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felhom.eu/documentation/architecture/07-backup-architecture.md
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gates / gates (push) Successful in 21s
chaos-night fixes: rulings recorded, guide reordered, three rows closed, two filed
Architecture: 08 records ruling A (45 m, the round-9 arithmetic, the cost) and
the two new event types with their audiences; 03 records the slow counter as
built; 07 records the restore-record persistence as a REVERSED design for the
restore record only; CONTEXT.md carries the day's rulings.

Guide: the recovery code moves after the first apps and waits for the yellow bar.

Register: R-549 and R-550 closed PROVEN-LIVE; R-546 closed on red-proofed tests
with its live walk owed by R-551 (no Tier-0 box is paused AND agent-connected).
R-552 filed: an interrupted-restore notice for a removed app never clears -
found in my own v0.246.0 after the release was built.

Evidence: Part A (hub prints 45m/1h30m), Part C delivery on HP and N100, B.4(a)
live proof and its teardown.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_0159rPz1ZhFKsS53msqPYxtS
2026-09-17 11:00:29 +02:00

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# 07 — The recovery model
> | | |
> |---|---|
> | **Status** | **NOT RATIFIED.** Ratification is Viktor's review, not an editor's. |
> | **Written** | 2026-07-28 (full rewrite; supersedes the 2026-07-14 DRAFT entirely) |
> | **Verified against** | controller **v0.183.0** · agent **v0.110.0** · hub **v0.80.0** · catalog `4252121` · repo HEADs `felhom.eu ff050cf`, `felhom-controller fd50a73`, `felhom-agent d5c7691` |
> | **Live fleet at verification** | demo-felhom + demo-hp, both guest 9201, both on the versions above |
> | **Freshness** | **CURRENT** as of 2026-07-28. Per standing ruling **S-2**, mark this STALE the moment it is more than a few trains behind. The document it replaces was DRAFT since 2026-07-14, verified against controller v0.132.0 — **fifty-one versions stale** — and was cited as authoritative throughout that time. |
>
> **How to read this document.** Two kinds of statement appear, and they are always labelled:
>
> - **[DESIGN]** — a decision taken in the 2026-07-28 architecture discussion (D1–D6, §3–§5, §9).
> Not derived from code; the code may not implement it yet. Where it does not, §10 says so.
> - **[FACT]** — an observed property, carrying a `file:line`, a live command output, or a citation
> to `_recovery-inventory-2026-07-28.md` (below: **INV**).
>
> Where the model is silent, this document says **OPEN** rather than filling the gap.
>
> **Primary input:** `_recovery-inventory-2026-07-28.md` (read-only inventory, 2026-07-28) — cited
> throughout as **INV Part n**. Every number in §6, §8 and §11 traces back to it.
---
## 1. Purpose and scope
This document describes **how a Felhom customer gets their system back**, and who can do it.
It replaces a document that described **where copies are written**. That was the wrong frame, and
§7 explains why: a set of copies is not a set of recovery routes, and the previous document's tier
table could be entirely satisfied while a real recovery was impossible.
**In scope:** the recovery model — trust boundary, lanes, the three-part model, the tiers as
*inputs to recovery*, the dependency chain between them, the failure→recovery matrix, and the
encryption policy.
**Out of scope, deliberately:** implementation specs (they live in task specs), the capture-set
algorithm (`internal/appbackup/captureset.go` and its tests are the source of truth), and per-tier
operational runbooks (`documentation/runbooks/`).
**Authority split.** This document is authoritative for the **failure→recovery matrix** (§8). The
capability map (`00-capability-map.md`) stays authoritative for **per-capability status**. Neither
restates the other; §8 rows are cited from the map, not copied into it.
---
## 2. The trust model
**[DESIGN] The operator holds root SSH on every box.** That is a fact of the product — the agent is
operator-tier, the host is operator-managed, and break-glass exists precisely so the operator can
get in when nothing else works. **"The operator cannot read customer data" was never the security
property**, and no part of this document may be read as claiming it.
**[FACT]** The mechanics that make this concrete:
- The operator's OOB SSH public key is pushed to every box from the hub
(`hub_settings.oob_operator_ssh_pubkey` → `/var/lib/felhom-agent/felhom-sshd/authorized_keys.felhom-op`,
93 bytes, LIVE on both hosts — INV Part C, row 21).
- The break-glass `root@pam` console password for every host is stored in the hub and retrievable
with the operator's global key (`documentation/runbooks/break-glass.md:42-48`; LIVE:
`host_recovery` holds 3 rows — INV Part D2.1).
- Guest data is reachable from the host by definition: `pct exec`, and the data drives are bind
mounts on the host (`mp8 /mnt/felhom-drives`, LIVE `pct config 9201` on both hosts).
**[DESIGN] What R (the customer's recovery code) does provide, and must keep providing: the hub
alone is not enough.** A compromised hub yields blobs nobody can open. This property holds **only
while the operator's own key is not stored in the hub** — which is why §11-A is an open decision and
why its recommendation on record is "operator key held offline and never in the hub".
**[FACT]** The escrow is genuinely zero-knowledge today: `host_escrow` rows carry
`posture = zero_knowledge`, a 383-byte blob and a 572-byte identity blob, and the hub holds only a
`restic_pw_sha256` **hash** beside them (LIVE, both hosts — INV Part D2.1). R exists in **zero**
system copies by design (INV Part C, row 24).
So the honest statement of the property is:
> **The hub cannot open the escrow. The operator can reach a live box. Neither fact substitutes for
> the other, and R is what keeps the first true.**
**[DESIGN] Because R is the only key, the household is ASKED for it from the first login** (controller
v0.245.0, R-543). Off-site backup is enabled by default but does not RUN until the ceremony is done,
so the ask is not a nicety — it is the step that turns the default-on tier into an actual copy. The
volunteer guide asks for it immediately after the dashboard password and before the first app
(`runbooks/VOLUNTEER-first-hour.md` §6), and the product repeats the ask on every page until it is
done (§6.1).
---
## 3. The two lanes (D1)
**[DESIGN] Recovery is split into two lanes with different owners. This is a product decision, not a
limitation.**
### Lane 1 — the customer, unassisted: files and app data
The customer owns their data and can get it back themselves, through the „Visszaállítás" surfaces,
with nothing but their dashboard password. No operator, no ticket, no scheduling.
**[FACT] What Lane 1 contains today** (INV Part A.1 — seven paths, all behind the controller's
`RequireAuth` gate, which is the **customer-owned** password: `internal/web/auth.go:34-35` puts
`settings.json → password_hash` ahead of the operator-provisioned `controller.yaml` value):
| # | Surface (HU) | Endpoint | Semantics |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | „Visszaállítás indítása" | `POST /backup/restore` | destructive — rebuilds the app from its Tier-1 unit |
| 2 | „Fájlok visszaállítása" | `POST /backup/tier2/restore` | additive, missing-only |
| 3 | „Visszaállítás a távoli tárolóból" | `POST /backup/offbox/restore` | non-destructive, to a verification copy |
| 4 | „Helyreállítás az élő adatok közé" | `POST /backup/offbox/place` | additive, missing-only **2026-08-30 (R-359): the store is now VERIFIED on a cadence** — a daily `offsite-integrity` job runs `restic check` when the last successful one is over 7 days old. **This is a readability check, not a restore-test (R-87 stays open).** The depth that ships ON now re-reads **100%** of the pack data (R-399 CLOSED, controller v0.228.0) — the sentence here previously said the opposite and was stale. **2026-08-31 (SPIKE R-87):** a scratch restore of every app on demo-hp was measured at **25 s for 8 snapshots / 774 MB**, against 40.3 s for one weekly check — but restic 0.14.0's `--verify` checks size and mtime, **not content**, so nothing available today can vouch for the restored BYTES. Row 4's verdict is UNCHANGED by the spike. `audits/SPIKE-restic-restore-test-2026-08-31.md`. `audits/SPIKE-restic-restore-test-2026-08-31.md`. |
| 5 | „Teljes visszaállítás (fájlok + adatbázis)" | `POST /backup/offbox/reconstitute` | destructive to files + DB, never deleting |
| 6 | „Megosztások visszaállítása" + place | `POST /backup/shares/{restore,place}` | additive |
| 7 | `.fab` import | `POST` → `apiImportStart` | destructive re-import of one app |
**[FACT] What is proven in Lane 1** (INV Part G.1): paths 2 and 6 are proven live end-to-end;
path 5 is proven live through a destructive drill (photos deleted, trash emptied, restored, timeline
confirmed); path 3 is proven for **bytes** only; path 7 is proven for the drive-to-drive circle but
its browser-upload leg is not; path 1 is proven to **execute** but its **content recovery after real
loss has never been demonstrated** — the single most valuable unproven item in the system
(`audits/CAMPAIGN-9-restore-proof-2026-07-28.md:825-827`); path 4 has never been exercised as a
distinct action (`audits/CAMPAIGN-8-backup-restore-2026-07-27.md:520`).
**[FACT] One honest residual on the whole lane:** every proven run was performed by the **operator**,
not by a customer. `00-capability-map.md:75` still carries "A customer (not the operator) performs a
restore via UI alone" as **MISSING as evidence** — by absence of the run, not by a product gap.
**[RULING 2026-09-17, operator — a design choice REVERSED] The restore record survives a restart
(R-550, controller v0.246.0).** The async restore status (`internal/backup/opstatus.go`) was in memory
by choice — „same precedent as notification cooldowns". Chaos night round 10 measured the cost: a
restore accepted, the box hard-reset four seconds later, and the status answering the Go zero value, so
the household could never learn whether it finished. **For the restore record only**, it is now written
atomically to `restore-status.json` in the controller's state directory at both ends of an op; at
startup a record still marked running becomes a failed, interrupted result („A visszaállítás megszakadt
(a doboz újraindult) — indítsd el újra."), shown per app on the restore page until that app's next
restore, and raised once as `restore_interrupted`. **Notification cooldowns stay in memory** — the
precedent is kept for what it was written for.
### Lane 2 — the operator: guest and host recovery
Rebuilding an LXC guest, rebuilding a host, and re-establishing a box's identity are **operator
work, by design and by contract**. They are not customer-facing and are not going to be.
**[FACT] What Lane 2 contains** (INV Part A.2): the scheduled restore-test, `pct restore`, raw
`proxmox-backup-client restore`, raw `restic restore`, the agent's DR bring-up
(`--selftest=bring-up -mode dr`), the host-loss plan builder, and the escrow-consume ceremony. Each
needs root on the host or a CLI flag; none is reachable from any customer surface.
**[FACT] What is proven in Lane 2** (INV Parts G.1, G.3): whole-guest `pct restore` from both tiers
is proven with exact mount parity; the unattended restore-test is proven and currently running on
both boxes; a corrupted snapshot is proven to fail cleanly. **The DR bring-up path has never been
executed** (`CAMPAIGN-8…:522`), the host-loss plan **executes nothing by construction**
(`felhom-agent/internal/dr/plan.go:1-4`), and **no host has ever been rebuilt as its former self**
(INV Part D1).
### Lane 2's restore-test is scheduled PER ARCHIVE GENERATION (R-86, 2026-08-03)
**[CONTRACT, changed 2026-08-03 — agent v0.121.0 + hub v0.91.0.]** The scheduled restore-test used to
fire on an interval started at daemon start. It no longer does. The rule is:
> Let **A** be the newest archive on a tier that has settled for at least the settle lag (24 h).
> The tier is **DUE** when **A** exists and **A has not already been proven**.
So a tier is proved **once per archive**, on its own archive, and the proof follows the backup rather
than the process's uptime:
| tier rhythm | what is proved, and when |
|---|---|
| daily (host tier) | yesterday's archive, once a day |
| weekly (offsite tier) | last week's archive, once a week |
| newborn (no archive yet) | nothing — **UNKNOWN, never a fault** |
**The trap in the obvious formulation, recorded so it is not reintroduced:** *"due when the newest
archive is ≥ 24 h old"* is never true on a **daily** tier — a new archive resets the newest-archive
age to zero long before it reaches the lag — so the literal reading silently switches restore-testing
off for the tier that matters most.
What survives unchanged: the restore-test itself (restore → boot → verify → destroy the scratch), its
journal and crash recovery, the scratch VMID band, the one-heavy-operation gate, proof credit only on
success, and oldest-proven ordering, which is now the tie-break **between due tiers**. A ticker
remains, but only as the **evaluation interval** (6 h by default, chosen from a measured cost: one
due-check is 18 ms on a local dir storage and 392 ms on the PBS tier over the WAN).
**The hub's half is not optional.** `restoreProvenStaleAfter` was a flat 7 days derived from the very
cadence this replaced, and a weekly tier proved weekly reaches a proof age of **exactly** one interval
just before its next proof — 168 h against a 168 h window. It sat ON the line, so any ordinary delay
tipped a healthy tier into a nightly alarm. The window is now per tier, from that tier's observed
archive interval, floored at the old 7 days, capped at 12 days (strictly inside the two-week offsite
retention), and falling back to the tier's declared rhythm when history is too short to observe one.
### Why the split is right, stated once
**[DESIGN]** A customer can reason about "my photos are gone". A customer cannot reason about
"restore the LXC and re-attach mp8 by durable_id without binding another guest's bootstrap
credentials" — a hazard serious enough to have its own runbook page
(`runbooks/RUNBOOK-manual-guest-restore.md:45-48`, F-OPS). Putting Lane 2 behind the operator is
what lets Lane 1 be a button instead of a procedure.
**[FACT] And as of D5 (v0.188.0) the split is real, not just intended.** Until then Lane 1 only *looked*
independent: an app's files sat on the customer's drive but could not be brought back without secrets
that lived solely in the guest, so the fast customer lane was silently conditioned on the slow
operator lane (§7.1 leg 1). The unit now carries those secrets, so **Lane 1 needs the drive and nothing
else** for app rebuild (§7.4). The one honest caveat: Lane 1's *file-merge* surface (Tier-2 additive)
still reads its destination from the guest's `settings.json`, so that surface remains guest-conditioned
— D5 removed the secrets leg, not the living-app leg.
---
## 4. The three-part model (D4)
**[DESIGN] Recovery needs three things, and they live in three different places.** Losing one is a
different problem from losing another, and the matrix in §8 is organised around that.
| Part | Holds | Where | Lost when |
|---|---|---|---|
| **Recipe** | scaffolding — guest sizing, drive inventory, PVE storage definitions, PBS coordinates, app inventory + storage bindings. **No secrets, no bytes.** | the hub | the hub is lost |
| **Escrow** | the host identity key material and the restic repo password | the hub, R-wrapped | the hub is lost, **or** R is lost |
| **Bytes** | Tier-1 / Tier-2 / Tier-3 / whole-guest | the tiers | the relevant medium is lost |
**[FACT] The Recipe exists and is current.** `dr_recipe` holds 6 rows; demo-felhom's was updated
`2026-07-28 17:31:13` and demo-hp's `17:25:31` — i.e. within one report cycle (LIVE, INV Part D2).
It carries guest sizing, `pve_storage[]`, and an app half with per-app `storage_bindings`.
**[FACT] The Escrow exists and is zero-knowledge.** `host_escrow`: 2 rows, `posture` `zero_knowledge`;
the identity bundle's shape is `{tunnel_token, pbs_token, wg_private_key, restic_repo_password}`
(`felhom-agent/internal/escrow/identity.go:26-39`).
**[FACT] Three parts of the Recipe are empty or wrong on the live fleet**, and they are exactly the
parts a host-loss recovery would read (INV Part D2.3): `hosts.dr_record_json` is `{}` on all three
hosts; `host_escrow.directive_json` is `{}` on both escrowed hosts; `dr_recipe.host_half.drives` is
`[]` on every customer including two with enrolled data drives; and `dr_recipe.host_half.pbs.namespace`
reads `"root"` while the real namespaces are `demo-felhom` / `demo-hp`. → **R-105**, **R-106**.
---
## 5. Encryption policy (D2)
**[DESIGN] Encryption follows the boundary, not the tier.**
### On the customer's own premises: plaintext
Tier-1 recovery units, Tier-2 cross-drive copies, the app data on the drives, and the local vzdump
archives on the host are **unencrypted, deliberately**.
The reasoning, recorded so nobody "hardens" this later:
1. **It buys nothing against a real threat.** Someone who can take the second drive can take the
first. Local encryption defends against a threat model — physical theft of *only* the backup
medium — that does not describe a home server where both media sit in the same box.
2. **It adds a key-loss path that turns a working backup into a brick.** Every local encryption key
is one more thing that must survive the disaster it exists for, and the system already has one
such dependency it is trying to reduce (§7).
3. **It would break browsing, which is a feature.** FileBrowser and SMB let the household see and
use their own files. An encrypted local copy is not browsable, and the „Megosztás" and
FileBrowser surfaces are part of the product, not an accident.
**[FACT]** The local plaintext posture is real and verifiable: `dir: local` in `/etc/pve/storage.cfg`
carries no `encryption-key` (LIVE, both hosts), so the daily whole-guest archive is a plain
`.tar.zst` — 5.93 GB on demo-felhom, 1.68 GB on demo-hp (LIVE, INV Part B.3). **That archive is the
single highest-value object on the box**: it contains `encryption.key`, the restic `repo_password`,
the offbox `ssh_key`, `settings.json` and `controller.yaml` (all under `/var/lib/docker` = `mp0`,
`backup=1`). Naming that plainly is part of the policy, not an argument against it.
### Leaving the premises: encrypted, and the provider must not be able to read it
**[FACT]** Both offsite tiers encrypt client-side:
- **restic (Tier-3):** repo password is a 256-bit hex value generated once on the box and never
logged (`internal/backup/offbox.go:392-410`); restic is invoked with
`RESTIC_PASSWORD_FILE` (`:608`).
- **PBS (whole-guest offsite):** `/etc/pve/storage.cfg` carries a **per-customer** `encryption-key`
and the fingerprints differ between demo-felhom and demo-hp (LIVE). The live restore command line
observed on demo-felhom carries `--crypt-mode=encrypt` (INV Part A.2.3). Per-tenant encryption is
why cross-customer dedup is impossible on the shared datastore — a cost consequence, recorded, not
a defect.
### The one exception, stated because it is not covered by either rule
**[FACT]** The `.fab` bundle writes `app.yaml` with **decrypted plaintext secrets, deliberately**,
and its password is **optional** (`internal/appexport/export.go:484,506-511`; the generated file's
first line is literally `# Exported by felhom-controller — plaintext secrets`, `:531`;
`Encrypted: req.Password != ""`, `:307`). A `.fab` can also be written to a registered **network**
share, because `storageDriveList()` does not filter network paths
(`internal/web/handler_export.go:377-387`). This is a portability artifact, not a tier — but it is
the one place where a customer action can put every secret of one app onto a NAS in plaintext.
Recorded here so the encryption policy is not read as covering it. → **R-108** (same root cause).
---
## 6. The tiers — what each captures
The tiers are **inputs to recovery**, not recovery routes. §7 and §8 say what they can actually do.
**[RULING 2026-09-16, operator] Tier 3 (off-site) is ON for every new customer — shared, 100 GB soft
quota.** Opting a customer out stays the per-customer exception, as DR-tier-by-default has been since
2026-07-12. **The reason is this document's own [FACT] two sections down:** the whole-guest tiers do
not carry `mp8 /mnt/felhom-drives`, and a Tier-1 unit has no file leg — so for the four class-A apps
a one-drive box with Tier 3 off keeps the household's files in NO tier at all. That was measured on a
fresh box the same day: five photos put into Nextcloud, deleted, restored from the box's own backup,
and none of them opened (`audits/DRILL-prove-fixes-0243-2026-09-16.md`, R-537/R-538). Implemented in
hub v0.116.0 (`handleConfigNewForm`). **What this ruling does NOT change: what any tier captures.**
**The app update's safety precondition accepts ANY tier** (operator ruling 2026-09-13, controller
v0.239.0, R-475): the first fresh copy in the order Tier 2, Tier 1, Tier 3; with none, it backs up
first. Design: `09-update-architecture.md` §3 decision 8. **What a Tier-1 route back restores is only
what the unit holds** — for an app whose data is a bind mount that is the definition, not the data
(R-479). **Removal and the tiers (controller v0.240.0):** removing an app with its backups KEPT keeps
the unit, the Tier-2 mirror AND the Tier-2 record, so „Teljes visszaállítás" still works afterwards
(R-486); „Mentési adatok törlése" deletes the unit, every mirror and the app's backup preferences, and
never touches off-site snapshots (R-474). A removed app whose unit was kept is listed on both local backup pages with its restore since controller v0.242.0 (R-487): **the local lists are keyed on the drives, not on what is deployed** — the rule R-237 set for the off-site list — and the restore opens the unit where it sits, a data drive included. **For a bind-data app the update's tier order is second drive → off-site → own unit (R-479, v0.241.0), because the unit does not hold the files.**
### 6.1 The four tiers, as configured on the live fleet
| Tier | Location | Captures | Cadence (LIVE) | Retention (LIVE) | Encrypted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| **Tier-1** recovery unit | `<nsRoot>/backups/primary/<app>/` on the app's own drive | compose + `.felhom.yml` + **secret-stripped** `app.yaml`, `db-dumps/*.sql`, `volume-dumps/*.tar`, `manifest.json` | nightly at W, plus a checksum-gated refresh on the periodic status pass | one point per app (`restore_points.go:14-18`) | no |
| **Tier-2** cross-drive | `<target nsRoot>/backups/secondary/<app>/` | **always** a full mirror of the unit (`tier2.go:368-369`) **plus** `mandatory + optional` file legs, v2 layout `hdd/<rel>` + `userdata/<rel>` | nightly at W+60m | mirror (rsync) | no |
| **Tier-3** restic offsite | Hetzner Storage Box over SFTP, one multi-path snapshot per app per run | the unit **plus** `mandatory` legs only; a separate `_shares` snapshot | nightly at W+105m | `--keep-daily 7 --keep-weekly 4 --keep-monthly 6` | **yes** (restic) |
| **Plane-2** whole-guest, local | `local:` → `/var/lib/vz/dump` on the host | rootfs + `mp0 /var/lib/docker` + `mp1 /mnt/sys_drive` | **24 h** (`backup_cadence_seconds: 0`) | `local_backup_retention: 3` | **no** |
| **Plane-2** whole-guest, offsite | `felhom-pbs:` → ep0 datastore `felhom-offsite`, per-customer namespace, over WireGuard | same contents | **7 days** (`604800`) | server-side prune on ep0, `keep-last 2` at `03:30` — **and the box asks for none** (R-191) | **yes** (per-customer key) |
> **[FACT] Tier-3 has a fifth state the table above does not show: PAUSED (R-543, controller
> v0.245.0).** Off-site is ON by default from hub v0.116.0, and a run does not start until the
> household has performed the escrow ceremony — `tier3State` calls this `escrow_pending` and the page
> says „Kulcsletétre vár". **This is the design, not a defect:** the escrow is zero-knowledge (§2),
> the household's recovery code is the only key, and a run started without one would write a copy
> nobody could ever open. What was wrong until v0.245.0 is that **nothing asked the household for the
> code**, so a fresh box could sit paused indefinitely while its Tier-1 row promised that the off-site
> copy protected the app's files. Since v0.245.0 every dashboard page carries the reminder (the R-241
> bar, second instance) and the Tier-1 sentence renders by state — „védené … szünetel" while paused.
> Measured on a fresh box 2026-09-16: zero snapshots, and the page said the files were protected.
> **R-191 (2026-08-04) — this row was RIGHT and the configuration disagreed with it, weekly, for as long as R-89 has been in force.** The contract has not changed: offsite retention is ep0's, the box's token is write-only, and the box cannot delete its own history. What had not followed was the installer's `keep_last: 2` on the offsite tier, so every weekly run uploaded its snapshot successfully and then failed the whole JOB on a prune the token is refused — `whole_guest_backup_failed` in the operator's inbox about a backup that had already succeeded. Fixed in installer **1.25.0** (`keep_last: 0`) and on both live boxes; a gate now asserts it. **Verified before changing it:** ep0's two prune jobs have run every day since 2026-07-27, 18 tasks, all OK. A doc that states the contract does not enforce it — the gate does.
**[FACT]** The three nightly legs derive from **one** customer-settable window start W at fixed
offsets — db-dump at W, Tier-2 at W+60m, offsite at W+105m — so they can never be misordered
(`cmd/controller/main.go:604-607`). Both boxes run W = `02:30`.
**[FACT] What the whole-guest tiers do NOT carry.** `mp8 /mnt/felhom-drives` and
`mp9 /etc/felhom-bootstrap` are **host bind mounts** and are out of `vzdump` scope entirely (LIVE
`pct config 9201`, both hosts). So the whole-guest tiers carry the guest and **none of the customer's
data drives** — 916 GB on demo-felhom, 938 GB on demo-hp.
### 6.2 Coverage per app class — and an unresolved count
**[FACT]** Of 53 catalog templates, **52 keep data in Docker named volumes**; exactly **13** carry a
`backup:` block, and those 13 are exactly the templates that bind `${HDD_PATH}` / `${USERDATA_PATH}` /
`${IMPORT_PATH}` at all; **14** have a database service (INV Part B.1, computed against catalog
`4252121`).
Applying the classifier's documented two-level default (`internal/appbackup/classify.go`: explicit
entry wins; else a `:ro` reader is *excluded*; else a writable bind is *mandatory*):
| tier filter | templates with at least one file leg |
|---|---|
| **Tier-3** (`mandatory` only) | **4** — calibre-web, immich, nextcloud, paperless-ngx |
| **Tier-2** (`mandatory + optional`) | **7** — the 4 above plus audiobookshelf, komga, romm |
| legacy resolver path (apps with no block) | **0** — no non-block template binds a namespace path |
> ### ✔ RESOLVED 2026-08-31 (controller v0.229.0) — **A = 7 · B = 45 · C = 1**
>
> | source | count | verdict |
> |---|---|---|
> | C9-F1 Phase 0, as shipped | **A = 9 / B = 43 / C = 1** — `felhom.eu/REPORT.md:17-24` (since overwritten), restated `backlog/OPEN-ITEMS.md:31` | **WRONG by two apps** |
> | INV Part B.1, independent enumeration at catalog `4252121` | **A = 7 / B = 45 / C = 1** | **CORRECT** |
> | Measured at catalogue `459766cb16395fd1d1a66282f5cc6da59ead5924`, 2026-08-31 | **A = 7 / B = 45 / C = 1** | adopted |
>
> **The method, so it can be re-run rather than re-argued.** A throwaway `main` inside the controller
> module drove the PRODUCTION rule over all 53 template directories — `stacks.LoadMetadata` (the single
> validation choke point, so a rejected `backup:` block degrades to legacy exactly as it does live) →
> `stacks.ParseComposeClassifiableBinds` → `appbackup.ClassifyBinds` → `appbackup.ComputeCaptureSet` at
> `TierSecondary`, with the legacy branch falling back to `AppDataBindsPresent` + `AppDataDirNames` as
> `backup.tier2CaptureSet` does. **A = at least one leg survives that pipeline.** 13 templates carry a
> valid `backup:` block; 40 are legacy and none of them binds a namespace path, so all 40 are B or C.
>
> **A (7):** audiobookshelf, calibre-web, immich, komga, nextcloud, paperless-ngx, romm.
> **C (1):** bentopdf — it declares no `volumes:` key and no `${…_PATH}` bind at all.
> **B (45):** everything else.
>
> **How the earlier disagreement arose, established rather than guessed.** Phase 0's own write-up
> (controller `CHANGELOG.md`, v0.183.0) says four apps — plex, jellyfin, emby, navidrome — are in B
> "only because their single bind is a `:ro` media mount, which `ClassifyBinds` correctly excludes". It
> applied the `:ro` **default** rule. The two apps it therefore missed are **radarr and sonarr**: their
> `${USERDATA_PATH}/media/*` and `${USERDATA_PATH}/downloads` binds are **writable**, so the `:ro` rule
> does not reach them, and they are excluded by an **explicit** `class: excluded` entry instead. 9 − 2 =
> 7 and 43 + 2 = 45, which is exactly the gap. No catalogue file was changed; this is a measurement.
**[FACT] The class-B consequence is real regardless of which count is right.** For an app whose data
lives entirely in named volumes, the Tier-2 copy holds a full `recovery-unit/` and **no readable
leg** — LIVE on demo-felhom, `backups/secondary/bookstack/` and `.../docmost/` contain
`recovery-unit` and nothing else, at 156 MB and 86 MB (INV Part B.2). Since v0.183.0 the button
refuses **before** stopping the app and names the action that works.
### 6.3 Where capture and restore disagree
**[FACT]** Three asymmetries, each source-cited:
| tier | captured | read back by that tier's restore | gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tier-1 | unit incl. volume tars + DB dumps | all of it | none |
| Tier-2 | unit mirror **+** file legs | the file restore reads `hdd/` and `userdata/`; **since controller v0.218.0's Tier-3 sibling and now v0.229.0, a SECOND action reads the unit mirror itself** (`RestoreTier2Unit` → `RestoreFromRecoveryUnitAt`, `tier2_restore.go`) | **CLOSED — R-102** |
| Tier-3 | unit (incl. volume tars) + mandatory legs | files + DB replay **+ the named-volume tars, replayed from the scratch unit** (`offbox_reconstitute.go` `volReplay`, controller **v0.218.0**); the unit itself is still **skipped** on the way to live (`offbox_reconstitute.go:284-289`; placed only if the live unit is absent, `offbox_restore.go:352-356`) | **CLOSED — R-107** |
**[FACT] 2026-08-22 — the Tier-3 row above was corrected; the Tier-2 row was NOT.** Until controller
**v0.218.0** this table said *"no offsite action unpacks the named-volume tars it captures"*, and that
was true from the day Tier-3 shipped until 2026-08-21. **R-107 closed in v0.218.0**: `volReplay`
(`offbox_reconstitute.go`) replays the scratch unit's `volume-dumps/` into the live named volumes,
proven live on `demo-hp`. The old sentence is kept here, in the past tense, because a correction that
erases what was believed leaves the next reader no way to tell a fixed gap from one that was never
noticed.
**[FACT] 2026-08-31 — the Tier-2 half is now closed too (R-102, controller v0.229.0), and the old
sentence is kept here in the past tense for the reason the paragraph above gives.** Until v0.229.0 this
table said of Tier-2: *"the unit mirror is read by nothing — `RecoveryUnitPath` resolves to
`backups/primary/` (`appbackup/paths.go:46-48`)"*, and that was true from the day Tier-2 shipped until
2026-08-31. The mechanism was a hard-coded `primary` segment: every reader of a recovery unit could
only name a path under it. `appbackup` now also exposes four **unit-directory-relative** primitives,
`Manager.RestoreFromRecoveryUnitAt(stack, unitDir)` holds the restore body, and `RestoreTier2Unit`
points it at `<dest>/backups/secondary/<app>/recovery-unit/`. Proven live on `demo-hp` **with the
primary unit moved aside** — `audits/DRILL-r102-tier2-unit-2026-08-31/`.
**Two things did NOT change, and both are load-bearing.** THE SOURCE MOVED; THE DESTINATION DID NOT —
data still lands in the live named volumes and the live database container. And the FILE restore's
reach is unchanged: `CanRestore()` still answers only "are there file legs?", and
`tier2UnitNotCoveredMsg` is still appended where that restore runs, so a clean file result never reads
as a clean bill of health for the database.
**[FACT]** Tier-2's gap was the sharper one because of *when* it bit: Tier-2 exists for the case
where the primary drive is lost — and in exactly that case the primary unit is gone while this
mirror survives on the second drive. Until v0.229.0 it was unreachable by any customer action.
**[FACT] 2026-08-23 — taking the undo copy used to DESTROY the app's own database backup (R-361).**
`writeSafetyDump` called `DumpOne` into the app's own unit directory and renamed the result to
`pre-restore-*` afterwards. `DumpOne` writes `<stack>-<dbtype>.sql` — the app's canonical dump, the
name the replay loop matches exactly — so **every safety dump overwrote the app's real backup and then
moved it away**, leaving the app with no database backup of its own until the next nightly run. A local
restore-from-unit in that window finds no `.sql` and tells the customer the app never had a database.
The comment beside it asserted the rename meant it *"can never overwrite the app's real dump"*; it was
false as written and stood for four months. **Measured before the fix on `demo-hp` 2026-08-22:**
`docmost` and `bookstack` each held only `pre-restore-*` files and no canonical dump.
Fixed in controller **v0.221.0**: `DumpOneTo` takes an explicit final path and derives its own `.tmp`
from it, so neither the destination nor the scratch file can collide with a nightly dump running
beside it. **Proven the only way it can be** — the canonical dump's sha256, unchanged across a
restore, on both engines.
**[DESIGN] 2026-08-23 — `db_dumps` lists the app's OWN dumps, not the undo copies.** They are local
material for a restore that went wrong, not part of the app's recovery set: nothing reads them from
the manifest, and three per app were being pushed off-site permanently for no recovery value. The
files are neither deleted nor hidden — their visibility is a separate recorded decision and it stands.
**One consequence, recorded because it bit within minutes:** a stable `db_dumps` lets
`CaptureRecoveryUnit`'s already-current early return fire, so anything that must happen on every
capture — such as bounding the undo copies — has to sit ABOVE that check, not after it.
**[DESIGN] 2026-08-22 — the failure ladder of a database restore: replay → rollback → hold.**
Recorded here rather than only in a closed register row, because a decision that survives only inside
a closed work item is a decision nobody will find.
1. **Replay.** The snapshot's `.sql` is imported into the app's database, with only the DB service up
(R-47). A pre-restore copy of the LIVE database was taken first and is on disk (R-43); the restore
refuses outright if it could not be taken.
2. **Rollback (controller v0.220.0, R-379).** If the replay fails, the product re-applies that undo
copy itself. **The whole set for this run** — an app with two databases gets two undo files, and
restoring only the first would leave the other half-written — matched on **the run's own stamp**,
never on the `pre-restore-` prefix, because several runs' copies coexist in the same directory. It
runs with the DB service still up and before any restart, so the app never observes the half
state, and into a **re-discovered** container: the DB-only start re-creates it, so the id captured
at dump time is dead by rollback time (v0.220.1, found by the first live run). The app then starts
and the customer is told **both** that the restore failed and that their data is as it was.
3. **Hold (v0.220.0, operator ruling 2026-08-22).** If the rollback ALSO fails, the app is **held
stopped**, not started. A running app on a half-written database lets the customer type into it and
makes the damage permanent. The hold is persisted, every start path refuses it with a reason and a
route, the app-stop marker is ended so nothing auto-restarts it at the next boot, and the app reads
**red** rather than green. An operator clears it with `--clear-restore-hold`, which requires a
controller restart.
**Why a rollback and not an engine flag.** Postgres gained `--single-transaction` in the same release
and that does make its replay all-or-nothing — but **MariaDB's DDL is not transactional**, so a
partial apply there is unavoidable at the engine. Measured 2026-08-22: the same truncated dump left
Postgres emptied and crash-looping, and left MariaDB with its user data intact, its schema-version
table wiped to zero rows, and the app reporting `health=healthy, running=true, restarts=0`. The flag
is a belt; the rollback is the fix. **R-379, R-380.** Evidence:
`audits/DRILL-r379-rollback-2026-08-22/`.
**[DESIGN] 2026-08-22 — the restore destination is resolved by the same rule as the capture
destination.** The drive if the app declares one (`HDD_PATH`), the system data path otherwise —
`Manager.GetAppDrivePath`, one expression, used by `CaptureRecoveryUnit` and, since controller
**v0.219.0**, by `ReconstituteFromOffsite` and `PlaceOffsiteRestore` too.
**[FACT] 2026-09-01 — the rule now has a FOURTH consumer and the "one expression" sentence is
true (R-414, controller v0.232.0).** `offboxRestoreScratchDir` — where a restore is UNPACKED, as
distinct from where it LANDS — never consulted `systemDataPath`, so on a box with no registered
storage path it refused, and the nightly proof could not run at all. **It was not excluded on
purpose:** R-356's own commit (`08eb1a6`) records in its tests that *"the prepared scratch still
resolves to the registered storage path … only the DESTINATION moves"* — it was out of scope, and
every fixture assumed a registered path exists. The one comment about a `systemDataPath` fallback
belonged to `PlaceOffsiteRestore`, concerned bulk **userdata**, and R-356 deliberately overruled it.
**But the fallback is SCOPED, and the scoping is the point.** The two callers ask different
questions, and one predicate answering both is R-356's own defect: a **unit-only** restore (the
R-87 proof) may fall back to the system data path, because §7 records as `[FACT]` that a driveless
app's unit already lives there indefinitely and that the same-device placement is *"intended, not
a defect"*; a **full** restore keeps the R-252 refusal, because it pulls the app's bulk userdata
onto what §2.2 makes a **state-only** tier.
The refusal that protects a drive app from being restored onto the wrong disk (R-253, R-351) applies
to apps that **have a drive to get wrong**. It used to be reached by testing `HDD_PATH == ""`, which
also answered "is this app installed?" — one predicate for two questions. Measured in the catalogue at
`459766cb1639`: **53 templates, 13 declare `needs_hdd: true`, 40 declare `false`**, so for 40 apps that
test was permanently true and the off-site restore refused them forever, while they were running,
with a message telling the customer to reinstall them "in the same place" — a place those apps never
offer. **An app with no drive is not misconfigured** (§8 of `01-topology-and-trust.md` carries the
`[DESIGN]` marker); it is the majority case.
Since v0.219.0 the two questions are asked separately: *installed?* of `ListDeployedStacks()`, failing
CLOSED when there is no provider to ask; *where?* of `GetAppDrivePath`. A third refusal, with its own
sentence, covers installed-but-no-resolvable-data-root. **R-356**; reasoning also recorded in
`felhom-controller/CONTEXT.md`.
---
### 6.4 The customer's page speaks per tier, and a tier without storage is skipped (2026-09-15)
**What the page may claim** (controller v0.243.0 + agent v0.131.0, R-517). The whole-system tile used
to show the agent's single latest record — so a failed 0-byte PBS attempt read „Naprakész" and ticked
„Távoli rendszermentés — külön hardveren" (BIGNIGHT 2026-09-14). Now `GET /backup/status` returns per
tier the newest **success**, the last **attempt** kept apart, and whether the tier's storage exists.
The page shows each tier's newest success; a failed attempt under it as „sikertelen"; a tier whose
storage does not exist as „nincs beállítva". „Naprakész" and the remote tick are computed from
successes only. After an agent restart the success is read back from the tier's storage (size unknown).
**What a run may do** (R-518, cheap half). A tier the agent reports `storage: absent` is dropped before
anything is stopped, logged, and reported once as `backup_tier_skipped`; `unknown` is never skipped.
**Still open:** quiescing per tier, so a slow second tier does not keep every app down.
## 7. The recovery chain (D3) — the reason this document exists
**[DESIGN] 3-2-1 describes copies. It does not describe recovery.**
Three copies on two media with one offsite is a statement about *bytes surviving*. It says nothing
about whether the bytes can be turned back into a working system, and a system can satisfy 3-2-1
completely while having no executable recovery route for a given failure. That is not a hypothetical
here — §8 has rows where it is the actual state.
### 7.0 What a customer can and cannot do ALONE — the four steps the drill found
> **[FACT] Added 2026-08-05.** The 2026-08-04 R-201 drill (`audits/DRILL-r201-night-run-2026-08-04.md`)
> is the first end-to-end proof that a customer's file survives a machine rebuild and comes back
> byte-identical. **It passed with an operator present, and four manual interventions stood between
> "the key is recoverable" and "the file is back" — none of which was in any design document.** They
> are recorded here because this is the section a future reader will use to answer *"can the customer
> do this alone?"*, and until 2026-08-05 the answer was no for reasons nothing wrote down.
| # | The step | Why it stopped a customer | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | **The reset code was refused on the first try** | `--print-reset-code` runs as a SEPARATE process (`docker exec`); it persists a new code while the running controller keeps the old one in its cache, so the code the customer is told to type never matches. **The controller had to be restarted in between**, which nothing said. Two attempts failed during the drill before that was worked out. | **CLOSED — controller v0.198.0** (R-204 item 1). `effectiveClaimCode` reads through to the persisted state. Read-through, not a TTL: a TTL would leave a window in which a superseded code still works. Fails closed on an unreadable state. Proven live on demo-felhom 9201 with nothing restarted. |
| 2 | **Re-issuing the off-site credential marked the recovery escrow "stale"** | A stale escrow withholds `restic_pw_sha256` from the report ACK → the controller's auto-confirm cannot flip `pending→escrowed` → `OffboxRunnable()` is false → **every off-site backup refused**. The customer is then told to re-run the recovery ceremony, **which is the one act that would have destroyed the key just recovered.** The repository password had not changed at all. | **CLOSED — hub v0.95.0** (R-204 item 2 / R-196). The precautionary mark is gone. The real case is measured by the controller's Scenario-F hash re-check each ACK — which the mark was BLINDING by emptying that very hash — and by R-197's `offsite_repo_key_changed` at a supersession. |
| 3 | **The restore's default returned the wrong thing, silently** | `mode=unit` restores the recovery unit — the app's definition, configuration and database dumps — and **not the customer's files**; the userdata in the same snapshot is excluded by `--include`. The outcome message was one sentence for both modes and named neither scope. On the last step of a disaster recovery, the default quietly did not do what the person asked. | **CLOSED — controller v0.198.0** (R-204 item 3). The unit outcome names what came back, what did not, and the step that gets it; the wizard's intent card states its scope before the choice. **The size gate on `mode=full` is untouched**, and the default stays `unit`. |
| 4 | **A rebuilt box cannot obtain an off-site credential unaided** | The one-time provider password was spent by its predecessor, so the rebuilt guest has nothing to authenticate with and an **operator Re-issue** was required. | **CLOSED — controller v0.199.0 + hub v0.96.0** (2026-08-05, operator ruling: automate it, and **the trigger is a state the BOX DECLARES**). The box now reports `offsite.state=needs_credential` when two local facts hold together — a fresh data area AND a hub-held recovery package — and the hub's `internal/offsiteheal` re-arms the stored one-time secret, minting only when there is nothing to re-arm. **Deliberately NOT automated: the escrow ceremony.** A credential is replaceable; the recovery code is not. |
> **[FACT] The honest current answer, updated 2026-08-05 (controller v0.200.0): all four are gone AND
> the customer is now offered the recovery.** A full-page screen meets the owner of a rebuilt box while
> the hub holds a sealed package the box cannot open: it explains the situation, says plainly that
> **nobody can replace a lost recovery code**, takes the code, opens the repository and **lists what is
> in it** — apps, dates, sizes. No step requires an operator, and no step requires a command line.
>
> **WHERE THAT STOPS, and it is a real stop.** The screen **unlocks and only unlocks**. It restores
> nothing. Putting files back is per-app, lives in the backups area, and the step after the listing —
> a customer seeing what would change before anything is overwritten — is **not built** (→ R-213). A
> screen that unlocks and then offers to overwrite is two decisions wearing one button, which is why
> the operator ruled them separate.
>
> **What is still owed as evidence:** the final unlock has never been driven with a CORRECT code
> through the page (no code was kept for demo-felhom's orphaned history; demo-hp's is operator-held),
> so the live run exercised handler → agent → hub fetch → age KDF and stopped at the unseal. **And the
> whole journey has not been re-walked end to end since these fixes** — the closures are proven
> individually, not as one uninterrupted run. That re-walk is one more drill.
>
> **WHY THE TRIGGER FOR STEP 4 IS A DECLARATION, recorded here because it is the design and not an
> implementation detail:** from the hub, an ABSENT off-site object means *never configured*,
> *mid-restart*, *a transient config read failure* OR *rebuilt and stranded*, and the hub cannot
> distinguish them. The BOX can, from two local facts it holds with certainty. So the box states its
> condition and the hub acts on a stated request — never on a silence. Both facts are required:
> freshness alone is a box that never had off-site backups, and an escrow alone is a healthy box.
>
> **The split that is deliberate and must not be widened: CREDENTIAL AUTOMATIC, KEY CUSTOMER-PRESENT.**
> A credential is transport and is replaceable; the recovery code is not, because only the customer
> holds it. Nothing in this chain runs, or asks for, an escrow ceremony.
### 7.1 The dependency graph
> **[FACT] SUPERSEDED IN PART BY D5 — SHIPPED 2026-07-30 (controller v0.188.0).** Leg 1 below
> (**secrets**) is **no longer true for Tier-1 and Tier-2**: the local recovery unit now carries the
> portable secret class, so those two tiers need the **drive and nothing else**. The graph and leg 1
> are kept as written because they are the model everything downstream was derived from, and because
> leg 2 (**the living app**) is unchanged and still binds Tier-2's file leg and Tier-3. Read §7.4 for
> the current chain; the corrected rows are 3, 4 and 9 in §8.
**[FACT — as of the R-108 survey, before D5]** Every app-tier restore depends on the guest, for one of
two reasons:
```
┌──────────────────────────────────────────┐
│ the LIVE GUEST │
│ · settings.json (tier-2 destination) │
│ · encryption.key (32 B) │
│ · app.yaml (ENC: under that key) │
│ · the deployed app itself │
└───────────┬──────────────────────────────┘
│ required by
┌──────────────────────────┼──────────────────────────┬─────────────────────┐
│ │ │ │
Tier-1 restore Tier-2 restore Tier-3 reconstitute Tier-3 scratch
(rebuild the app) (fill in files) (overwrite + replay) (verification copy)
│ │ │ │
needs SECRETS needs the app needs the app needs only the
from app.yaml running + the deployed + a DB repo password
(restore_unit.go recorded dest service identifiable (also in the guest)
:130-132) (tier2_restore.go
:114-116)
│ │ │ │
└──────────────────────────┴──────────────────────────┴─────────────────────┘
│
┌───────────▼──────────────────────────────┐
│ WHOLE-GUEST TIER (local vzdump / PBS) │ ← Lane 2, operator only
└───────────┬──────────────────────────────┘
│ required by
┌───────────▼──────────────────────────────┐
│ THE HOST (agent.json, bootstrap.json, │ ← in NO backup at all
│ vmbr9, sudoers, /etc/pve/priv, WG) │ (INV Part D1)
└──────────────────────────────────────────┘
```
**[FACT] The two legs of the dependency, precisely:**
1. **Secrets.** The recovery unit is secret-free by design — *"It NEVER writes a secret value"*
(`internal/backup/recovery_unit.go:73`). `RestoreFromRecoveryUnit` recovers secrets **from the
guest, never from the unit** (`restore_unit.go:130-132`), and the policy is stated outright at
`:18-22`: *"Regenerate NOTHING… A missing DATA-ENCRYPTING key is FATAL: regenerating it would
render the restored data unreadable, so we refuse and tell the operator to do a PBS whole-guest
restore."* Those secrets are encrypted under `encryption.key`, a 32-byte file that exists **only
inside the guest** (LIVE, both boxes — INV Part C, row 9).
2. **The living app.** Tier-2's restore reads the destination recorded in the guest's `settings.json`
(`tier2_restore.go:114-116`), and Tier-3's reconstitution refuses outright when the app is not
deployed — *„a(z) %s nincs telepítve — előbb állítsd helyre az alkalmazást, utána az adatokat"*
(`offbox_reconstitute.go:198-201`).
**[FACT] So all three app tiers are conditioned on the whole-guest tier**, which is Lane 2. The
customer's own recovery lane rests on an operator-only tier, and today nothing tells the customer
that. — **This sentence was the reason D5 exists. It is now false for Tier-1 and Tier-2; see §7.4.**
### 7.4 The chain AFTER D5 (controller v0.188.0, 2026-07-30) — the current model
**[FACT] Tier-1 and Tier-2 no longer depend on the whole-guest tier.** The unit's `compose/app.yaml`
(mode 0600) carries the **portable secret class** — every catalog `type: secret` field, i.e. the
declared `data_key`s, the 18 DB/root passwords and the internal signing secrets — so neither
`encryption.key` nor the guest's `app.yaml` is required to rebuild an app:
```
Tier-1 restore Tier-2 restore Tier-3 reconstitute Tier-3 scratch
(rebuild the app) (fill in files) (overwrite + replay) (verification copy)
│ │ │ │
needs ONLY THE DRIVE needs the app needs the app needs only the
(unit carries the running + the deployed + a DB repo password
secrets; guest is recorded dest service identifiable
consulted only for
the withheld class) └────────── still conditioned on the guest (leg 2, unchanged) ──────┘
│
✅ INDEPENDENT of the whole-guest tier
```
**[FACT] What still needs the guest, precisely** — so this is not read as more than it is:
1. **Leg 2 is untouched.** Tier-2's *file* restore still reads the destination from the guest's
`settings.json` (`tier2_restore.go:114-116`) and Tier-3's reconstitution still refuses when the app
is not deployed (`offbox_reconstitute.go:198-201`). D5 removed the **secrets** leg, not the
**living-app** leg. So "Tier-2 no longer depends on the guest" is true of the *unit-restore* path it
shares with Tier-1, and **false** of its additive file-merge path.
2. **The withheld class.** The 7 `type: password` admin logins and `vaultwarden/ADMIN_TOKEN` are
deliberately NOT on the drive; they come from the guest, or are regenerated (O4). Their absence
costs a credential reset, never data.
3. **The fail-closed gate remains.** A `data_key` in neither the unit nor the guest still refuses the
restore outright. D5 makes it normally present; it does not soften the gate.
**[DESIGN] Why plaintext is the right answer here, and what it is coupled to.** Every travelling secret
either decrypts data on the *same drive* or authenticates to a container on an internal compose network
with no external listener — so possessing it adds nothing to possessing the drive, which is exactly D2's
argument for keeping the DATA plaintext. That argument holds **only because** the internet-reachable
class is withheld. **The exclusion is what licenses the plaintext; the two must not be relaxed
independently.** `stacks.PortableSecretEnvVars` is the single boundary, with a code-level
`nonPortableSecrets` register (not a catalog flag — a boundary a catalog push can move is not a
boundary, cf. R-97a).
**[FACT] Precedence, because two sources now exist.** The **unit wins** over the guest. Not
"newest wins": the unit's secrets are captured in the same run as the dumps beside them, so the unit's
value matches *the data being restored*, whereas the guest's is merely the most recent. Preferring the
guest is the data-loss bug — a rotated data key does not decrypt data encrypted with the old one, and a
rotated DB password does not match the hash inside the restored data directory.
**[FACT] Proven live 2026-07-30**, on a scratch drill guest, through the real endpoints: AdventureLog
(`SECRET_KEY` data_key + `DB_PASSWORD`) restored with the guest's `app.yaml` **moved aside** —
`secrets recovered=2/2`, 27.6 s — and then **the application itself read the seeded customer row over
TCP with its own credential**, which is the observable that matters (a restore that returns success onto
unreadable data is a failure that looks like a pass). The discriminator held: the pre-backup row came
back, a row added *after* the backup was gone, so the volume tar was genuinely restored. There was **no
`.sql` dump** in that unit, so the DB came back from the volume tar — the exact case where a regenerated
password would have failed. Separately, Grafana's `type: password` admin login was proven **withheld**:
the sentinel value was live in the container and encrypted in the guest, and appeared in **0 files**
anywhere under the backup namespace. Full record: `audits/D5-drive-alone-restore-2026-07-30.md`.
### 7.2 A tier whose prerequisites cannot be met in the failure it exists for
**[FACT]** Two instances, both current:
- **~~Tier-2 vs primary-drive loss~~ — CLOSED 2026-08-31, controller v0.229.0 (R-102).** Tier-2's
stated purpose is surviving the loss of the primary drive. It was true until v0.229.0 that in that
failure the primary recovery unit is gone while the surviving mirror on the second drive —
`backups/secondary/<app>/recovery-unit/` — was read by **no code path** (§6.3), so for the **45**
class-B apps (§6.2, count settled the same day) the restore was a guaranteed no-op in exactly its
designed scenario.
**Tier-2 can now meet its prerequisite in the failure it exists for**, and that is stated plainly
because it is the whole point: the restore was run on `demo-hp` **with the primary unit moved aside**
and returned 3 volumes of 3 and 1 database of 1 in 28.65 s, byte-for-byte, with the app then reading
its own row over TCP with its own credential — and again with the guest's `app.yaml` also moved
aside, `secrets recovered=2/2` from the mirrored unit. Evidence:
`audits/DRILL-r102-tier2-unit-2026-08-31/`.
**What the drill did NOT cover, stated per §8 below:** the full drive-loss journey — a genuinely
absent or replaced physical drive — was not run. Only the recovery-unit half was.
- **Tier-3 vs guest loss — HALF of this closed.** Tier-3 holds the volume tars and the DB dump. It
was true until controller v0.218.0 that the tars were unpacked only by the Tier-1 path; since
v0.218.0 the reconstitution replays them itself (`volReplay`) → **R-107 CLOSED 2026-08-22**. What
is **still** true, and is the part that was never R-107: reconstitution requires the app to be
**deployed** and skips the unit, so offsite alone cannot rebuild an app onto a fresh guest. That
requirement is a deliberate decision (R-253) — the restore does not choose a customer's drive for
them — and since **v0.219.0** it means only what it says: an app that is not deployed. It no longer
catches the 40 driveless apps → **R-356**.
### 7.3 ~~What D5 would change — and why it was blocked~~ — **D5 SHIPPED 2026-07-30 (v0.188.0)**
> **This section is history.** D5 is implemented and proven live; the current chain is **§7.4**. Kept
> because the reasoning below is why the precondition was required, and because the last paragraph
> (`.fab` / R-126) is still open and still not part of D5.
>
> **One correction to the target as stated below.** It assumed the class that must travel is the
> `data_key`-flagged secrets. Part 0 of the D5 task tested that and it did not survive: the flag is
> unreliable (four encryption keys the catalog itself labels as such are unflagged → **R-127**), and a
> DB password is **not resettable in practice** — `POSTGRES_PASSWORD` is ignored once PGDATA is
> non-empty, so a regenerated value leaves the app unable to authenticate against its own restored rows
> while the dump replay still reports success. The shipped boundary is therefore *all* `type: secret`
> minus the register, not `data_key` alone.
**[DESIGN, TARGET — SUPERSEDED BY §7.4]** The intended fix is to make app secrets travel with the **local**
recovery unit, so Tier-1 and Tier-2 restore work **without the guest and without R**. Offsite
already encrypts everything, so secrets travelling offsite would be covered by the escrowed repo
password. R would then be required for **offsite recovery and host identity only** — losing R would
cost the offsite route, not local recovery.
**The premise D5 rests on is now established.** §2 of the task that produced this document required
it to be proven, not assumed: the backup tree must be unreachable from every browsing, download and
export surface. When this document was written it was **not** — the FileBrowser network-share bind
reached it. **R-108 closed that on 2026-07-30** (controller v0.187.0) by refusing app namespaces on
network storage, so no `backups/` tree can exist under the share-root bind; every other surface was
already clear (§10.1's table). **D5's precondition is therefore MET and D5 may be adopted.**
**Still true, and not part of D5's precondition:** a `.fab` bundle carries plaintext secrets by
design with an optional password, and `storageDriveList()` does not filter network paths, so a bundle
can be **exported onto** a NAS (§5, → **R-126**). That is an export destination the customer chooses
explicitly, not a browsing surface reaching a backup tree, and it is unchanged by D5 — D5 moves
secrets into the local recovery unit, not into `.fab`. It is tracked separately rather than folded in.
Until D5 is actually implemented, §7.1's chain stands as the model.
---
### 7.5 Where a recovery unit is RETAINED — and the size bound it puts on Lane 1
Added 2026-08-02 from `audits/SPIKE-recovery-unit-space-2026-08-02.md` and
`audits/CAMPAIGN-10-closeout-2026-08-02.md`. §6.1 says a Tier-1 unit lives *"on the app's own drive"*,
which is true and is the whole story for a drive-resident app. **It is not the whole story for an app
with no data drive, and that case was undocumented until now.**
**The unit is RETAINED, not staged.** `GetAppDrivePath` (`felhom-controller/internal/backup/backup.go:245-255`)
returns the app's `HDD_PATH` if it has one and **`systemDataPath` otherwise** — what
`internal/appbackup/paths.go:26-27` calls *"the SSD-only system-data fallback"*. Nothing deletes a unit
after it is copied onward: the only prune is F5 (`backup.go:1053-1112`), which removes residue on an
**old** drive when an app **moves**. So for every app without a data drive, `mp1` holds the kept copy
indefinitely.
**What a unit contains, which bounds the problem** (`internal/backup/recovery_unit.go:20-25`):
`compose/` + `db-dumps/` + `volume-dumps/` (named-volume tars) + `manifest.json`. **It never contains
`mp8` / `HDD_PATH` userdata** — a photo library on a 1 TB drive is not in a unit, and cannot make one
overflow.
**The resulting mismatch, on a default appliance:**
| | size | holds |
|---|---|---|
| `mp0` `/var/lib/docker` | **50 G** | every app's live volumes — the thing a unit copies |
| `mp1` `/mnt/sys_drive` | **20 G** | the retained units of every **driveless** app |
A DB-backed app's unit is up to **~2×** its data, because it carries the volume tar **and** the SQL
dump (measured: 21.1 GB of app data → a **40.2 GB** unit). A file-only app's is **1.00×** (measured:
homebox 2305 MB → 2305 MB). `--sysdata-grow` (`felhom-agent/cmd/felhom-agent/main.go:178`) defaults to
**0**, is not derived from the physical drive, and no observed box passes it — demo-hp's production
guest 9201 ships `mp0 50G / mp1 20G`.
**`mp1` gates the entire app-data chain, not just Tier 1.** Tier-2 mirrors the unit *"(always)"* from
`RecoveryUnitPath` (`internal/backup/tier2.go:302,368`) and Tier-3 carries it too, so a unit that
cannot be written to `mp1` leaves Tier-2 and Tier-3 with nothing to copy.
**The bound this places on Lane 1 (§3).** Lane 1's promise is that a customer can restore an app from
the drive alone, without the operator and without the guest — D5 (§7.4) made that true by putting the
portable secrets in the unit. **That independence is bounded by app size**, and the bound is:
> On a default appliance, an app can be restored by Lane 1 only while its recovery unit still fits the
> retained space — **≈ 19 GB of app data for a file-only app, ≈ 10 GB for a DB-backed one.**
> Past that the unit cannot be captured, and the app falls back to Lane 2's operator-driven
> whole-guest route.
**AS OF 2026-08-02 SOMETHING NOW WARNS, AND THE ALERTING IS PART OF THIS CONTRACT (R-167 / R-158,
decision D-c; controller v0.191.x + hub v0.89.0).** The last sentence of this section used to end
"nothing warns when an app crosses the line". Two signals now exist and both are PROVEN-LIVE:
- **To the CUSTOMER, before anything fails** — `internal/fillwatch` warns per FILESYSTEM (never per
app: one full disk holding ten apps would fire ten times) on **whichever trips first, used ≥ 85% or
free < 5 GiB**, critical at 95% / 2 GiB, clearing at 75% / 7 GiB. **Two terms, because a percentage
alone lies at both ends of the range this section itself documents:** 85% of a 20 G `mp1` leaves
3 G — less than one DB-backed app's unit — while 85% of a 4 TB drive leaves 600 G. It watches the
app-data volume, the system-data volume **and** every registered drive, which the previous
`health_degraded` signal did not. Edge-triggered against persisted state; the hub owns cooldown.
- **To the OPERATOR, when a capture actually fails** — `recovery_unit_capture_failed`, per app, with
the target filesystem's used/free bytes at the moment of failure, so the *why* needs no login. It is
**operator-tier** (`notify.operatorOnlyEvents`) and deliberately not `backup_failed`: a customer can
take no action on a capture failure.
### 7.5.1 — THE CEILING THIS SECTION DESCRIBES HAS BEEN REMOVED (2026-08-03, R-165 / decision D-a)
**Everything above describes the SPLIT layout, which is now the legacy shape.** A golden built by
`build-golden.sh` **v3.0.0** ships **one** data volume; `mp1` does not exist. Both consumer paths are
binds of subdirectories of it (variant **V-c**):
```
mp0 -> /var/lib/felhom ├─ docker/ --bind--> /var/lib/docker
└─ sys_drive/ --bind--> /mnt/sys_drive
```
**So the size bound below no longer applies to a box built from that golden.** A driveless app's
recovery unit is limited by the box's actual free space, not by a partition set at build time. The
mismatch table above (`mp0` 50 G vs `mp1` 20 G) describes what a merged box no longer has.
**R-175, fixed here rather than left standing.** The bound below was stated as the fleet's and was
**one box's**: it is derived from `mp1 = 20 G`, which is demo-hp exactly and never was demo-felhom
(`mp0 200G / mp1 50G`, where the same arithmetic gives ≈ 49 GB / ≈ 24 GB), nor the golden (`16 G / 8 G`
before provision grew them). **Read it as a function of `mp1`, and only for a box still on the split
layout.** Measured: `audits/SPIKE-r165-mp1-merge-2026-08-02.md` M1.
**What replaced the partition's second job — the reserve.** `mp1` was also a BULKHEAD: an overflow was
refused per app with the last good unit byte-identical, and it **could not reach `/var/lib/docker`**,
because that was a different filesystem. On a merged box it can. Decision **B2**, shipped in controller
**v0.192.0**, is that bulkhead made deliberate — a two-term reserve (97% used or 1 GiB free) in
`internal/fillwatch`'s shape, sitting beyond its critical band so the customer is always warned first.
It **refuses per app and never deletes**: nothing on this filesystem is generational, so pruning could
only destroy a different app's only local copy.
**WHAT IS RECORDED, WHAT IS E-MAILED, AND HOW OFTEN (controller v0.194.0 + hub v0.90.x, R-182).**
The two are deliberately different mechanisms, because conflating them is how seven failures went
missing on 2026-08-03 without leaving a trace.
| | Record | Notification |
|---|---|---|
| what | `recovery_unit_capture_failed`, one per failed app | `backup_run_failures`, one per RUN |
| when | every time, unconditionally | at the end of a run, **only if something failed** |
| gated by | nothing — not cooldowns, preferences or delivery | the hub's operator cooldown |
| where it lands | the events table **and** `notification_log` (status `recorded`) | the operator's inbox |
- **A clean run e-mails nothing.** Silence means the run finished and found nothing wrong — and that
is only safe because the hub's daily deadline check raises `expected_backup_missed` from the box's
REPORT freshness, independent of any mail the box sends. That check is load-bearing for this
design; weakening it re-opens a silent-failure path.
- **A suppressed operator notification leaves a `suppressed` row** naming the key that suppressed it.
Deciding not to tell someone is itself an event worth recording.
- **Deliberate skips are not failures** and never appear in the digest — a disconnected or
decommissioned drive has its own alert, and a nightly digest about an unplugged drive is one the
operator stops reading.
- **Cadence:** a nightly run gives at most one mail a day. A manual run always reports, even within
the hour, because someone pressing the button is actively trying to get a backup. The periodic
capture sweep is capped by the ordinary hourly cooldown.
**THE CONTRACT, stated as what the code provides (controller v0.193.0, R-181).** The reserve is a
**per-app, per-run ADMISSION decision, not a capture check.** It is taken once for an app, immediately
before that app's FIRST write of the run, and it covers **all three write legs — the database dump, the
volume dump and the recovery-unit capture**. Those three write under one per-app root
(`backups/primary/<app>`), which is what makes one verdict able to cover them honestly.
- **What it guarantees.** A refused app has **nothing written for it in that run**, its previous unit
is **byte-identical**, it is **not stopped**, nothing anywhere is deleted, and the operator gets
**exactly one** alert naming the app, the term that bound and the disk figures.
- **Two terms, two questions.** *Headroom*: is the filesystem already below the reserve? *Size*: would
THIS app's write take it below? The size estimate is the app's previous `.sql` + `.tar` on disk;
with no history the decision degrades to headroom alone, deliberately — otherwise the first backup
is the one that can never happen.
- **Why it is decided lazily and not once per run.** Space changes during a run: app A's dump can put
app B under the reserve, so a verdict taken at run start reads a disk that no longer exists.
- **Why it is never re-decided between an app's own legs.** That is precisely the shape v0.192.0 had —
the two dump legs unguarded and only the capture refused — under which the reserve was consumed by
the very write it exists to bound, and the refusal's *"the previous unit is untouched"* was measured
false. Proven live on demo-hp 2026-08-03 (R-181), fixed the same day, and re-proven by filling the
box for each of the two terms.
- **It sits ahead of `DumpAppVolumesSafe`**, which stops the stack as its first act — a refusal
decided inside it would already have bounced the app it is refusing to back up.
**Status caveat, deliberately explicit:** every box in the field that has not been reinstalled is still
on the split layout and everything above still describes them exactly. This subsection describes what a
box built from golden ≥ 0.192.0 gets. Both demo boxes were reinstalled from it on 2026-08-03 (R-178).
Two things are deliberately **not** recorded here. **The sizing ratio is the operator's ruling**
(**R-163**) — this section states the constraint, not a number. And **the same-device placement is
intended, not a defect**: a driveless app's unit sits on the same SSD as its volumes, but Tier-2's
cross-drive mirror, the whole-guest tier (which covers `rootfs + mp0 + mp1`, §6.1) and Tier-3 all cover
device loss. What was missing was that this case existed at all, and that nothing warns when an app
crosses the line — **R-158**.
## 8. The failure → recovery matrix
> ### THE ARC IS CLOSED FOR BETA — read this before the blanks below (2026-09-01)
>
> **Closed at controller v0.232.0 / hub v0.111.1.** Everything a **customer** does for themselves is
> finished and proven live — rows **1, 2, 3, 3b, 3c, 6, 7, 14**. Everything only an **operator** does
> is **deliberately deferred until after beta** — rows **4, 8, 9, 10, 11 (+11b), 12**, each carrying
> the marker **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** in its status cell so the set greps as a group.
>
> **The blanks in the RTO column below are now blank ON PURPOSE, and that is the whole difference.**
> Eleven rows carry a blank RTO — 4, 5, 8, 9, 10, 11, 11b, 12, 13, 14, 15 — and only six of those are
> deferred work. **Row 5** has no recovery to time (a derived copy), **row 13** has no route by
> design, **row 14** is proven and merely never stopwatched, **row 11b** is a note not a row, and
> **row 15 is an open DEFECT (R-104) that this line does NOT cover.**
>
> **NO STATUS MOVED ON THE DAY THIS WAS WRITTEN, because nothing was proven that day.** A stopping
> line that promotes a row is a stopping line that lies. Full text, and the conditions that reopen
> this: `documentation/backlog/OPEN-ITEMS.md`, *"DECIDED — the backup and restore arc is CLOSED FOR
> BETA"*.
**This is the core artifact.** One row per failure. It is authoritative for recovery routes;
`00-capability-map.md` stays authoritative for per-capability status.
**How to read the numbers.**
- **RTO** — **only measured durations** from INV Part F appear here. A blank cell means *nobody has
ever measured it*, and a blank is a finding, not an omission.
- **RPO** — **no RPO has ever been measured from an incident.** These cells carry the **configured
cadence that bounds RPO**, read live from the box, labelled `(cadence)`. A blank means no cadence
governs the row.
- **Status** — `PROVEN` (live, cited) · `PARTIAL` (some legs proven) · `IMPLEMENTED` (code + tests,
never exercised) · `NONE` (no route exists).
| # | Failure | What survives | Recovery route | Invocable by | RTO (measured) | RPO (cadence) | Status | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | **Customer deletes files** | everything else | „Fájlok visszaállítása" — Tier-2 additive merge | **customer** | **39 s** (6 files) | 24 h | **PROVEN** | CAMPAIGN-9 A1 — byte-identical returns, both non-destruction promises kept, bytes re-served by paperless's own API |
| 2 | **An app's data directory is destroyed** | the guest, the other tiers | same route | **customer** | **46 s** (43 files) | 24 h | **PROVEN** | CAMPAIGN-9 A3 — loss verified by a positive observable (doc download 200 → 404), then 16/16 documents usable |
| 3 | **An app's DB and named volumes are lost** | the guest, the unit | „Visszaállítás indítása" — Tier-1 unit restore (the **only** path that unpacks volume tars) | **customer** | **18.25 s** (path execution) · **27.6 s** (D5 drill, guest `app.yaml` absent) | 24 h | **PROVEN** (content recovery proven 2026-07-30) | CAMPAIGN-9 A2 proved the path executes; **D5 v0.188.0 closed the content gap** — after a restore with the guest's `app.yaml` moved aside, the app read the seeded row **over TCP with its own credential**, the pre-backup row returned and a post-backup row was gone (so the tar was really restored). No `.sql` dump in the unit ⇒ the DB came back from the volume tar. **2026-08-30 — this row KEEPS its PROVEN status and the reason is worth stating: R-353 was a defect in the MESSAGE, not in the mechanism.** The restore really did return what the unit held, every time; what it could not do was say so, because the count was discarded one call deep. Controller v0.226.0 fixed the sentence and changed nothing about the recovery path. A status that measures whether data comes back must not move because a status line was wrong |
| 3c | *same, with the GUEST GONE (secrets unavailable)* | the drive | Tier-1 unit restore — **the unit carries the portable secrets** | **customer** | **27.6 s** | 24 h | **PROVEN** | D5, §7.4. Before v0.188.0 this row was **NONE**: the data-key gate refused and the customer's own copy of their own data was not a recovery |
| 3b | *same, for a class-B app via Tier-2* | the Tier-2 copy on the second drive | „Teljes visszaállítás a másolatból" — **Tier-2 unit restore** (`POST /backup/tier2/unit-restore` → `RestoreTier2Unit` → `RestoreFromRecoveryUnitAt`), controller **v0.229.0** | **customer** | **28.65 s** (3 volumes, 1 database, 114.5 MB unit) | 24 h | **PROVEN** (2026-08-31) | `audits/DRILL-r102-tier2-unit-2026-08-31/`. docmost — a class-B app whose Tier-2 run reports **0 leg(s)** — restored **with the primary unit moved aside**: 3 volumes of 3 and 1 database of 1, from `/mnt/felhom-drives/hdd_1/backups/secondary/docmost/recovery-unit`. **The observable is the DATA:** an accented Hungarian filename returned byte-for-byte (verified as hex, R-364) and the app read its own row **over TCP with its own credential**; the post-backup discriminator was **gone**, so the tar was genuinely replayed. Repeated with the guest's `app.yaml` also aside → `secrets recovered=2/2` from the mirrored unit. **R-102 CLOSED** |
| 4 | **Primary drive dies** | Tier-2 copy on the second drive; Tier-3 offsite; the guest | Tier-2 for **file legs** (7 of 53 apps) **and, since controller v0.229.0, for the unit mirror — its volume tars and DB dump, i.e. the whole of what the other 45 own**; Tier-3 reconstitute for files + DB **+ the named-volume tars since v0.218.0** (`volReplay`) | **customer** (all) | | 24 h | **PARTIAL** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | §7.2. **Both unreachability gaps are now closed — R-107 (v0.218.0) and R-102 (v0.229.0).** This row stays **PARTIAL** deliberately: what is proven is the ROUTE (row 3b, live, primary unit absent), not the JOURNEY. **No drive has ever actually died or been replaced under this recovery** — the drill removed a unit directory, not a disk, so drive re-attachment by `durable_id`, the agent's enrolment of a replacement, and a Tier-2 copy read from a drive that is the ONLY surviving one are all still unexercised. Promoting this row to PROVEN needs that journey, not another unit restore |
| 5 | **Secondary drive dies** | everything the customer uses | none needed — Tier-2 is a derived copy, rebuilt on the next run (`07` §8 migration rule: *"Migration = rebuild, not preserve"*) | automatic | | 24 h | **PROVEN** (by construction) | tier2 v2 layout marker + rebuild, `internal/backup/tier2.go`. **The derived-copy rule is UNCHANGED by R-403 (controller v0.230.0) and the single exception is stated in §8.2 below — read it before "fixing" a skip you find in the code** |
| 6 | **Guest lost or corrupted** | the host, both whole-guest tiers, the data drives (they are host binds) | `pct restore` from `local:` or `felhom-pbs:` | **operator** (SSH) | **84–112 s** local · **1101 s** PBS (both = restore-test into a scratch guest, boot + verify + teardown) | 24 h local · 7 d offsite | **PROVEN** | CAMPAIGN-2 T-P9; CAMPAIGN-8 Phase C (exact mount parity, `unprivileged: 1` preserved); LIVE restore-tests on both boxes this session |
| 7 | **Guest stopped and does not come back** | everything | guest-power watchdog (60 s, `onboot` as the deliberate-stop discriminator) | automatic | **120 s** | | **PROVEN** | agent v0.107.0 replay — 120 s unattended vs the incident's 587 s with a human |
| 8 | **Host dies (hardware), drives intact** | the data drives; ep0's PBS namespace; the hub's Recipe + Escrow | **install a new host, then** `--selftest=bring-up -mode dr` per guest, **then** re-attach drives by `durable_id` | **operator** (SSH) | | 7 d | **IMPLEMENTED** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | bring-up code exists and has **never been executed** (`CAMPAIGN-8…:522`); the drive half of the plan is empty on every box (**R-105**) |
| 9 | **Whole box lost (fire/theft) — host and drives gone** | ep0 PBS namespace; the restic repo; the hub's Recipe + Escrow | new hardware → day-0 → escrow-consume with **R** → restore guests from PBS → app data from Tier-3 | **operator + customer** (R) | | 7 d (guest) · 24 h (app data) | **IMPLEMENTED / UNPROVEN** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | every leg exists; the composed path has never been run. The destructive S5 drill is operator-gated and unrun (`06-offsite-connectivity.md:327`) |
| 10 | **Ransomware / malicious deletion inside the guest** | PBS offsite (the box **cannot** delete its own snapshots); **the restic repo is NOT protected the same way** | whole-guest restore from PBS to a point before the event | **operator** (SSH) | | 7 d | **PARTIAL** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | R-89 proved the box is refused when deleting its own PBS snapshot (`CAMPAIGN-8…:514-515`). **R-95 (open, ranked #1):** the restic credential **can delete** — `readonly=False`, `forget --prune` runs from the box, and SFTP cannot express append-only (`OPEN-ITEMS.md:13`) **2026-08-30 (R-359): the store is now VERIFIED on a cadence** — a daily `offsite-integrity` job runs `restic check` when the last successful one is over 7 days old. **This is a readability check, not a restore-test (R-87 stays open).** The depth that ships ON now re-reads **100%** of the pack data (R-399 CLOSED, controller v0.228.0) — the sentence here previously said the opposite and was stale. **2026-08-31 (SPIKE R-87):** a scratch restore of every app on demo-hp was measured at **25 s for 8 snapshots / 774 MB**, against 40.3 s for one weekly check — but restic 0.14.0's `--verify` checks size and mtime, **not content**, so nothing available today can vouch for the restored BYTES. Row 4's verdict is UNCHANGED by the spike. `audits/SPIKE-restic-restore-test-2026-08-31.md`. **2026-09-01 (SPIKE R-95, `audits/SPIKE-r95-offsite-delete-2026-09-01.md`) — THIS ROW'S STATUS IS UNCHANGED, but the seven-day bound beside it is now known to be unverified.** Measured on BOTH boxes over their own SFTP credential, with controls: **no `.snapshots` is visible to either sub-account**, and the account is jailed. Either none exist or a sub-account cannot see them — and a snapshot the box cannot see is one the box cannot restore from, so recovery would be an operator act at the Hetzner panel, not a product capability (R-429; the confirming field needs the provider API, fenced by §11-D). **The PBS shape does NOT transfer**: the sub-account API has one permission axis, `readonly`, and a backup target cannot be read-only — PBS is a server that can refuse, a Storage Box is a filesystem that runs nothing. **What the spike removed as a fear:** withdrawing delete does NOT wedge the store (measured — restic treats a dead owner's lock as stale and proceeds). **What it added:** `unlock --remove-all` reports success while deleting nothing (R-430). **2026-09-01, LATER THE SAME DAY — THE PROBE ABOVE LOOKED FOR THE WRONG NAME AND THIS ROW'S SECOND CLAUSE IS NOW HALF WRONG.** It searched `.snapshots`; the vendor documents `/.zfs/snapshot`. Re-probed at the documented path on BOTH boxes, with controls, the two halves separate cleanly: **(a) the LIVE repository is deletable by the box — unchanged, R-95 stands;** **(b) the daily SNAPSHOTS of it are not writable by anything — PROVEN, not cited:** a write into `/.zfs/snapshot` is refused (`dest open …: Failure`) while the identical write to the account home succeeds. Seven daily snapshots confirmed in the panel (R-429). **So this row's "the restic repo is NOT protected the same way" is true of the repository and FALSE of its snapshots** — a deletion costs at most the day since the last snapshot, recoverable per-file (vendor). **Two limits kept honest:** a sub-account sees the snapshot directory EMPTY, so per-file recovery is operator-only today (R-432); and a panel-driven restore rolls back the WHOLE box. **The status is NOT moved** — evidence (b) is measured, but the recovery ROUTE has never been walked, which is what PARTIAL means. **Detection shipped hub v0.111.0 (R-431):** an unexplained fall in the snapshot count is noticed within a day — **but only a fall of MORE than half (R-435).** **2026-09-01, THE DRILL — CLAUSE (b) OF THE RE-SCOPE ABOVE IS WITHDRAWN; THE STATUS IS STILL NOT MOVED.** The re-scope said a deletion is *recoverable per-file*. **It is not, from the box: no snapshot is reachable by ANY name.** MEASURED on demo-hp, read-only, no delete verb issued: **777,600** exact names in the vendor form `YYYY-MM-DDTHH-MM-SS` (nine full days, second granularity) plus 126 alternative shapes — **zero hits**, against a control where the identical 600-name batch returns a path that exists (6/6). **Structural cause:** `/home` (`u629488-sub3`) is **st_dev 0,82**, `/.zfs/snapshot` is **st_dev 0,276**, and `/home/.zfs` does not exist — a snapshot under `/.zfs/snapshot` belongs to a different dataset than the one holding the repository. **Clause (a) — the box cannot WRITE into the snapshot area — is unchanged and re-confirmed.** So this row's *"recoverable per-file (vendor)"* and its limit *"per-file recovery is operator-only today (R-432)"* both overstate what exists: the remaining routes are a panel rollback of the WHOLE Storage Box and the provider API (fenced, and the hub's client has no snapshot method at all). **R-432 ANSWERED negatively; R-433 opened. RTO still blank — nothing was recovered, so nothing was timed.** `audits/evidence-drill-r95-recovery-2026-09-01/`. |
| 11 | **Hub lost** | every box's data plane, every tier, every Lane-1 route | none needed for recovery **of a box**; the hub itself restores from its Longhorn volume backup | operator (`kubectl`) | | 24 h + weekly (Longhorn `RETAIN 1` each) | **UNPROVEN** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | a hub restore has never been performed. The backup target is `nfs://192.168.0.180` — **DooPlex itself** — and exactly **2** restore points exist (LIVE, INV Part D2.2) |
| 11b | *consequences while the hub is gone* | — | — | — | | | **[FACT]** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | **day:** nothing customer-visible breaks; events queue (`settings.go:1466-1485`). **week:** the operator alarm plane is dark, no claim/reset codes, no config or floor convergence, no PBS-secret re-issue. **permanently:** escrow custody and break-glass credentials are gone (INV Part D2.4) |
| 12 | **Offsite provider lost (Hetzner)** | everything on-premises: both drives, both whole-guest tiers | none needed — on-premises recovery is unaffected. Re-provision a new offsite target. | operator | | | **[FACT]** **`[BETA-DEFERRED]`** | **restic and PBS share the provider** (INV Part E.1). Whether they share an account and payment method is **UNKNOWN** → §11-D |
| 13 | **Customer loses R** | every byte, every tier, the Recipe | **on-premises recovery is unaffected** — Tier-1/2/3 and the whole-guest tiers all work while the guest and host live. What is lost: the ability to re-establish **host identity** and to open the escrowed offsite key material after a host loss | — | | | **NONE for host-loss** | R exists in **zero** system copies by design (INV Part C, row 24). Whether the operator should be able to recover is **open** → §11-A, §11-B. **D5 narrows this further:** Tier-1/2 app recovery needs only the drive, so losing R now costs the offsite route and host identity, never local app recovery (§7.4) |
| 14 | **Host SSH management plane dies** | everything | 3-layer break-glass: tmpfiles → 60 s watchdog → hub-vaulted `root@pam` on the PVE console | operator | | | **PROVEN** | `runbooks/break-glass.md`; the original incident and its fix |
| 15 | **Interrupted offsite run leaves a stale lock** | everything | manual `restic unlock --remove-all` | **operator** (SSH) | | | **DEFECT** | the self-heal exists (`offbox.go:634-648`) but the probe fails first and `classifyResticProbe` has no lock case → fail-fast, operator told *„ismeretlen okból"* → **R-104** |
### 8.2 The ONE exception to row 5's derived-copy rule (R-403, controller v0.230.0)
**[DESIGN] Row 5 stands: the secondary IS a derived copy and it IS rebuilt on the next run.** Nothing
below weakens that, and a future reader who finds `RunTier2` skipping a leg and does not find this
section will "fix" it back — which is why it is here and not only in a register row.
**[FACT] What was measured, on the shipped v0.229.0, on `demo-hp` 2026-08-31.** An app's Tier-2 copy
went from **120 082 104 B** (4 database dumps + 3 named-volume tars) to **7 036 B** (none of either)
in one nightly run, and the run recorded itself a success. The mechanism was three individually
correct lines: `RunTier2` guarded the unit leg with `os.Stat` alone — *does the folder exist* —
`rsyncMirror` is `rsync -a --delete`, and nothing between them compared source to destination. **An
empty recovery unit is a folder that exists.** Evidence:
`audits/DRILL-r403-tier2-delete-2026-08-31/`.
**Why it bites harder since 2026-08-30:** R-102 made that mirror a LIVE recovery route (§6.3, §8 row
3b). Deleting it used to cost a copy nobody could open; it now costs the route itself.
**[DESIGN] The exception, stated exactly.** The unit leg — and ONLY the unit leg — is skipped when the
SOURCE unit carries no data and the DESTINATION unit does. Everything else is unchanged:
| source unit | destination unit | behaviour |
|---|---|---|
| complete | complete | mirror, with `--delete`, as before |
| complete | hollow or absent | mirror (the normal first copy) |
| hollow | hollow | mirror — both sides agree, nothing is at risk |
| **hollow** | **complete** | **skip the unit leg, preserve the destination, warn, record for the surface** |
**"Hollow" is a MANIFEST question, never a size question** — the manifest lists no database dump and
no volume tar; absent or unparseable counts as hollow, fail closed. A unit with a fat compose capture
and no dumps is the dangerous shape; a 360-byte unit belonging to a tiny app is healthy.
**The data legs are NOT guarded and must not be.** A classified app's copy legitimately shrinks as
`export` drops out of its class set (`tier2.go` header), and fencing that would be calling this row's
own decision a defect.
**[DESIGN] And the CAUSE is closed at the other end.** The hollow primary was written by the 5-minute
capture job **two seconds** after a Tier-2 unit restore. Since v0.230.0 `RestoreTier2Unit` refills an
absent or hollow primary unit from the mirror **inside the call, before returning**, so no capture can
observe the hollow state. **The capture itself is deliberately not guarded:** a capture that describes
an empty drive as empty is correct, and guarding it would make the manifest lie.
### 8.1 The blank cells, listed explicitly
Per the rule that a blank is a finding, here they are:
| row | blank | why |
|---|---|---|
| 4 | RTO | no drive-loss recovery has ever been timed. **The Tier-2 unit restore inside it now is** — 28.65 s, row 3b, 2026-08-31 — but that is the route, not the journey: no drive has been removed or replaced under a recovery |
| 5 | RTO | never timed; the rebuild is a normal Tier-2 run |
| 6 | — | RTO present, but it is a **restore into a scratch guest on the same host**; a restore *to a different host* has never been timed |
| 8 | RTO | a host has never been rebuilt as itself (INV Part D1) |
| 9 | RTO | the composed whole-box path has never been run |
| 10 | RTO | no ransomware-shaped recovery has ever been run |
| 11 | RTO | a hub restore has never been performed |
| 12 | RTO, RPO | no provider-loss recovery has ever been run |
| 13 | RTO, RPO | not a timed recovery; a capability loss |
| 14 | RTO | the break-glass path is proven but was never timed |
| 15 | RTO | the manual unlock was performed but not timed |
**Also unmeasured, and not representable as a row** (INV Part F.3): any restore larger than 155.5 MB
from restic; any restore of a customer data drive (no tier holds one whole); the weekly PBS
incremental; `.fab` import wall-clock; and time-to-first-byte for a customer restore over a home
uplink — **no customer has ever driven a restore**.
---
## 9. What the model implies for the tiers (recorded, not new design)
**[DESIGN]** Three consequences follow from §3–§7 and are stated so they are not re-derived:
1. **Tier-2 is a *drive-loss* tier, not a second chance at Tier-1.** Its job is to survive one drive
dying. That is why it mirrors the unit at all — and why the unit mirror being unreadable (§6.3)
defeats the tier rather than degrading it.
2. **Tier-3 is a *premises-loss* tier.** It is the only copy that survives fire, theft and
ransomware-with-host-access, which is why it is the only tier whose credential exposure is ranked
as the largest open data risk (R-95).
3. **The whole-guest tiers are the *system* tier, and they sit under everything else** (§7.1).
Treating them as "one more copy" is precisely the 3-2-1 framing this document rejects.
---
## 10. Known gaps
Every divergence between the model above and the system as it is, each with an ID.
### 10.1 ~~D5 is BLOCKED~~ — precondition CLOSED by R-108 (v0.187.0); **D5 ITSELF SHIPPED (v0.188.0)**
> **D5 IS DONE — 2026-07-30, controller v0.188.0.** The precondition below was met by R-108, and D5 was
> then implemented and proven live the same day: Tier-1/Tier-2 no longer depend on the whole-guest tier,
> and a customer needs **the drive and nothing else**. The current recovery chain is **§7.4**; the
> corrected matrix rows are 3, 3c and 13. This section's remaining value is the *precondition* analysis,
> which is why the table below is kept.
> **D5's PRECONDITION IS MET.** An app's data namespace can no longer be placed on network storage, so
> no `backups/` tree can exist inside FileBrowser's share-root bind, and the browsing surface therefore
> cannot reach the backup tree on ANY storage class. Every other read surface in the table below was
> already NO. **D5 may be adopted** — nothing in this section blocks it.
>
> **The fix inverted the obvious one, and that is the durable lesson here.** The share-root bind was
> not narrowed, because it **cannot** be: (a) the `:rslave` share-ROOT bind is load-bearing — a
> Phase-0 probe (2026-07-22) proved an in-container access through it wakes the idle automount
> trigger, so narrowing it breaks NAS access itself; (b) there is no `userdata/` layer to scope to,
> since apps on a share store at `<share>/<app>`; and (c) creating one would write Felhom's directory
> convention onto a customer's own NAS, which R-67 forbids outright. The browsing surface being
> immovable is precisely *why* the backup tree must never be placed under it. Tier 2 had already
> reached the same conclusion for its own targets (`F-6C-1`); R-108 closes the PRIMARY namespace,
> which was the last remaining route.
>
> **Operator ruling 2026-07-30: refuse the placement, keep the browse bind.** `RefuseAsAppNamespace`
> (`internal/settings/settings.go`) is the single predicate; all placement surfaces consult it. It
> **fails closed** — `/mnt/felhom-drives` holds both storage kinds in-guest, so a path prefix cannot
> classify and `Kind` exists only on a REGISTERED path; an unregistered path under that root is
> therefore un-classifiable and is refused rather than assumed to be a drive.
>
> **Nothing was stranded:** zero apps on network storage across all six hub customers including Peti.
> R-67's browse capability is byte-for-byte unchanged (verified by diffing demo-hp's generated
> compose before and after the deploy). This also **supersedes** the controller README's "NAS backup
> locality — decision A" (v0.118.0), which deliberately kept a NAS-resident app's Tier-1 artifacts on
> the NAS: that case can no longer arise.
>
> Evidence: `audits/R108-network-app-namespace-2026-07-30.md`. The pre-fix analysis below is retained
> verbatim as the record of what was wrong.
#### 10.1 (historical) The exposure as it stood before v0.187.0
**[FACT] The verification and its result.** Every surface that can read a file was checked:
| surface | can it reach `backups/`? | evidence |
|---|---|---|
| SMB share creation | **NO** | `sharingResolvePath` (`internal/web/sharing_handlers.go:52-81`) resolves symlinks *before* containment, then refuses any path within `SharingDeniedRoots(root)`; that set covers `<root>/backups` **and** the legacy `<root>/felhom-data` + `<root>/felhom-data/backups` (`internal/stacks/samba.go:46-65`, derived from `ProtectedHDDPaths`, `delete.go:59-78`) — **both namespace shapes** |
| SMB browse (folder picker) | **NO** | same deny set applied per child (`sharing_handlers.go:521-537`) |
| SMB `ensureImportShare` (the store-direct bypass) | **NO** | writes one controller-generated constant, `GetImportRoot()` = `<system ns>/userdata/import` (`sharing_handlers.go:564-587`) |
| FileBrowser — **local drives** | **NO** | the bind is `appbackup.UserdataDir(sp.Path)` only, and the comment says why (`internal/web/handlers.go:2450-2460`) |
| **FileBrowser — network shares** | ~~**YES**~~ → **NO** (R-108, v0.187.0) | the bind is still the share **ROOT** (`- %s:/srv/%s:rslave`, `handlers.go:2437`) and deliberately so — but **no app namespace, hence no `backups/` tree, can exist on a share**, so the root bind reaches only the customer's own files. The reachability is closed at the PLACEMENT, not at the bind |
| `.fab` import path validation | **NO** | confined to `<root>/exports` (`handler_export.go:400-408`, `estimate.go:215-217`) |
| `.fab` browser download | **NO** | name-pattern + parent-must-be-the-staging-dir double guard (`handler_export_download.go:36-45,120-140`) |
| `/api/debug/*` | **NO** | no file-serving branch (`handler_debug.go:46-92`) |
| `http.ServeFile` (3 sites) | **NO** | assets only, `filepath.Base`-normalised (`server.go:720-771`) |
| log bundles | **NO producer found** | no filesystem-walk bundle producer exists on the box; searched `felhom-controller/internal`, `felhom-agent/internal`, `cmd/` |
| registering the backup dir as a drive | **NO** | the manual add requires `system.IsMountPoint(path)` (`handlers.go:2091-2095`); `<drive>/backups` is not a mount point |
**The exposure, end to end.** All six links are source-cited and the precondition is live today:
1. A NAS share is registerable as a storage path and lands `Schedulable: true` — **LIVE on demo-hp**:
`{"path":"/mnt/felhom-drives/Felhom-Share","kind":"network","schedulable":true}`.
2. `GetSchedulableStoragePaths()` has **no `IsNetwork()` filter** (`internal/settings/settings.go:904-914`),
so that share appears in the **deploy** dropdown (`handlers.go:462-473`).
3. The **per-app migrate** target list filters only current / decommissioned / disconnected /
schedulable — also no network filter (`handlers.go:674-679`).
4. `handleStorageMigrateApp` does **not** call `refuseNetworkLifecycle`, unlike its whole-namespace
sibling which does (`storage_handlers.go:397` vs `:410-424`), and `startMigration` has no guard
either (`internal/stacks/migrate.go:214-255`).
5. With `HDD_PATH` on the share, `namespaceRoot()` returns it as-is under Model A
(`internal/backup/backup.go:262-263`), so the app's Tier-1 unit is written to
`<share>/backups/primary/<app>/compose/app.yaml`.
6. FileBrowser binds that share at its **root** and serves it with `download: true`
(`internal/infra/infra.go:326`).
**Observed live on demo-hp, in the generated compose — the asymmetry is visible, not inferred:**
```
- /mnt/felhom-drives/nvme-1tb/userdata:/srv/nvme-1tb <- drive: userdata-scoped
- /mnt/felhom-drives/Felhom-Share:/srv/Felhom-Share:rslave <- network: ROOT-bound
- /mnt/sys_drive/felhom-data/userdata/import:/srv/beolvasas
```
**Today this is not a secret leak**, because the unit's `app.yaml` is secret-stripped
(`recovery_unit.go:73`). **D5 would make it one.** That is exactly the test §2 set, and D5 therefore
does **not** hold as written. → **R-108**
> **CLOSED (v0.187.0).** Links 2, 3 and 4 of the chain above are now guarded, and a **fifth** surface
> the chain did not list was found and guarded too: `handleStorageDecommission` mode=`migrate` checked
> only `req.Where` (the SOURCE) via `refuseNetworkLifecycle`, so a whole namespace could be
> decommissioned ONTO a NAS. Link 2's framing also understated the problem — the deploy **dropdown** is
> only a UI list; the boundary is the deploy **POST** (`internal/api/router.go`), which accepts any
> caller-supplied `HDD_PATH` and whose only other validation is `os.Stat` existence
> (`internal/stacks/deploy.go`). Filtering the list alone would have left the surface open. Links 5 and
> 6 are unchanged and still true — they simply can no longer be reached.
### 10.2 The gap register
| ID | Gap | Consequence |
|---|---|---|
| **R-102** | Tier-2 writes a full `recovery-unit/` mirror on every run and **no code path reads it** | Tier-2 is defeated in the drive-loss scenario it exists for (§7.2). Was C9-F4 |
| **R-103** | The Tier-2 no-coverage refusal **names** the working action but does not **route** to it | 45-or-43 of 53 apps dead-end at a message. Was C9-F1b |
| **R-104** | An interrupted offsite run leaves an exclusive restic lock the existing self-heal cannot reach, reported as *„ismeretlen okból"* | the offsite tier stays dead until a human unlocks. Was C9-F3 |
| **R-105** | Three hub-held DR records are empty on the whole live fleet: `hosts.dr_record_json`, `host_escrow.directive_json`, `dr_recipe.host_half.drives` | the Recipe (§4) is incomplete in exactly the fields host-loss recovery reads. Causes may differ per field |
| **R-106** | `dr_recipe.host_half.pbs.namespace` records `"root"` on every box | the recorded restore coordinate is wrong; real namespaces are per-customer |
| **R-107** | ~~No offsite action unpacks the named-volume tars Tier-3 captures on every run~~ — **CLOSED, controller v0.218.0, 2026-08-22** (`volReplay`, proven live on `demo-hp`). True from the day Tier-3 shipped until 2026-08-21. | was: offsite alone cannot rebuild a named-volume app (§7.2). Now: the tars replay; what remains is that the app must be **deployed** (R-253), which is not R-107 |
| **R-356** | The off-site restore resolved its destination with the raw `HDD_PATH` and read an empty answer as "not installed" — **CLOSED, controller v0.219.0, 2026-08-22** | 40 of 53 apps were refused permanently while running (§6.3 `[DESIGN]`) |
| ~~**R-108**~~ | ~~Network storage can host an app's namespace~~ | **CLOSED 2026-07-30, controller v0.187.0 — D5 UNBLOCKED.** An app namespace may no longer be placed on network storage (5 surfaces guarded by one fail-closed predicate); the share-root bind is deliberately UNCHANGED because it is load-bearing and unscopable (§10.1). `audits/R108-network-app-namespace-2026-07-30.md` |
| **R-126** | A `.fab` bundle — plaintext secrets, optional password — can be exported ONTO a NAS: `storageDriveList()` (`internal/web/handler_export.go`) does not filter network paths | split out of R-108, which closed without it. NOT a D5 precondition: an explicit customer-chosen export destination, not a browsing surface reaching a backup tree (§5, §7.3) |
| R-95 (open) | The restic offsite credential **can delete** — the box can `forget --prune` its own repo, from **two** call sites (`offbox.go:1388` retention and `offbox.go:1759` over-quota) | the tier holding the customer's documents and photos is the one whose credential can destroy it (matrix row 10). **SPIKE 2026-09-01:** prevention needs a transport change (restic 0.14.0 does speak `rest:` — measured; append-only is a rest-server flag, not a restic one), because the sub-account API cannot express write-without-delete. **Detection is nearly free and is recommended first** — `snapshot_count` already reaches the hub and the hub appends reports, so the comparison needs no box change. `audits/SPIKE-r95-offsite-delete-2026-09-01.md`. **RE-SCOPED 2026-09-01:** the box can delete the LIVE repository but **cannot write to the daily snapshots of it** (measured, both boxes) — so the exposure is at most one day's data plus an operator-driven per-file recovery, not open-ended loss. Detection shipped hub v0.111.0 (R-431). **DRILL 2026-09-01: the re-scope's recovery clause is WITHDRAWN — no snapshot is reachable from a sub-account by any name (R-433, 777,600 names, controlled), so the exposure is NOT bounded by an operator-driven per-file recovery. R-436 is the new cheap lead: the provider already offers `rclone serve restic --stdio` server-side and restic 0.14.0 speaks `rclone:` (measured) — but the client supplies the server command line, so ask the vendor whether `--append-only` is pinned BEFORE building anything.** |
| ~~R-86~~ | ~~Restore-tests are interval-scheduled, not backup-aligned~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-03 — agent v0.121.0 + hub v0.91.0.** Restore-testing is now **per archive generation**: a tier is due when its newest archive that has settled ~24 h has not been proven, so a daily tier is proved daily on its own archive and a weekly tier weekly on its own. The ticker survives only as the evaluation interval (6 h, chosen from a measured cost). The hub's staleness window moved with it — per tier, from that tier's observed archive rhythm — because a weekly tier proved weekly sat EXACTLY on the old flat 7-day line (§3, Lane 2's per-archive rule) |
| ~~R-353~~ | ~~A local unit restore reported a bare completion whether it returned an entire dataset or nothing~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.226.0.** The volume count already existed (`restoreDockerVolumesFrom`) and was discarded by a one-line wrapper, so the surface was structurally unable to say what came back. `RestoreFromRecoveryUnit` now returns `UnitRestoreResult` and the sentence has three cases, keyed on replayed-vs-**listed** — zero-replayed has two causes that are opposite news. Every sentence is a claim about the BACKUP, never the app: this path has no `SafetyDump` discriminator, and §6.3 is why that is not pedantry. Proven live on `demo-hp` |
| ~~R-357~~ | ~~The destructive reconstitute had no free-space gate; all three that existed guarded non-destructive paths~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.226.0.** The gate sits before `writeSafetyDump` and `StopStack`, so a refusal costs no outage — the test asserts the StopStack call count, not the sentence. No headroom multiplier (a measured tree, not a predicted download); fail-closed when either probe reads ≤ 0, which was a real fail-open hole. **Not live-validated** — filling a filesystem is a drill step |
| ~~R-358~~ | ~~`OffboxFullScratchReady` asked "non-empty directory", which is exactly what a failed restic run leaves~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.226.0.** A completion marker written only after restic returns nil, stale ones cleared before it starts, both orders pinned by an AST test. Both handlers refuse server-side — a hidden button is not a guard. Proven live on `demo-hp`. **See R-396: the bad state needed only a SUCCESSFUL safe restore, not a failed one** |
| ~~R-360~~ | ~~The verification-copy delete gated on the concurrency flag, which a verification restore never holds~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.226.0.** `restoreOpBlocked()`, matching the five sibling handlers. The doc comment that claimed it already did this is corrected in place — that sentence is why nobody looked. Proven live on `demo-hp` in the exact flag state that produced it |
| ~~R-396~~ | ~~A unit-only verification restore unlocked the destructive full restore~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.226.0** (by R-358's marker). Found while answering R-358's open question. Both restore modes write the SAME scratch directory, and one boolean (`ScratchReady`) drove three different intents — "is there a scratch", "may we place", "may we destructively restore". The safest action on the page unlocked the most dangerous one |
| ~~R-359~~ | ~~The off-site restic store is never verified by anything, ever~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.227.0/v0.227.1.** A daily `offsite-integrity` job on **due-ness, not a weekday**; it takes the single-writer flag and SKIPS rather than waits (`resticStep` escalates to `unlock --remove-all` and is only safe while that flag is held). Three outcomes — skipped / unreachable / failed — because 'I could not look' is not 'I looked and it is broken'. **⚠ The depth that ships ON does NOT catch silent corruption:** measured, a pack corrupted without a size change returned `no errors were found`, exit 0; only `--read-data*` caught it. Choosing the depth is **R-399** |
| ~~R-397~~ | ~~`NotifyIntegrityOK`/`NotifyIntegrityFailed` had no caller and the product advertised a weekly check that did not exist~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-30, controller v0.227.0.** Sixth built-but-never-wired instance: hub allowlist, Hungarian text, settings checkbox and debug button all existed; only the caller did not. `ok` is severity `info` and mails nobody by design |
| ~~R-399~~ | ~~The check reads the catalogue and never the data~~ | **CLOSED 2026-08-31, controller v0.228.0.** `monitoring.integrity.read_data_subset` now defaults to **`100%`**, so the weekly check downloads and re-hashes every stored byte. **The fact that made it necessary, and the sentence that should stop anyone turning it back down to save four seconds: the structure check PASSED a size-preserving pack corruption.** Measured on `demo-hp` 2026-08-30 — plain `restic check` reported `no errors were found` and exited 0 over a pack damaged without a size change; every read-data form caught it. Cost on that 134 MB store: 35.0 s structure vs 39.2 s at 100%. `off` (any case) returns a box to structure depth; an empty value means *not configured*, therefore the default; a malformed value WARNs and falls back to the DEFAULT, never to structure. A completed check over 5 minutes logs an operator WARN naming R-401 — **one data point, on one 134 MB store, so no rotation schedule, size threshold or bandwidth budget was invented from it.** Proven live at both depths 2026-08-31 with the restic argv observed from the guest |
| ~~**R-87**~~ **— SHIPPED 2026-08-31 (controller v0.231.0), RE-SCOPED. AND IT IS STILL NOT R-359** | ~~The restic tier is never restore-TESTED~~ **The box now PROVES its own off-site copy still HOLDS something.** **THE DISTINCTION, STATED ONCE AND PLAINLY BECAUSE THE GREEN TICK INVITES THE OTHER READING: this proves the snapshot CONTAINS a recoverable unit; it does NOT prove a restore puts data back into a running app.** The proof restores to a throwaway folder, judges it against the unit's own captured compose, and deletes it — it never touches a live app. Putting data back is drill work. **§8 matrix row 4 is deliberately NOT moved.** Nightly at 05:30, one app, due-ness per SNAPSHOT (R-86's model). Evidence `tests/r87-offsite-proof-2026-08-31/`; the reasoning is `audits/SPIKE-restic-restore-test-2026-08-31.md`. | **SPIKE VERDICT, `audits/SPIKE-restic-restore-test-2026-08-31.md`:** build the NARROW version, not the row as written. **Measured:** a scratch restore of all 8 apps costs **25 s / ≤213 MB scratch**, LESS than the 40.3 s weekly check beside it; but restic 0.14.0's `--verify` is a size-and-mtime reconciliation (a size-and-mtime-preserving corruption passed clean, red-proofed), `restic ls --json` carries no content hash, and the unit manifest hashes **4 918 B of a 213 231 242 B unit** — so **no reference for "correct" exists** (R-409). **Of the five drill-found restore defects R-353/354/356/358/403, an unattended scratch-restore would have caught ONE (R-356).** The value is elsewhere and the weekly check structurally cannot reach it: `check` proves the stored bytes are the stored bytes, never that we stored the RIGHT thing — a hollow unit backs up, checks and restores cleanly and recovers nothing (R-403, measured 2026-08-31). **Proposed re-scope, Viktor's call:** *prove the off-site snapshot still CONTAINS a recoverable unit* — one app a night, restored to scratch, checked against its own `manifest.json` via the existing `unitCarriesData`. Must use `--no-lock` and skip `unlockStale` (R-95's constraint is otherwise violated — R-407/R-408 record what the path writes today) and must take `acquireRunning`, which `RestoreOffboxScratch` does not. | matrix row 4's route has no unattended proof. **Stated explicitly because the two rows sit next to each other and are easy to conflate: a `check` proves the STORE IS READABLE; a restore-test proves DATA COMES BACK OUT.** v0.227.0 did the first and nothing else. This row is untouched by it |
### 10.3 Divergences that are documented elsewhere and are not re-opened here
**[FACT]** `06-offsite-connectivity.md:19-21` describes the operator's public edge as a Cloudflare
Tunnel and states DooPlex has no public IP. Live DNS resolves `hub.felhom.eu` through a no-ip
DynDNS CNAME straight to DooPlex's own public address (INV Part E.3). That is a topology-document
issue, not a recovery-model one; recorded so the discrepancy is not lost.
---
## 11. Open decisions — for the operator
**Recorded, deliberately not answered.**
**A. Escrow custody.** Split custody (R **or** an offline operator key) versus a 2-of-3 threshold
across customer / hub / box drives.
*Recommendation on record:* **split custody, operator key held offline and never in the hub.* Note
the constraint from §2: the moment the operator key lives in the hub, "a compromised hub yields
blobs nobody can open" stops being true.
**B. Lost-R policy.** Under split custody the operator **can** recover. Is that the stated policy —
and if so, what identity check gates it? Today matrix row 13 has no route at all, and the customer
is not told that losing R costs them the host-loss route.
**C. RTO / RPO targets per scenario.** **None have ever been stated.** Without them §8 cannot judge
whether, for example, offsite-only recovery is acceptable for drive loss, or whether the 7-day PBS
cadence is adequate for row 8. The measured column is the input; the target column does not exist.
**D. Hetzner as a single failure domain.** restic (Storage Box `u629488`, sub-accounts per customer)
and PBS (Cloud server ep0 + a Cloud Volume) are both Hetzner. Whether they share an **account,
login and payment method** is unverified (INV Unknown U-1) — the question was deliberately not
answered by calling the provider API with the production token. Accept explicitly, or mitigate.
> **The fence was reached again, and held, 2026-09-01 (SPIKE R-95).** The R-95 spike needed one
> provider-side fact — **do daily snapshots exist on the Storage Box, and how many** — because the
> register calls that mitigation ARMED and the whole ranking of R-95's options turns on it. It is
> readable from the box: measured on BOTH machines over their own SFTP credential, with positive
> and negative controls, **no `.snapshots` is visible to either sub-account**, and the account is
> jailed at `/`. The register's own confirming field, `size_snapshots`, is an API field. **So the
> spike stopped here rather than answering it by acting**, and left it as R-429 — ten minutes in
> the Storage Box panel, and it re-ranks R-95. `audits/SPIKE-r95-offsite-delete-2026-09-01.md` §Q1.
**E. `local` vzdump shares a physical device with the guest it backs up.** LIVE on both hosts:
`/var/lib/vz` (the archive target) and `local-lvm` (the guest's rootfs and both `backup=1`
mountpoints) are both on `/dev/sda3` → VG `pve`. The tier therefore protects against **corruption
and operator error only**, never against disk failure. Accept and name it honestly in the customer-
facing description, or move the target.
**F (added by §10.1, not in the original list). — ANSWERED 2026-07-30.** D5 could not be adopted
until R-108 closed. Closing R-108 *was* the intended path, and it is done (controller v0.187.0): the
operator ruled to refuse app namespaces on network storage rather than narrow the browsing surface,
because the share-root bind is load-bearing and cannot be scoped. **D5 is no longer blocked.** Whether
to now *implement* D5 remains an open scheduling decision, not a blocked one.
---
## 12. Evidence index
| Claim | Grade | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Tier-2 file restore, gap-fill and after total loss | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-9 A1/A3 |
| Tier-2 refuses without an outage for a no-coverage app | **PROVEN-LIVE** | v0.183.0 replay, `felhom.eu/REPORT.md:60` |
| Tier-1 unit restore **executes** | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-9 A2 |
| Tier-1 **content recovery after loss** | **UNPROVEN** | `CAMPAIGN-9…:825-827` |
| restic restore of app data (bytes) | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-8 R-87, 155.5 MB, 6/7 byte-identical |
| offsite reconstitution of a DB-indexed app | **PROVEN-LIVE** | destructive immich drill 2026-07-20, `00-capability-map.md:66,75` |
| offsite **place-to-live** as a distinct action | **UNPROVEN** | `CAMPAIGN-8…:520` |
| shares restore (files + definitions + credential) | **PROVEN-LIVE** | 2026-07-18, `00-capability-map.md:96` |
| `.fab` drive-to-drive round trip | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-6D P-FAB, 1.7 GB |
| `.fab` **browser upload** leg | **UNPROVEN** | `00-capability-map.md:67` |
| whole-guest restore, local and PBS, exact mount parity | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-2 T-P9; CAMPAIGN-8 Phase C |
| corrupted PBS snapshot fails cleanly | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-8 fault 17 |
| the box cannot delete its own **PBS** snapshots | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-8, R-89 |
| unattended restore-test across tiers | **IMPLEMENTED**; **per-archive due-ness PROVEN-LIVE 2026-08-03** (agent v0.121.0) | `00-capability-map.md:41`; the due verdict + a real offsite run on demo-felhom (§3, Lane 2's per-archive rule) |
| guest-power watchdog | **PROVEN-LIVE** | agent v0.107.0, 120 s |
| quiesce crash recovery | **PROVEN-LIVE** | CAMPAIGN-8 fault 10, 1 s, by SIGKILL |
| break-glass | **PROVEN-LIVE** | `runbooks/break-glass.md` |
| agent DR bring-up (`ModeDRGuestLoss`) | **NEVER EXECUTED** | `CAMPAIGN-8…:522` |
| host-loss plan → an actual restore | **EXECUTES NOTHING BY CONSTRUCTION** | `felhom-agent/internal/dr/plan.go:1-4` |
| host rebuilt as its former self | **NEVER DONE** | INV Part D1 |
| escrow **consume** in a real recovery | **SPIKE-LEVEL ONLY** | `06-offsite-connectivity.md:327` |
| hub DB restore from its Longhorn backup | **NEVER DONE** | INV Part D2.2 |
| a **customer** performing a restore unassisted | **MISSING AS EVIDENCE** | `00-capability-map.md:75` |
---
## 13. What this document deliberately does not do
- It does not restate capability status — §8 cites the map, the map cites §8.
- It does not resolve the 7/53-vs-9/43/1 count (§6.2). Both are on the record; neither is adopted.
- It does not estimate a single RTO or RPO. Every blank in §8 is a real gap.
- It does not answer §11. Those are the operator's.
- It does not claim ratification.
| 5 | **A customer had no way to BEGIN — the only route was a command line** | Everything above was self-service, and nothing told the owner of a rebuilt box that a sealed package was waiting or how to open it. | **CLOSED — controller v0.200.0** (R-193). A full-page recovery screen, shown while the hub holds a package this box cannot open; it unlocks and lists, and **restores nothing** (→ R-213 for the put-back). |