fluid-telegram/docs/seeding-runbook.md

# Operator runbook — seeding platform access

Some platform access cannot be provisioned from a specification. Telegram will
not let software create the *first* credential: an account needs a phone and a
device, and `api_id` / `api_hash` come from a web form behind a login. No API
exists for either, and none is coming, because their purpose is to establish that
a person is on the other end.

This runbook is what we do instead. It is not a lowering of the bar. **A manual
step is acceptable when it is guided, repeatable, and bounded — and unacceptable
when it is merely undocumented.** The test each step below has to pass is that
an operator who has never done it can follow it once, get the same result as
anyone else, and hand the outcome to a tool that takes over from there.

## The rule this runbook operates under

> Automate everything that has an interface. Where a step exists specifically to
> prove a human is present, guide it — and record why it resisted automation, so
> the judgement can be revisited rather than inherited.

Every manual step below carries a **Why not automated** line. That line is the
thing to re-read when the platform changes. Some of them will stop being true;
the sooner that is noticed, the smaller the runbook gets.

There is a real distinction here worth keeping. A KYC identity check resists
automation *by design* — automating it would defeat what it is for, and a
component weak enough to allow it is a defect, not an opportunity. A web form
that mints an API key resists automation only *incidentally*, because nobody
built the endpoint. The first stays manual on principle. The second is a
candidate the moment anything changes.

Telegram's steps are all the second kind. None of them is a fraud control; they
are just interfaces that were never built.

---

## Before you start

Have these ready. Stopping halfway through to find one is how the session
becomes irreproducible.

- [ ] A phone number that can receive SMS, **not** a personal one
- [ ] A device with Telegram installed, to complete the first login
- [ ] Access to OpenBao (`bao.coulomb.social`) with write on the campaign's subtree
- [ ] The campaign's presence spec merged (`pr-hall-of-helix/presence/telegram.yaml`)
- [ ] The avatar asset committed and referenced by the spec

Roughly 20 minutes, once.

## Where the secrets go

The provisioner computes these paths; they are not a convention you may vary.
For campaign `hall-of-helix` on the default `secret` mount:

```
secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/operator-app       api_id, api_hash
secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/operator-session   written by the tool
secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/bot-token          written by the tool
secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/redaction-salt     written by the tool, once
```

Set these before any command below. `BAO_MOUNT` defaults to `secret`.

```bash
export BAO_ADDR=https://bao.coulomb.social
export BAO_TOKEN=<your token>        # not committed, not echoed
```

Only the first path is written by hand. The rest are the tool's, and writing
one yourself will be overwritten or -- for the salt -- silently honoured
forever.

---

## Step 1 — Register the operator account

**Why not automated:** Telegram requires a phone number and an SMS round trip.
There is no registration API at any tier. This is the step whose whole purpose
is to prove a person is present.

1. Install Telegram on the device and register with the operator phone number.
2. Set a display name that reads as an operator account, not a person.
3. Enable two-factor authentication and store the password somewhere you can
   retrieve it. The tool prompts for it during Step 3 and does not read it from
   OpenBao, so this is for you, not for the provisioner.

**Do not use a personal account.** If it is rate-limited or restricted — which
automation can cause — the loss should be a throwaway account, not someone's
messages.

**Record:** the phone number where your team can find it. The tool prompts for
it rather than reading it, so it is not one of the paths above.

---

## Step 2 — Obtain `api_id` and `api_hash`

**Why not automated:** issued by a web form at my.telegram.org behind a login
code. No API. This one is incidental rather than principled — if Telegram ever
exposes it, Step 2 disappears.

1. Go to <https://my.telegram.org>, log in with the operator number.
2. **API development tools** → create an application.
   - App title: `helixforge-provisioner`
   - Platform: Other
3. Copy `api_id` and `api_hash`.

**Record:** both, in OpenBao. This is the one secret you write by hand, and
everything downstream reads it:

```bash
bao kv put secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/operator-app \
  api_id=<the number> api_hash=<the hash>
```

Verify the tool can see it before going on:

```bash
bao kv get secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/operator-app
```

They are shown once per application. Losing them means creating another.

---

## Step 3 — Mint the MTProto session

**Why not automated:** the login code arrives out of band, on the device. The
command is interactive by necessity — but *only this command*, and only once.

```bash
go run ./cmd/provision session bootstrap --campaign hall-of-helix
```

It prompts for the phone number, the login code, and the 2FA password, then
writes the session string to OpenBao at
`secret/fluid-telegram/hall-of-helix/telegram/operator-session`.

The session string is a **full-account credential** — it can do anything the
account can. It never leaves OpenBao, is never given to the adapter, and is used
only by the provisioner. Treat losing it as losing the account.

**Verify:**

```bash
go run ./cmd/provision session check --campaign hall-of-helix   # prints the account, no secrets
```

---

## Step 4 — Hand over to the provisioner

From here nothing is manual. The remaining work is `FT-WP-0002` T03–T06:

```bash
go run ./cmd/provision plan  --spec ../pr-hall-of-helix/presence/telegram.yaml  # read the diff
go run ./cmd/provision apply --spec ../pr-hall-of-helix/presence/telegram.yaml  # execute it
```

`apply` registers the bot through BotFather, sets its name, about text and
description, creates the test channel, adds the bot as administrator with
`post_messages` only, generates the redaction salt if it is absent, and writes
`presence/resolved/hall-of-helix.yaml`.

Two things it will *not* do on this first run, both by design and both reported
in the plan. The **public channel is held** until a rendering has been checked in
the test channel. The **avatar is deferred**: `/setuserpic` needs a photo upload
that is not implemented, so set it by hand in @BotFather, or wait.

**Read the plan before approving it.** That is the human judgement this design
keeps — not clicking through BotFather, but deciding whether the diff is what
was intended.

---

## Re-running this

Steps 1–2 are once per operator account, ever. Step 3 repeats only if the session
is revoked — by a password change, an explicit sign-out, or Telegram invalidating
it. When that happens, re-run Step 3 alone; nothing else is affected, because
resolved state and the bot token do not depend on the session that created them.

Step 4 is safe to repeat at any time. It is a converging reconciler, and a second
apply over an unchanged spec does nothing.

## When a step stops being necessary

Re-read the **Why not automated** lines whenever Telegram changes its API surface,
and delete the step if the reason has expired. A runbook nobody prunes becomes a
description of how things used to work, and the manual steps in it start looking
like requirements rather than gaps.