# Session Log – zlh-grind

Append-only execution log for GPT-assisted development work.  
Do not rewrite or reorder past entries.

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## 2025-12-14
- Goal: Stabilize zlh-agent provisioning pipeline for game + dev containers + addons without regressing game provisioning.
- Scope: Agent routing (ctype=dev), local artifacts strategy, addon skeleton, initial end-to-end tests.
- Adopted single base template approach (zlh-agent template) where agent installs roles at runtime.

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## 2025-12-20
- Goal: Restore reliable end-to-end provisioning for **game + dev** without regressions; preserve the explicit orchestration steps/logging.

### Current Architecture Reality (IMPORTANT)
- We are on **single base template**: `AGENT_TEMPLATE_VMID` is the only template in `.env`.
- In this workflow, **any zlh-agent code change requires rebuilding + pushing the binary into the template container**.
  - That effectively means: **agent change = new template promotion**.

### Key Findings / Fixes
- Game provisioning steps are functioning again and show clear step-by-step orchestration output (allocate VMID → clone → configure → start → IP → agent config → wait → DB save → edge publish).
- Dev provisioning failure was traced to a **wire contract mismatch** between API JSON and agent `state.Config` struct tags:
  - Agent expects: `container_type` (snake_case) on the JSON wire
  - API refactors were sending: `ctype` / `containerType` (camelCase) in some variants
  - Result: `cfg.ContainerType == ""` on decode → agent routes into game path → errors like:
    - `unsupported container identity (containerType="" game="")`

### Decision (to minimize churn)
- Because agent changes force a template promotion in this pipeline, the correct short-term move is:
  - **Update API to emit `container_type`** to match the existing agent contract
  - Avoid touching agent code until we intentionally rev the template

### Operational Guardrails
- Do NOT remove or "simplify" the explicit provisioning steps/logging; they are required for debugging and operator confidence.
- Treat `container_type` as the canonical wire key until the next planned template rev.

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## 2025-12-21
- Goal: Restore reliable end-to-end provisioning for devcontainers and agent-managed installs.
- Observed repeated failures during devcontainer runtime installation (node, python, go, java).
- Initial assumption was installer regression; investigation showed installers were enforcing contract correctly.
- Root cause identified: agent was not exporting required runtime environment variables (notably `RUNTIME_VERSION`).

### Devcontainer provisioning investigation
- Deep dive on zlh-agent devcontainer provisioning flow.
- Confirmed that all devcontainer installers intentionally require `RUNTIME_VERSION` and fail fast if missing.
- Clarified that payload JSON is not read by installers; agent must project intent via environment variables.
- Verified that installer logic itself (artifact naming, extraction, symlink layout) was correct.

### Embedded installer execution findings
- Agent executes installers as **embedded scripts**, not filesystem paths.
- Identified critical requirement: shared installer logic (`common.sh`) and runtime installer must execute in the **same shell session**.
- Failure mode observed: `install_runtime: command not found` → caused by running runtime installer without `common.sh` loaded.
- Confirmed this explains missing runtime directories and lack of artifact downloads.

### Installer architecture changes
- Refactored installer model to:
  - `common.sh`: shared, strict, embedded-safe installation logic
  - per-runtime installers (`node`, `python`, `go`, `java`) as declarative descriptors only
- Established that runtime installers are intentionally minimal and declarative by design.
- Confirmed that this preserves existing runtime layout:
  `/opt/zlh/runtime/<language>/<version>/current`

### Artifact layout update
- Artifact naming and layout standardized to simplified form:
  - `node-24.tar.xz`
  - `python-3.12.tar.xz`
  - `go-1.22.tar.gz`
  - `jdk-21.tar.gz`
- Identified mismatch between runtime name and archive prefix (notably Java).
- Introduced `ARCHIVE_PREFIX` as a runtime-level variable to resolve naming cleanly.

### Final conclusions
- No regression in installer logic; failures were execution-order and environment-projection issues.
- Correct fix is agent-side:
  - concatenate `common.sh` + runtime installer into one bash invocation
  - inject `RUNTIME_VERSION` (and related vars) into environment
- Architecture now supports deterministic, artifact-driven, embedded-safe installs.

Status: **Root cause resolved; implementation pending agent patch & installer updates.**

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