# STATUS — what works, what's broken, what's next

**Updated 2026-08-03.**

> **A view, not a source.** `documentation/backlog/OPEN-ITEMS.md` is the authority on open work; this
> page restates part of it in plain words, and **nothing may exist only here**. **Not `CONTEXT.md`**,
> which is technical state written for Claude Code — keep the two separate. **Maintenance:** update
> at the end of every session in which something shipped, broke, or was decided. One screen; cut
> items rather than extend it.

## What works right now

A blank machine boots the Felhom disc, installs itself unattended, and is claimed by the customer,
who sets their own password. They install apps from a catalogue of fifty-three, share files over the
home network, and open apps from a launcher or a shared link. Backups run on their own to three
places — the machine's drive, a second drive, and an encrypted off-site copy — and a customer can
restore files and app data from the drive alone. Apps come back after a power cut: hard-reset the demo
box six times, everything returned every time, and an app switched off deliberately stayed off.
Proven end to end on real hardware.

## What's broken

- **The off-site copy can be erased by the machine that made it.** The credential that writes it can
  also delete it. A daily snapshot is armed as a stopgap, and we have never restored from that copy.
  *(R-95, R-87)*
- **Nothing else open that affects a customer.** The three faults that were on this list yesterday —
  the reserve watching the wrong step, the last app whose data was never saved, and the alert that
  told you about one app and swallowed the rest — are all fixed and proven on a real machine.

## What shipped recently

- **Three ways the alarm system was misreporting its own work — all fixed.** None of them ever risked
  data. **(1)** When the machine proved a backup restores, that result could vanish if the agent was
  restarted in the following quarter-hour — and yesterday's change made the gap a week rather than a
  day, because the machine correctly refuses to re-prove an archive it has already proven. It is now
  written to disk with the result and survives. This was caught happening, not predicted: a real
  14.5 GB off-site restore passed and left no record at all. **(2)** Every release had about a
  fifty-fifty chance of emailing you a failure for a release that worked; the version tag is now
  published after the binary, and a new check catches the opposite mistake so nothing is traded away.
  **(3)** A released binary can now be rebuilt by anyone and checked against the fingerprint you
  approve — until today, rebuilding produced different bytes. *(R-189, R-188, R-186)*
- **Each backup is now proved, instead of the clock being obeyed.** The machine used to re-test a
  backup every twenty-four hours on a timer that restarted whenever the software was updated, so the
  test happened at an arbitrary time and a fresh backup could sit unproven while an old one was
  re-checked. Now a copy is tested once, about a day after it is made, and not again until there is a
  newer one — so the daily copy is proved daily and the weekly off-site copy weekly, each on its own.
  The alert that says "this copy has not been proved lately" learned each copy's own rhythm in the
  same change; without that it would have started complaining every night about a system that is
  working. *(R-86)*
- **A failed backup now tells you about every app, once**, with every failure written down whether or
  not it is emailed, and a message the machine decides not to send now leaves a record saying so.
  *(R-182)*


## What we're working on

- **Now:** nothing outstanding.
- **Next:** proving the off-site *app-data* copy can actually be restored — the one tier nothing
  tests unattended. Most of the machinery it needed arrived with the restore-test change below.
  *(R-87)*
- **After:** the off-site copy that the machine making it can still erase. *(R-95)*

## Waiting on you

- **A job, not a decision: the hub password needs changing.** A diagnostic command printed it into a
  session log; nothing suggests anyone else saw it. *(R-132)*
- **One small question, not urgent.** The automatic check cannot see which version you have told
  machines to install, only which ones exist. Closing that needs either a password given to the build
  server or a check inside the hub itself. *(R-184)*
- **Nothing else.** The question about whether the off-site endpoint counts as protected is
  **settled — it does**, and the machine list now says so instead of asking.

## Changed since last update

- **2026-08-03** — Fixed three ways the alarm system misreported itself: a proof of a working backup
  that could vanish on a restart (seen happening), a release that emailed a failure for a release
  that worked, and a released binary nobody could rebuild and check. *(R-189, R-188, R-186)*
- **2026-08-03** — Backups are now proved one at a time, each about a day after it is made, instead of
  on a timer; the "not proved lately" alert learned each copy's own rhythm so it does not complain
  about a healthy weekly copy. You settled that the off-site endpoint is protected, and the machine
  list records it. One thing found while testing: on the small demo machine the agent cannot see its
  own local backups at all — a permission that was never granted — so that copy has never been
  test-restored there. Written down, not yet fixed. *(R-86, R-185)*