for _, c := range m.Claims {
if !name.MatchString(c.Name) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%q is not a usable claim name", c.Name))
}
switch c.At() {
case ScopeNode, ScopeSite, ScopeMesh:
default:
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s claims %s at scope %q; a claim is held per node, per site or per mesh",
m.Module, c.Name, c.Scope))
}
}
if m.Computed != "" && len(m.Resources) > 0 {
// One or the other. A module that both ships files and has them computed would leave
// nobody able to say where a given file came from.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s has resources of its own and says they are computed by %q; it is one or the other",
m.Module, m.Computed))
}
for to, values := range m.Contributes {
if !name.MatchString(to) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%q is not a usable name to contribute to", to))
}
if len(values) == 0 {
// An empty contribution is either a mistake or a requirement written the long way
// round, and both are better said plainly.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s contributes nothing to %q; if it only needs one, require it", m.Module, to))
}
}
for to := range m.Serves {
var offered bool
for _, o := range m.Offers() {
if o == to {
offered = true
}
}
if !offered {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s serves %q to whoever requires it, and does not provide it", m.Module, to))
}
}
for to, where := range m.Binds {
if !strings.HasPrefix(where, "/") {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s binds %q at %q, which is not an absolute path", m.Module, to, where))
}
var wanted bool
for _, w := range m.Wants() {
if w == to {
wanted = true
}
}
if !wanted {
// Being told about something you never asked for would write a file describing a
// machine this one has no business talking to.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s binds %q and does not require it", m.Module, to))
}
}
for to, where := range m.Receives {
if !name.MatchString(to) {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("%q is not a usable name to receive", to))
}
if !strings.HasPrefix(where, "/") {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s receives %q at %q, which is not an absolute path", m.Module, to, where))
}
var offered bool
for _, o := range m.Offers() {
if o == to {
offered = true
}
}
if !offered {
// Receiving contributions to something you do not provide would create a file nobody
// ever writes to, on a machine where nothing asked for it.
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf(
"%s receives contributions to %q and does not provide it", m.Module, to))
}
}
for i, r := range m.Resources {
id, _ := r["id"].(string)
if id == "" {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("resource %d has no id", i))
}
if _, ok := r["type"].(string); !ok {
problems = append(problems, fmt.Sprintf("resource %q has no type", id))
}
}
if len(problems) > 0 {
sort.Strings(problems)
return Manifest{}, fmt.Errorf("this manifest cannot be used:\n - %s",
strings.Join(problems, "\n - "))
}
return m, nil
}
// Offers is everything this module can satisfy: its own name, and what it provides.
func (m Manifest) Offers() []string {
out := []string{m.Module}
for _, p := range m.Provides {
out = append(out, p.Name)
}
sort.Strings(out)
return out
}
// OffersAt is what this module provides at one scope, with its own name counted as node-scoped:
// a module is only ever itself on the machine it is installed on.
func (m Manifest) OffersAt(scope string) []string {
var out []string
if scope == ScopeNode {
out = append(out, m.Module)
}
for _, p := range m.Provides {
if p.At() == scope {
out = append(out, p.Name)
}
}
sort.Strings(out)
return out
}