claude.md was eating 400 lines of subsystem detail that's useful
when you're working on that subsystem and noise the rest of the
time. split into:
- docs/conventions.md naming, identity, async forms, commit style
- docs/gotchas.md nspawn / nixos-container quirks
- docs/web-ui.md dashboard + per-agent layouts and endpoints
- docs/turn-loop.md claude invocation, wake prompt, mcp surface
- docs/approvals.md approval flow, manager policy, helper events
- docs/persistence.md sqlite dbs, retention, state dir layout
claude.md is now the entry point — file map, reading paths
("pick the doc that matches your task"), quick reminders that
fit on one screen, and a small scratchpad section for in-flight
context. references the docs; the docs don't reference claude.md.
no content was lost — the docs/ files cover everything the old
claude.md did, plus things i wrote up better while extracting.
2.6 KiB
Conventions
Code-style and process expectations across the workspace. Most of these exist because something already went wrong without them.
Naming
- Containers are length-bounded by
nixos-container(≤ 11 chars). - Sub-agents are
h-<name>with<name>≤ 9 chars. - The manager is
hm1nd(noh-prefix, fixed name). MAX_AGENT_NAMEinlifecycle.rsenforces the cap.- Per-agent web UI port =
WEB_PORT_BASE + FNV1a(name) % WEB_PORT_RANGE(8100..8999); manager fixed at 8000; dashboardcfg.dashboardPort(default 7000).
Identity = socket
There are no auth tokens on the per-agent unix sockets. The socket
path identifies the principal; perms come from "who has the
bind-mount." A sub-agent only sees its own /run/hive/mcp.sock; the
manager has access to its privileged socket; hive-c0re owns the host
admin socket.
Wire protocol
JSON line-delimited over unix sockets in both directions (host admin
/ manager / agent). SSE streams (/messages/stream,
/events/stream) are text/event-stream. Request/response types
live in hive-sh4re — change them in one place.
Async forms
Dashboard + per-agent mutating forms carry data-async; a delegated
submit listener in assets/app.js intercepts, shows a spinner,
POSTs application/x-www-form-urlencoded (axum's Form extractor
rejects multipart), calls refreshState() on success. New mutating
forms should add data-async and optionally data-confirm for a
JS-side confirmation prompt.
rebuild is the reconcile verb
lifecycle::rebuild idempotently rewrites
/etc/nixos-containers/<C>.conf (PRIVATE_NETWORK=0, clears
HOST_ADDRESS / LOCAL_ADDRESS, sets EXTRA_NSPAWN_FLAGS),
regenerates applied/<name>/flake.nix, writes the systemd limits
drop-in, then nixos-container update + stop + start.
Anything that changes per-container state on the host should be
re-applied here so a manual ↻ R3BU1LD from the dashboard is
sufficient to recover.
Actions are factored
approve / deny / destroy (and the lifecycle helper) live in
actions.rs / dashboard.rs. The admin socket and the dashboard
POST handlers both call into them so the two surfaces never drift.
Commit messages
Short, lowercase, no Co-Authored-By trailer. Imperative mood, no
period. Body explains why if non-obvious; otherwise the subject
alone is fine. Wrap at ~72 cols.
Commit before test
Stage and commit when work looks ready, then run validation
(cargo check, nix flake check, real deploy). Failures get a
follow-up commit rather than an amend. The commit history is the
work log; rewriting it loses signal.