## Thinking Path > - Paperclip coordinates agent work and keeps its authority in the server. > - Remote native runners can preserve execution through a server replacement. > - Deployment operators need evidence that current runs support that recovery. > - Process-local drain counters do not establish this fact. > - This PR adds an optional, operator-only readiness observation from existing records. > - A deployment consumer can use that report while the existing runtime retains recovery authority. ## Linked Issues or Issue Description Refs #17439. **What happened?** A deployment cannot distinguish recoverable remote native executions from runs that require a task drain. The existing status endpoint reports only process-local counts. **Expected behavior** An instance operator can request a bounded readiness report without stopping admission or exposing checkpoint material. Missing ownership or persistence evidence must prevent readiness. Ordinary status reads must keep their current cost. **Steps to reproduce** Run a remote native task. Read the task-drain status. It reports active work but supplies no recovery eligibility. Deployment code therefore has no affirmative signal to select an active-run handover. ## What Changed - Add `GET /api/instance/task-drain?upgradeReadiness=1` for instance administrators and existing Cloud control callers. - Return aggregate eligibility from current run identities, controller leases and bound opaque checkpoint headers. Unknown work, pending admission and incomplete reads prevent a positive report. - Bound the explicit read to 1,001 rows, encrypted headers of at most 256 KiB each and 8 MiB total, and a two-second SQL statement timeout in a read-only transaction. Keep ordinary status reads in memory. - Add PostgreSQL, count-transition and route authorization tests. Update the API contract, operator docs and access maps. ## Verification - All seven readiness cases pass against an isolated PostgreSQL 18 fixture. They cover missing checkpoints, legacy adapters, missing process/session identities, foreign owners, expired leases, missing lease tokens, failure state and in-flight work. The positive SQL fixture uses the real Runner checkpoint writer and encryption. Regular sandbox workspace identity and plugin environment-lease identity are tested with independent IDs. Stopped/released/undispatched plugin tasks and every mismatched identity field are rejected. Local/legacy/malformed/oversized or mismatched headers are rejected. A held PostgreSQL table lock proves the two-second cancellation budget, rollback/connection release and unrelated query responsiveness. - All 123 focused readiness, instance-settings and Cloud control assertion tests pass, including operator-only access and no readiness read on ordinary status requests. Runner’s 168 checkpoint tests pass. Runner and server typechecks pass after review fixes. - Workspace typecheck, full build, module-boundary and map checks passed locally before the master rebase. Current-head GitHub CI is now green, including typecheck, build, all grouped/serialized server and Runner tests, browser shards, policy and review-dispatch checks. Greptile completed cleanly at 5/5 for `f15fb0c7e9dfb975090cd5d791a1c8e6701275f8`; all actionable threads are resolved. - The broad local test run was stopped after the macOS embedded PostgreSQL fixture failed to bootstrap. The SQL test was then run on the isolated PostgreSQL fixture. No assertion or timeout was weakened. One unrelated existing route test exceeded its 15-second limit under concurrent local builds; it passed on one isolated retry and the subsequent whole route suite passed. - Hosted active-run upgrade acceptance has not run. This PR supplies an observation; it does not change rollout policy or establish live continuity by itself. ## Risks This is an instance-wide observation, so company members and agent keys must not receive it. A readiness snapshot can age as work changes; shutdown and startup retain their existing execution authority and fencing. The report does not validate a replacement artifact or authorize a schema migration. It decrypts only bounded headers through the checkpoint owner and delegates format/identity inspection to Runner; full journal restoration and physical sandbox authentication remain with recovery. No migration, recurring query, new checkpoint write or wire protocol change is included. The additive Runner header inspection contract reuses its existing parser. ## Model Used OpenAI Codex, based on GPT-6, with reasoning, source inspection, tool use and code execution. The host does not expose the exact serving model ID or context-window size. ## 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 and contains no internal Paperclip ticket id or instance-derived details - [x] I have run tests locally and they pass for the affected contracts; the broad-run limitation is recorded above - [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>
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Installation, configuration, updates, and backups — agent access
Product map: Installation, configuration, updates, and backups.
Feature ID: instance-operations.
Review date: 2026-10-12. Source commit: f981fa3cc10cb8663a87dec60345fbff46d54d0a.
This is a source-reviewed baseline of representative operations and known gaps. Each capability needs operation-level review before its entire scope can be qualified. No live agent execution is claimed. Follow the map contract for format, permission checks, evidence and maintenance.
install-update
Capability ID: instance-operations/install-update.
Review: baseline.
API: not-applicable — No uniform company REST updater API. Treat pre-start
installation as an operator exception or design an explicit delegated operator API.
Agent access: operator-only — Existing CLI install/update/rollback commands.
Policy: Local machine operator and instance-administrator authority; distinct from company-scoped agent keys.
Evidence: source-only — implementation at the reviewed
commit above.
Verification: not-run — exercise the listed local workflow in an authorized, owned
operator environment. Verify its isolation and result; do not count local machine
authority as company-agent API access.
Gaps: No uniform company REST updater API. Treat pre-start installation as an operator exception or design an explicit delegated operator API.
server-service
Capability ID: instance-operations/server-service.
Review: baseline.
API: present — representative operation IDs:
GET /api/health.
Agent access: operator-only — Existing CLI service/dev controls; health REST; owned
workspace services have separate agent APIs.
Policy: Local machine operator and instance-administrator authority; distinct from company-scoped agent keys.
Evidence: source-only — implementation at the reviewed
commit above.
Verification: not-run — exercise the listed local workflow in an authorized, owned
operator environment. Verify its isolation and result; do not count local machine
authority as company-agent API access.
Gaps: Instance start/stop and task workspace start/stop are different capabilities. Local service control is not agent company authority.
configuration
Capability ID: instance-operations/configuration.
Review: baseline.
API: present — representative operation IDs:
GET /api/instance/settings.PATCH /api/instance/settings.GET /api/instance/settings/experimental.PATCH /api/instance/settings/experimental.
Agent access: restricted — Board/admin instance settings; CLI configure/env; local
configuration files.
Policy: Local machine operator and instance-administrator authority; distinct from company-scoped agent keys.
Evidence: source-only — implementation at the reviewed
commit above.
Verification: not-run — assert the documented agent denial with an owned test fixture;
verify any listed agent request/result path separately. A delegated operation needs its
own policy and access review.
Gaps: Settings APIs cover parts of configuration; pre-start database/binding/storage configuration is local operator tooling.
Cloud stack Admins may update experimental settings through the trusted Cloud
actor without receiving other instance-admin powers. This uses the current
stack role on each request; company membership alone does not grant it.
Members, Support users, agents, and ordinary self-hosted sessions remain denied.
Cloud staging exposes experimental controls to instance admins and stack Admins.
It permits saved overrides of Cloud-disabled experimental defaults. Cloud-enabled
features remain true on every managed stack, including staging, and the settings
service rejects attempts to disable them with 403 before saving.
This exception requires a managed instance
and a provisioner-supplied *.staging.paperclip.app primary hostname; request
headers do not establish staging. Ordinary board members and agents still cannot
mutate instance settings. Only an explicit feature allowlist is editable on staging. Cloud
owner-admin elevation and managed-sandbox execution policy remain managed, and
production policy and other Cloud floors remain.
Local route tests
cover stack Admin experiment access and auditing, denial for other instance
controls and actor sources, hidden-setting restrictions, and a spoofed request hostname;
the Cloud actor tests
cover role changes and preserved instance-admin isolation;
no live Cloud or agent-credential verification is claimed.
diagnostics
Capability ID: instance-operations/diagnostics.
Review: baseline.
API: present — representative operation IDs:
GET /api/health.GET /api/instance/task-drain?upgradeReadiness=1— instance-admin or signed Cloud control only. Returns aggregate restart eligibility, never checkpoint contents, task identities or credentials. Company members and agent keys are denied. The explicit request performs bounded read-only SQL; ordinary drain status remains an in-memory read. Route coverage and PostgreSQL coverage establish this local boundary; hosted active-run continuity requires separate proof.GET /api/livenessandHEAD /api/liveness— public process startup status and build commit only; no database readiness or workspace identity.
Liveness is anonymous and runs before actor/session resolution. Hostname and signed-bootstrap endpoint validation still apply. It grants no instance control authority. Liveness tests cover idle drain, invalid ambient credentials, unavailable SQL, and startup recovery with local Express fixtures; no live provider or agent access is claimed.
Agent access: partial — REST health plus local CLI doctor.
Policy: Local machine operator and instance-administrator authority; distinct from company-scoped agent keys.
Evidence: source-only — implementation at the reviewed
commit above.
Verification: not-run — exercise a listed permitted operation with actual agent
credentials/run context; inspect its result and applicable persistence/attribution.
Assert the relevant denied actor, owner, company or mode from Policy. Review the
remaining operations before qualifying the whole capability.
Gaps: Health is an API; full local doctor/repair inspects host configuration and is not equivalent to that response.
backup
Capability ID: instance-operations/backup.
Review: baseline.
API: present — representative operation IDs:
POST /api/instance/database-backups.
Agent access: restricted — Board/admin backup API; local CLI db:backup; restore into
an authorized separate target.
Policy: Local machine operator and instance-administrator authority; distinct from company-scoped agent keys.
Evidence: source-only — implementation at the reviewed
commit above.
Verification: not-run — assert the documented agent denial with an owned test fixture;
verify any listed agent request/result path separately. A delegated operation needs its
own policy and access review.
Gaps: API creation exists. Restore/lifecycle are operator workflows rather than ordinary company agent capabilities.
runtime-setup
Capability ID: instance-operations/runtime-setup.
Review: baseline.
API: not-applicable — these commands provision an operator-owned published package and local filesystem cache. They have no company-domain REST equivalent and deliberately bypass instance config, environment, and credential initialization.
Agent access: operator-only — explicit host/package provisioning through the runtime CLI, with the installed release’s verified assets. A company agent grant does not authorize another host’s installation or private operator cache.
Policy: Host setup verifies public pinned assets without model calls and requires the published server package layout/identity. Import requires a trusted manifest digest, exact installed source/profile identity, Linux x64 companion inventory/pack/ELF integrity, and a private operator-owned cache. Import performs no downloads or executable probes. A Pi companion does not enable remote Cursor or qualify credentials.
Evidence: source-only — reviewed at 9ef434fe79c57d976b8b03b14c5242db270b8320. Runtime CLI, instance-config bypass, Pi provisioning, Cursor provisioning, and companion importer.
Verification: not-run — Inspect setup identity/path and repeat reuse on an owned disposable published installation. Verify a matching trusted companion import and reject altered/cross-release/linked inventory while preserving unrelated files. Check no instance credentials are loaded and no model is called. Qualify actual adapter/account task execution separately.
Gaps: Source-checkout setup, different platforms, remote Cursor, provider execution, and published-package acceptance remain separate scopes. Local fixture materialization does not establish remote model readiness.