ClusterClient→gRPC migration Phase 4 (docs/plans/2026-07-22-clusterclient-to-grpc-plan.md).
Phases 2/3 proved both directions on gRPC; this removes the Akka transport underneath.
Deleted:
- AkkaCentralTransport, AkkaSiteTransport (+ their dedicated tests)
- ISiteClientFactory + DefaultSiteClientFactory; CentralCommunicationActor legacy
ctor + SelectTransport (Host now builds GrpcSiteTransport and injects it)
- ClusterClient creation + both ClusterClientReceptionist.RegisterService calls in
AkkaHostedService; the RegisterCentralClient message + receive block
- CommunicationOptions.CentralContactPoints; the CentralTransport/SiteTransport
coexistence flags; the CentralTransportMode/SiteTransportKind enums
gRPC is now the only site↔central transport (site→central CentralControlService via
GrpcCentralTransport; central→site SiteCommandService via GrpcSiteTransport), both
built unconditionally by the Host. NoOpCentralTransport is the fail-loud null-default
so TestKit command-dispatch suites still construct the site actor without a wired
transport; production always injects GrpcCentralTransport.
Config: CentralGrpcEndpoints is now unconditional — CommunicationOptionsValidator
rejects blank entries (role-agnostic), and StartupValidator requires a Site node to
list >=1 endpoint (fail-fast, mirrors GrpcPsk). Rig configs moved
CentralContactPoints -> CentralGrpcEndpoints (docker x6, docker-env2 x2, Host default,
deploy/wonder-app-vd03). Kept Akka.Cluster.Tools (ClusterSingleton still used).
Tests: build 0/0; Communication.Tests 640, Host.Tests 421 green. Removed the
ClusterClient.Send per-site-routing tests (covered by the transport suites), swapped
the ISiteClientFactory-based ctors to a substitute ISiteCommandTransport, converted
the audit-push integration relay to an in-process bridge transport.
Docs: Component-Communication/Host/StoreAndForward, components/Communication,
topology-guide, grpc_streams (SUPERSEDED note), the frame-size known-issue (retired
amendment), and CLAUDE.md transport decisions.
Not included: the dead IntegrationCallRequest path (#32) is a separate user-owned
behavioral decision — SiteEnvelope routing is transport-agnostic so it still compiles.
Phase 0 of the ClusterClient→gRPC migration
(docs/plans/2026-07-22-clusterclient-to-grpc-plan.md). Standalone hardening: it
closes a gap that exists today and is a precondition for moving command/control
onto gRPC in later phases.
T0.1 — delete the ManagementActor ClusterClientReceptionist registration.
It was built for an out-of-cluster CLI that was never written: the shipped CLI
speaks HTTP Basic to /management, which asks the actor in-process through
ManagementActorHolder. Nothing in the repo ever sent to /user/management. The
actor still runs there; only the cross-boundary advertisement is gone. Six
documents claimed the CLI used ClusterClient — including the CLI's own README
"Architecture Notes" — and are corrected here rather than left to rot.
T0.2 — record, do not port, the dead integration-routing path.
IntegrationCallRequest is unwired at BOTH ends: RouteIntegrationCallAsync has
zero callers anywhere, and RegisterLocalHandler(Integration, …) appears only in
a test, so production always answers "Integration handler not available". It is
excluded from the gRPC contract (28 of 29 commands migrate) rather than
enshrined on an additive-only wire format, and deleting it during a
transport migration would mix a behavioural change into a change whose whole
value is that behaviour is identical. See
docs/known-issues/2026-07-22-integration-call-routing-is-dead-code.md.
T0.3 — preshared-key authentication on SiteStreamService.
The service shipped with no auth at all: plaintext h2c, no interceptor, so
anything that could reach a site node's :8083 could open a live data stream or
read audit rows back via PullAuditEvents/PullSiteCalls. ControlPlaneAuthInterceptor
now gates /sitestream.SiteStreamService/ — modeled on LocalDbSyncAuthInterceptor
(constant-time compare, fail-closed, PermissionDenied) but gating a SET of
service prefixes so phases 1A/1B add services rather than interceptors. LocalDb
sync keeps its own separate key: it authenticates the pair partner, not central,
and collapsing the two would make a site's central-facing key also admit writes
into its database.
Keys are per site (SB-GRPC-PSK-<siteId>), never fleet-wide, so a compromised
site yields only its own. Central attaches them through ControlPlaneCredentials,
which binds CallCredentials to the channel — covering unary and streaming
uniformly, and letting the key resolve asynchronously, which a client
interceptor could not do without blocking. All three central→site channel
creation sites go through it (SiteStreamGrpcClient and both audit pull invokers);
the pull invokers' channel caches are re-keyed by (site, endpoint) because
credentials are per-site and bound to the channel.
Two decisions beyond the plan:
* StartupValidator now requires GrpcPsk on Site nodes. The plan specified only
the runtime gate, but fail-closed with no boot check produces a node that
joins, answers heartbeats and reports healthy while refusing every stream,
audit pull and telemetry ingest — silent and total. Same reasoning as the
existing inbound API-key pepper rule.
* Added Communication:SitePsks as a central-side key map. The plan assumed
central would read the store, seeded via a dev KEK; the docker rig
deliberately boots with no master key, so store-only resolution would leave
it unable to dial its own sites. The store stays primary — it is the only
source that can serve a site added at runtime — with the map covering
key-less hosts and one-off pins. Neither source falling back to
"unauthenticated" is the invariant.
T0.4 — dev keys on both rigs and tests.
34 tests. The seven that matter most exercise a real in-process gRPC stack over
TestServer: the unit tests on either side of the wire would both stay green if
the halves disagreed, and gRPC refuses call credentials on a plaintext channel
by default — the UnsafeUseInsecureChannelCallCredentials opt-in is only provable
by making a real call. They confirm correct key passes on unary AND streaming,
wrong key and no-credentials both get PermissionDenied, and an unresolvable key
fails the call with nothing reaching the service.
OPERATIONAL: a site node upgraded to this build without a key will not boot.
That includes the gitignored deploy/wonder-app-vd03/ overlay.
Alarm Summary is now live-cache-driven via a transient per-site central
live alarm cache (ISiteAlarmLiveCache) fed by a site-wide, alarm-only
SubscribeSite gRPC stream (seed-then-stream), with the 15s poll retained
as fallback + NotReporting authority. No persisted central alarm store
([PERM]). Updated Component-CentralUI, Component-Communication (new §6.1
+ SubscribeSite RPC), M7 design (T13 delivered note), native-alarms
[PERM] note, stillpending follow-up note, CLAUDE.md, and moved register
row #10 to Resolved (left #22 in place for the sibling branch).
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01MtdgwpEeCUn6cUA5f1LMPj
Remediation from the full per-module code review at 4307c381 (findings recorded
separately in code-reviews/).
Highs fixed:
- DeploymentManager-025/SiteRuntime-031: stop broadcasting notification lists + SMTP
configs (incl. credentials) to sites; site purges already-persisted rows on apply
(enforces the central-only delivery design; clears plaintext SMTP creds at rest).
- DataConnectionLayer-023: guard the native-alarm subscribe path against the
mid-flight-unsubscribe adapter-feed leak (mirrors the DCL-021 tag-path fix).
- SiteEventLogging-024: normalize From/To query bounds to UTC (the -016 fix the
audit trail claimed but never committed).
- KpiHistory-001: add an in-flight guard to the recorder sample tick.
- ScriptAnalysis-001: harden the trust analyzer's TPA-absent fallback (resolve
forbidden anchors in the minimal reference set; warn on degraded mode) — anchors
added to validation references only, never the compile gate.
(InboundAPI-026 left to the feat/ipsen-movein effort per owner decision.)
Medium/Low: DM-026 deterministic deploy-status tiebreaker; SR-027/028/029/030
native-alarm leak/phantom-active/delete-during-redeploy fixes; AL-013/014/016;
TE-024 (folder-mutation audit rows now persisted)/025; SF-025 gauge-provider
clear-on-stop; ESG-025/026; SEC-023/024/025; SCA-007/008/009; plus doc/test
accuracy COM-023/024, HOST-025/026, HM-024/025, NS-027/028.
Full-solution build 0 warnings; ~3560 tests across 18 touched suites green.
Gitea renders mermaid inline, so the flow/state/hierarchy/DAG diagrams
move to text-in-markdown: auto-layout (removes the manual overlap-prone
draw.io step), diffable source, no committed binaries, and a dark-text
theme so labels stay legible. Keep draw.io PNGs only for the two complex
bespoke diagrams (logical architecture, env2 topology) where pixel
control still wins. All 24 mermaid blocks validated by rendering.
Replace ASCII-art diagrams across the README and docs/ with editable
.drawio sources plus exported PNGs, so the diagrams render clearly in
rendered markdown and can be maintained/regenerated instead of being
hand-edited as fragile text art. Non-diagram blocks (code, folder
trees, UI wireframes) were left as text.
Comm-016: delete dead HandleConnectionStateChanged + _debugSubscriptions /
_inProgressDeployments tracking + ConnectionStateChanged message record.
Disconnect detection is owned by the transport layers (gRPC keepalive PING
~25s; Ask-timeout at CommunicationService). Updates the
Component-Communication.md design doc to make that explicit.
SnF-018: NotificationForwarder.DeliverAsync now discards a corrupt buffered
payload (Warning log + return true) instead of returning false and parking
the row — honoring the design's "notifications do not park" invariant.
DM-018: reconciliation no longer force-sets Enabled, preserving an
intentional Disabled state after central failover.
ESG-018: DeliverBufferedAsync (both ExternalSystemClient + DatabaseGateway)
catches JsonException and returns false, turning a corrupt buffered row
into a parked operation instead of a retry-forever poison message.
InboundAPI-022: register ActiveNodeGate as IActiveNodeGate in the Central
DI branch so standby-node gating is actually wired up in production.
NS-019: remove orphaned NotificationDeliveryService /
INotificationDeliveryService / NotificationResult; central notification
delivery now lives entirely in NotificationOutbox.
SEL-016: normalise From/To filters to UTC before ISO-string compare so
non-UTC DateTimeOffset clients no longer get spuriously excluded events.
TE-017: include Description on attributes/alarms and a HashableConnections
projection (protocol, endpoint JSON, failover count) in the revision hash
and DiffService; staleness detection now catches description-only and
connection-endpoint edits.
Transport-001 and Transport-002 (also High) remain Open — they're being
handled in a follow-up batch because both touch BundleImporter.cs and
must serialise.
Switch site host to WebApplicationBuilder with Kestrel HTTP/2 gRPC server,
add GrpcPort/keepalive config, wire SiteStreamManager as ISiteStreamSubscriber,
expose gRPC ports in docker-compose, add site seed script, update all 10
requirement docs + CLAUDE.md + README.md for the new dual-transport architecture.
ClusterClient Sender refs are temporary proxies — valid for immediate reply
but not durable for future Tells. Events now flow as DebugStreamEvent through
SiteCommunicationActor → ClusterClient → CentralCommunicationActor → bridge
actor (same pattern as health reports). Also fix DebugStreamHub to use
IHubContext for long-lived callbacks instead of transient hub instance.
The debug view polled every 2s by re-subscribing for full snapshots. Now a
persistent DebugStreamBridgeActor on central subscribes once and receives
incremental Akka stream events from the site, forwarding them to the Blazor
component via callbacks and to the CLI via a new SignalR hub at
/hubs/debug-stream. Adds `debug stream` CLI command with auto-reconnect.
Organize documentation by moving requirements (HighLevelReqs, Component-*,
lmxproxy_protocol) to docs/requirements/ and test infrastructure docs to
docs/test_infra/. Updates all cross-references in README, CLAUDE.md,
infra/README, component docs, and 23 plan files.
Joseph Doherty