DottaandPaperclip
9adeabb590
## Thinking Path > - Paperclip is the open source app people use to manage AI agents for work. > - Connections let people give agents access to external tools. > - A personal connection needs the current user's authorization. > - A new MCP URL must be probed before Paperclip can discover its sign-in method. > - Requiring a personal grant before that probe prevents sign-in from starting. > - This pull request permits the initial probe for a creator-owned draft with no credentials. > - People can complete personal setup while later requests retain authorization checks. ## Linked Issues or Issue Description **What happened?** Connecting an unknown MCP URL with "Just me" failed with HTTP 502 and "This connection needs the current user's authorization". Paperclip checked for a personal grant before contacting the provider. The health wrapper also changed the expected authorization error into a server error. **Expected behavior** Discover OAuth and start browser sign-in. Create a personal grant after consent. For a public endpoint, discover its tools and create the empty personal grant after a successful probe. Keep missing authorization on later health checks as HTTP 422. **Steps to reproduce** 1. Add an unknown remote MCP URL with no saved credentials. 2. Select "Just me". 3. Check the link. Before this fix, the request fails before sign-in or tool discovery. **Paperclip version or commit** The three original regressions fail against `6cfe4acff` with the service fix removed and pass with it restored. **Deployment mode** The defect was reported in production and reproduced in local server tests with isolated PostgreSQL. Related work: Refs #11831. Refs #11144. Searches found no duplicate fix. ## What Changed - Allow an initial credential-free probe only for the creating user's personal draft with unknown authentication and no supplied credentials. - Leave OAuth grant creation to the callback. Create an empty personal grant only after a public probe succeeds. - Preserve the personal grant for URLs that already contain a credential. - Make empty personal grant creation conflict-safe without overwriting a concurrent grant or duplicating its creation audit. - Commit the empty grant and audit atomically. Retain the established public draft identity after a later catalog failure, so a failed retry cannot remove a successful retry's grant. - Run the following catalog/default-profile step in its own transaction, so failures discard partial catalog, profile, binding, and audit changes without deleting the established identity. - Verify archived personal connections retain their owner: another user is rejected before probing, while the original owner can resume setup. - Preserve `user_authorization_required` and HTTP 422 in health failures. - Cover the connect and OAuth callback routes, real loopback HTTP, credential-bearing URLs, and later health checks. - Document personal setup and the test fixtures. ## Verification - Red/green: the original three tests failed with the exact reported error before the fix and passed after it. - The credential-bearing personal URL regression also failed before its guard was added. - Focused suite: `pnpm --filter @paperclipai/server exec vitest run src/__tests__/generic-mcp-connection.test.ts src/__tests__/tool-access-service.test.ts` passed all 385 tests across the two suites. An earlier run had a socket hang-up in an existing agent-permissions test; the unchanged suite passed on rerun. - The concurrent rollback regression failed before its fix because the successful retry's grant was deleted. It now verifies the grant and draft survive and a later normal health check succeeds. - Database fault injection during profile-entry insertion reproduced partial catalog writes before the transaction fix. The regression now verifies unchanged catalog rows, no partial profile/bindings, a retained grant, and successful retry. - CI's first serialized-server shard 3 attempt failed an existing peer-agent mutation test (the real run-context guard ran despite the test's mock). The test passed in isolation and all 108 tests in that suite passed unchanged locally. The single failed-shard rerun passed without code changes. - Final-commit CI: all 32 applicable checks passed on `639f037987352cab6084c4ebfa5dbf7b0aed6046`, including all 385 affected tests, the full test matrix, browser suite, build, typecheck, release checks, and security checks. The two Storybook-only checks were not applicable and skipped. Greptile is 5/5 with all review threads resolved. [Successful CI run](https://github.com/paperclipai/paperclip/actions/runs/35027478353). - `pnpm -r typecheck` passed. - `pnpm smoke:mcp-fixtures -- --require-paperclip` passed. - `pnpm build` passed. - Full local `pnpm test:run` was attempted: its general-server group finished with 12,372 passed, 4 failed, and 70 skipped tests. The run started before review edits; its two MCP failures used the old cached service (including an insert without the new conflict clause). All 385 focused tests pass on the final code. The other failures were existing workspace-cleanup and runtime-port tests; their unchanged suites passed on rerun (66 passed, and 25 passed/3 skipped). The local command stopped before later groups. The final-commit CI matrix is the full-suite merge gate; this local run is not claimed as green. ## Risks - The initial probe must not become a general authorization bypass. It is restricted to the creating user's draft. Normal health checks retain authorization enforcement. - Public endpoints get a personal grant with no secrets only after they answer successfully. Credential-bearing URLs keep their existing grant. - The concurrent-probe regression seeds the catalog and default profile to isolate grant creation. Existing first-time catalog/profile creation races are outside this change; this does not claim to make the entire setup flow concurrency-safe. - No database migration or UI change is required. OAuth tests use a simulated provider; the public endpoint test uses real loopback HTTP. ## Model Used OpenAI Codex, GPT-6-based assistant for regression tests and PR preparation; a GPT-5-based Codex assistant assisted with the initial implementation. Exact runtime model IDs and context-window sizes are not exposed in this session. Both used reasoning, repository tools, and code execution. ## Checklist - [x] I have included a thinking path that traces from project context to this change - [x] I have specified the model used (with version and capability details) - [x] I have checked ROADMAP.md and confirmed this PR does not duplicate planned core work - [x] I have searched GitHub for duplicate or related PRs and linked them above - [x] I have either (a) linked existing issues with `Fixes: #` / `Closes #` / `Refs #` OR (b) described the issue in-PR following the relevant issue template - [x] I have not referenced internal/instance-local Paperclip issues or links (only public GitHub `#NNN` / `github.com/paperclipai/paperclip` URLs) - [x] My branch name describes the change (e.g. `docs/...`, `fix/...`) and contains no internal Paperclip ticket id or instance-derived details - [x] I have run tests locally and they pass - [x] I have added or updated tests where applicable - [x] I have updated relevant documentation to reflect my changes - [x] I have considered and documented any risks above - [x] All Paperclip CI gates are green - [x] Greptile is 5/5 with no open P2s, recommendations, or follow-ups - [x] I will address all Greptile and reviewer comments before requesting merge --------- Co-authored-by: Paperclip <noreply@paperclip.ing>
Apps, Connections, and Integrations
Audience: internal engineers and product contributors working on integrations.
Start here when adding a provider: Connection authoring runbook. It is the canonical agent tutorial from provider research and protocol classification through manifest generation, branding, secrets, deterministic tests, real-account proof, and PR submission.
Runtime authentication: AI Connections.
Provider notes: Google Workspace, Gmail, PostHog, AgentMail, and iMessage Photon. Optional credential custody: Vercel Connect.
Post-read action: classify a new integration request, pick the right Paperclip layer to change, and avoid creating a parallel connection framework.
Decision Record
Board decisions from PAP-13211 make the Apps v2 substrate on the PAP-10341 branch canonical:
- D1: Apps v2 is the substrate. The active model is
tool_applications,tool_connections, catalog entries, profiles, policy rules, action requests, gateway sessions, audit events, and runtime slots. Connections v1 is retired as an implementation path. - D2: one credential authority per connection, brokered projections. The
default is the Paperclip instance vault: durable third-party credentials live
in
company_secretsas secret refs. A reviewed remote MCP method may instead opt in to Vercel Connect, in which case Vercel is the durable credential authority and Paperclip stores only the connector reference and redacted grant metadata. A connection must never mix those two sources. Adapter config, plugin config, harness credential files, and run environments may receive only brokered or projected credentials. - D3: the vocabulary and three-door IA are product law. The default product doors are Apps, Connections, and Review. Protocol and operator-depth concepts live behind Developer or Advanced surfaces.
- D4: unification lands on PAP-10341. Pages, CircleBack-style harness MCP OAuth, provider gallery work, and plugin-provided integrations converge on this branch instead of spawning new integration substrates.
- D5: inbound stays thin. External clients that call Paperclip use scoped Paperclip tokens and existing profiles/rules. They do not get a separate permission model.
Canonical Object Model
Use connection as the unifying noun. A connection is four things:
- A stored credential reference.
- A capability catalog.
- A governance layer.
- An audit trail.
Everything else is an axis on that object:
| Axis | Values | It answers |
|---|---|---|
| Direction | outbound, inbound | Who is the client? |
| Transport | MCP, native REST/OpenAPI, OAuth app install, webhook | How do bytes move? |
| Auth mode | OAuth, API key/PAT, app installation, none | What does the secret represent? |
| Credential owner | company, user, run | Whose identity acts? |
| Packaging | catalog entry, plugin, skill | How does it ship? |
MCP is a transport, not a product category. "Install the Discord app", "connect Google Drive", and "add an MCP endpoint" all produce governed connections with different transport/auth values.
Layer Stack
When you are unsure where a change belongs, place it on the narrowest layer that solves the problem:
| Layer | Owns | Examples |
|---|---|---|
| Surface | user-facing Apps, Connections, Review, Developer/Advanced screens | gallery cards, setup wizard, review queue |
| Governance | profiles, bindings, allow/ask-first/block rules, quarantine, audit | read-only profile, ask-first write policy |
| Capability | action catalogs, schemas, risk classes, changed-tool review | search_issues, create_comment, schema hash |
| Credential | company_secrets, OAuth broker, credential resolver, token broker |
Slack bot token ref, Google OAuth refresh token ref |
| Identity | actor attribution and token exchange | board user, agent run, first-party service identity |
| Transport | how the external system is reached | remote HTTP MCP, local stdio, REST/OpenAPI, webhook |
The agent should not hold a durable provider credential. It should hold a Paperclip run/session token; the server or broker resolves the connection, checks governance, invokes the provider, and writes audit.
Identity vs. connections
Signing a user in and connecting a resource are different planes with different owners, different token profiles, and different homes. Do not merge them. This section is the public, connections-side statement of the identity model so connector implementers inherit the rule without depending on private identity-service documentation or re-deriving it.
| Plane | Question | Lives where | Token profile |
|---|---|---|---|
| P1. Sign-in methods | Who are you? | paperclip-id (id.paperclip.ing → Account) |
Minimal-scope provider tokens (openid email profile), used once to authenticate, encrypted at rest, never exported |
| P2. Connections (Apps) | What may your agents touch? | Paperclip App instances (tool_connections), acquired via the connect broker for hosted + self-hosted |
Rich-scope, long-lived resource tokens in the instance's encrypted vault; per-agent grants; risk-tier policy defaults |
| P3. Login with Paperclip | Who may authenticate against us? | paperclip-id OIDC provider + DB-backed client registry |
Our ES256 ID/access tokens issued by us to registered RPs (instances, the broker, future third parties) |
Everything in doc/connections/ — the First-30 matrix,
the connection authoring runbook, and the connect-broker work —
lives on plane P2. It never acquires, stores, or brokers a P1 sign-in token.
The standing rule (D7)
Adopted as a standing rule (decision D7) with the identity-model plan. State it verbatim in any P2 design so the app-store work cannot drift into merging the planes:
Sign-in tokens are never reused as resource tokens; id.paperclip.ing never stores resource tokens; no connections hub on the ID service.
P2 tokens flow broker → instance vault as pass-through only; the id.paperclip.ing Account page therefore must not grow a "Connections" hub. The reasons to hold the planes apart (from the plan §3):
- Scope discipline. Sign-in wants the narrowest grant; connections want deliberately broad ones. One button that does both is how you grant repo access just to log in.
- Blast radius. id.paperclip.ing holding every customer's Vercel/Slack/GitHub resource tokens would make it the single juiciest target in the fleet; the broker is intentionally pass-through.
- Self-hosted symmetry. Instances own their vaults, so self-hosters don't depend on our uptime to use their own connections.
- Legibility. Sign-in and connections answer different user questions, and every product we benchmarked (Vercel, Railway, GitHub, Google) keeps them on separate pages with separate names.
The explicit Vercel Connect exception does not change D7 or merge P1 and P2.
The operator chooses Vercel as the P2 credential authority for an individual
connection. id.paperclip.ing is not involved, and neither sign-in tokens nor
provider tokens pass through it. The deployment's Vercel access token or
workload OIDC identity is bootstrap authority for that external vault, not a
provider resource credential.
Naming alignment
Use the surface-correct name for each plane; they intentionally differ:
| Surface | Plane | Name to use |
|---|---|---|
| Paperclip App instances | P2 | "Connections" |
| id.paperclip.ing Account | P1 | "Ways to sign in" |
| id.paperclip.ing admin | P3 | "OIDC clients" (until the app store productizes it) |
Packaging Rule
Default to a catalog entry when an integration can be described as metadata: manifest, auth config, action catalog, resource filters, and policy defaults.
Use a plugin only when the integration needs product code such as custom UI pages, its own tables, workers, migrations, routines, or specialized ingestion. A plugin may bundle catalog entries, but it must not bypass the connection, profile, policy, credential, and audit model.
Use a skill for agent instructions. Skills may use connections; they must not own durable tokens.
Canonical Docs
- Glossary defines product and internal terms.
- Identity vs. connections is the public statement of the P1/P2/P3 boundary and the D7 standing rule for connections work.
- Security threat model harvests the keeper from PAP-2359 and maps it onto Apps v2.
- First-30 matrix harvests the keeper from PAP-2432 and is the source matrix for connector playbook work.
- Connecting any remote MCP server is the baseline: how an operator connects a standards-compliant remote MCP endpoint with no Paperclip code change, and how sign-in resolves a client.
- Connection authoring runbook is the one end-to-end, agent-executable guide for adding a vendor as a catalog entry on Apps v2: research, connection-type selection, OAuth/API-key/generated-URL setup, encrypted credential handling, branding, implementation, browser and live-provider testing, verification, and PR submission.
- Vercel Connect operator guide documents the optional external credential source, deployment flags, runtime resolution, recovery, and smoke requirements.
- MCP access governance remains the operator runbook for the current gateway, profile, policy, approval, runtime, and audit APIs.
Migration Notes
Connections v1 contributed useful policy, UX, and rollout thinking, but its
implementation branch is no longer the target. When you see old tickets or code
using connections, connection_grants, or a provider-directory mental model,
translate the intent into Apps v2:
| Connections v1 intent | Apps v2 home |
|---|---|
| Provider directory | Apps gallery / tool_applications |
| Configured provider instance | Connection / tool_connections |
| Grant allowlist | Profiles, profile bindings, policies |
| Resource filters | Policy/profile conditions plus provider config |
| Tool broker | Tool gateway and runtime supervisor |
| Connection UX tail | Apps, Connections, Review, Developer/Advanced IA |
Do not add new work to the retired v1 branch. If an old ticket still describes a valid product gap, retarget it to an active Apps v2 issue or close it as superseded with a link to the replacement.