net-kingdom/workplans/NK-WP-0056-bounded-executor-path.md

id	type	title	domain	repo	status	flavor	owner	topic_slug	created	updated	related	state_hub_workstream_id
NK-WP-0056	workplan	Bounded executor path: founder admits, executors run	infotech	net-kingdom	proposed	design	claude	netkingdom	2026-10-30	2026-10-31	NK-WP-0054 NK-WP-0040 NK-WP-0031 NK-WP-0055	5bc74ef8-136e-5157-9a7f-da765dbfc977

NK-WP-0056 — Bounded executor path

Intake from the founder's direction on 2026-10-30, before the live LLDAP bind split: top-level decisions and guardrails stay with the founder; execution below that is delegated to automation with limited expense budgets and risk control, and the security architecture is the means. Founder-attended runbooks are a transitional state.

SI-15 (canon/standards/service-identity-privilege_v0.1.md) already names the golden path prepare → admit → execute → verify → retain and allows "a bounded executor under the admission" at step 3. Today preparation and verification are strong, admission is prose (a hub decision) and execution falls to the founder, because no executor exists that has its own identity, its own secret delivery and an authority ceiling the founder can admit and bound. SI-14 adds that an interactive agent session holds everything its tools reach, so it cannot be that executor until a session contract exists (glas-harness GLAS-WP-0018, proposed).

Why the bind split needed the founder (2026-10-30 run, step by step)

Runbook step	Needed the founder because	Class	Delegable once
Setup: decrypt custody copy	custody is a personal SOPS/age copy	delegable	service credentials live in OpenBao (T04)
1 prepare custody (generate passwords)	writes the personal custody copy	delegable	executor generates into OpenBao (T04)
2 plan, 4 verify, 10 verify	sign in as the human admin	delegable	read-only executor directory identity (T03)
3 create svc-* accounts	needs lldap_admin (LLDAP has no narrower grant that can create users)	root-class	admitted per run; executor runs it (T03)
5-8 switch one consumer	cluster-admin kubeconfig; secret values; founder sign-in check	delegable	scoped service account (T03), OpenBao/ESO (T04), synthetic MFA journey (T05)
9 change LLDAP's configured super-admin	changes who administers the directory	root-class	admitted per run; executor runs it
10 change admin's own password; seal ld-admin in the password safe	the founder's own credential and crisis custody	human-intrinsic	never: stays with the founder
Afterwards: restore drill on the next generation	admin operates drills	delegable	executor identity with the drill's read scope

Root-class means the founder still admits each run, but no longer types it. The run also showed why personal custody does not scale: the custody copy had drifted from live (AUTHELIA_KEYCAPE_CLIENT_SECRET) and step 6 had to be done by a one-off path.

Admission contract

id: NK-WP-0056-T01
status: todo
priority: high
assignee: claude-code
state_hub_task_id: "99df0ee2-2c17-55f2-9f3e-4277da52e01c"

Draft a NetKingdom standard for a bounded-execution admission: the founder approves, at aal2, an exact plan by digest with a validity window, a scope ceiling (MODE @ SCOPE grants, SI terms), a blast-radius rule (for example one consumer at a time), a stop-and-revert policy tied to named machine checks, a risk class, and an expense budget (wall time, attempts, compute/egress cost). The executor consumes the admission once. Map it to SI-15, the Playbook Capability Contract's trust-state requirements and the execution-attribution receipt (NK-WP-0040). Include a validator and synthetic fixtures.

Done when: the standard is proposed with a schema, a validator, and the bind-split steps expressed as admissions in its examples.

Owner agreement on the components

id: NK-WP-0056-T02
status: todo
priority: high
assignee: claude-code
needs_human: true
intervention_note: "Founder chooses the executor runtime owner; owner answers are agreements, not agent decisions."
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T01]
state_hub_task_id: "7263417b-b227-54f7-9edc-3e7f97cf132f"

Ask the owners which part each carries: approval-engine (the admission as its consumable approval object, plan digest and budget as bound fields, single consume), access-engine (reads the admission as an input claim), secrets-engine and railiance-platform (executor credential delivery through OpenBao), glas-harness (GLAS-WP-0018 session contract, so a harness-launched agent can be an executor), audit-core (receipt holder, as in NK-WP-0040). The founder decides who builds the executor runtime itself.

Done when: each component has a named owner and an answer, and the founder has chosen the executor runtime owner.

Executor identity and authority ceiling

id: NK-WP-0056-T03
status: todo
priority: high
assignee: claude-code
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T02]
state_hub_task_id: "592231dd-1981-57a6-a0e8-5d6fc474c6e7"

Declare the executor as a WORKLOAD (or harness-launched AGENT) principal in declarations/ with grants no wider than the pilot: a Kubernetes service account whose Role names the sso Secrets, ConfigMaps and Deployments it may patch or restart; a read-only directory bind for plan and verify; lldap_admin only for root-class steps under an admission. Extend tools/service-identity to check it.

Done when: the declaration validates and the Role is prepared in source with tests, not applied.

Service credentials into OpenBao

id: NK-WP-0056-T04
status: done
priority: high
assignee: claude-code
needs_human: true
intervention_note: "Founder runs the custody reconciliation and approves moving service binds out of personal custody."
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T02]
state_hub_task_id: "fd439c0c-9b5e-562c-9bfb-48dd0fb2c570"

With railiance-platform, move the LLDAP service binds (LLDAP_SVC_*_PASS) and the Authelia secrets from the personal custody copy into OpenBao paths delivered by ESO, so that neither a person nor an agent handles the values in a rotation. First reconcile the stale custody AUTHELIA_KEYCAPE_CLIENT_SECRET with the live value (founder-run, value-free comparison as in the 2026-10-30 evidence). Root-class material (ld-admin, unseal shares) stays in founder custody.

Done when: the four service binds are ESO-delivered from OpenBao, and the custody copy no longer needs to be decrypted for a bind rotation.

2026-10-30: reconciliation tool prepared: sso-mfa/bootstrap/reconcile-keycape-client-secret.py (value-free; accepts the live KeyCape value only if it matches Authelia's live hash, writes custody through rotation-env.py, no cluster writes; tests/test_reconcile_keycape_client_secret.py). Founder ran it 2026-10-30: live KeyCape value matches Authelia's hash; custody did not match before, was updated and matches after (value-free output); custody re-sealed and shredded. The reconciliation step is done; the ESO move remains.

2026-10-30, pilot svc-provisioner prepared (source only, nothing applied): railiance-platform CCR-2026-0052 (proposed) and policy net-kingdom-svc-provisioner-bind-eso; sso-mfa/k8s/identity-provisioner/bind-eso.yaml (ServiceAccount, SecretStore, ExternalSecret with creationPolicy: Merge into the existing Secret, password only); tools/service-binds/bind-lane.py setup|verify (approved sha256-bound CCR, attended platform-admin, custody must equal live, coding-agent fence, KV CAS=0, value-free receipts); tests/test_service_bind_lane.py (7). Next: owner approval of the CCR, then the founder-run setup, ESO apply and verify. Authelia, KeyCape and privacyIDEA follow one at a time.

2026-10-30, pilot live and verified: CCR-2026-0052 approved; founder-run setup, ESO apply and verify passed; svc-provisioner now binds with the ESO-delivered value (evidence). Finding: ESO targets need template.metadata: {} or the admission guard refuses the Secret update. Remaining: svc-authelia, svc-keycape, svc-privacyidea.

2026-10-31, svc-authelia lane prepared (source only, nothing applied): railiance-platform CCR-2026-0053 (proposed) and policy net-kingdom-svc-authelia-bind-eso; sso-mfa/k8s/authelia/bind-eso.yaml (Merge of ldap_password only into authelia-secrets, which also holds the session, storage and OIDC keys). bind-lane.py gains per-lane Secret keys: Authelia keeps the bind user in authelia-config, so setup refuses unless the live configuration binds uid=svc-authelia, and it decodes only the bind key. Authelia reads the file at start-up only, so the identical projection needs no restart; a later rotation does. 12 lane tests. Next: owner approval and binding confirmation, then the founder-run setup, ESO apply, verify and an Authelia restart with a login.

2026-10-31, svc-authelia live and verified: CCR-2026-0053 approved and binding confirmed; founder-run setup, ESO apply (Ready first time), verify and Authelia restart passed, and an admin portal sign-in with OTP worked (evidence). Two of four binds are ESO-delivered. Remaining: svc-keycape (bind inside sso/keycape-config), svc-privacyidea (resolver password stored in the privacyIDEA database, not a Secret key).

2026-10-31, svc-keycape design proposal (for founder decision): KeyCape's server reads lldap.bindPW only from config.yaml inside sso/keycape-config (internal/config/config.go); unlike client secrets (secretRef: env:... via secretKeyRef) it has no environment indirection. ESO Merge cannot own one field inside a YAML document, and rendering all of config.yaml from OpenBao would move every KeyCape value at once. Proposed:

1. key-cape (owner change, new KEY-WP): config.Load takes KEYCAPE_LLDAP_BIND_PW (the name lldap-export already uses). Env set and bindPW empty: use env. Both set and equal: use it and log that bindPW is redundant. Both set and different: refuse to start. This allows a staged switch with a clean rollback. Image through the owner pipeline; check-config reports which source is used, without the value.
2. NetKingdom: CCR-2026-0054 and a svc-keycape lane; ESO creates a new dedicated Secret keycape-lldap-bind (creationPolicy: Owner, key password), so no Secret has two writers. Setup compares custody with the live bindPW in keycape-config.
3. Deployment: add the env from secretKeyRef keycape-lldap-bind/password with the new image; values are equal, so behaviour is unchanged. Verify, restart, admin login.
4. Remove bindPW from keycape-config (directory-bind-rollout.py --operation clear-password, guarded on uid/resourceVersion); create-secrets.py stops writing it. Rollback at any step: re-add the value or drop

2026-10-31, founder decision: environment override, implemented by claude-code in key-cape. Done in source: key-cape e2b5fa1 (KEY-WP-0046-T01; image main-e2b5fa1 = sha256:9e082dca…6f8d, built by the Forgejo workflow; its acceptance job also fails on the previous commit a1ab8ff). NetKingdom: CCR-2026-0054 (proposed), sso-mfa/k8s/keycape/bind-eso.yaml (dedicated Secret keycape-lldap-bind, creationPolicy: Owner), bind-lane.py svc-keycape (setup reads bindPW from keycape-config and requires bindDN = svc-keycape; verify reads the dedicated Secret and requires it to equal bindPW while present), directory-bind-rollout.py --operation clear-password (only with the service bind and the delivered env; switch restores), and deployment.yaml pinned to the new image with the KEYCAPE_LLDAP_BIND_PW env. The new image also carries key-cape 67a0869..e2c5a94 (online token status, inactive while tokenStatus is unset) and identity-facts. Founder order: approve, setup, ESO apply, verify, deployment apply (image + env), login, clear-password, restart, login.

2026-10-31, svc-keycape live and verified: CCR-2026-0054 approved and binding confirmed; founder-run setup, ESO apply, verify, deployment rollout (image main-e2b5fa1 + env; both sources equal), admin login, clear-password, restart, env-only verify and a second admin login all passed (evidence). Three of four binds are ESO-delivered; keycape-config no longer holds the bind password. Remaining: svc-privacyidea (resolver password stored in the privacyIDEA database, not a Secret key: needs its own design).

2026-10-31, svc-privacyidea design proposal (for founder decision): privacyIDEA keeps the resolver BINDPW encrypted in its own database, and only the pi-admin API can change it (realm_bootstrap.py), so neither ESO nor an unattended job can deliver it without pi-admin's password standing in the cluster (rejected: SI rules). Proposed: OpenBao custody with attended write-through, following CCR-2026-0028 (attended-host-key-delivery):

1. bind-lane svc-privacyidea setup: the custody value must sign in to LLDAP as svc-privacyidea (LLDAP is the authority for the current password; the working resolver proves privacyIDEA holds the same one), then KV directory-binds/svc-privacyidea CAS=0, coding agents fenced. No Kubernetes role, no ESO, runtime_access: false.
2. realm_bootstrap.py --switch-bind --from-openbao: reads the KV value in memory under the attended platform-admin session and writes only BINDPW with the attended pi-admin; the existing preservation checks apply, and the write must be proven by an MFA login through the resolver (--verify-user).
3. Rotation becomes: change the password in LLDAP, write the next KV version, run step 2, verify with an OTP login. No custody decryption; the founder runs it and proves it with an MFA login.
4. CCR-2026-0055 needs a request type for attended delivery into a service; railiance-platform's credential-change.py gains it, modelled on attended-host-key-delivery. The done criterion of T04 then reads: three binds ESO-delivered, svc-privacyidea held in OpenBao with attended write-through. Alternative: keep it in founder custody as a recorded exception until privacyIDEA can read the resolver password from a file or environment.

2026-10-31, founder decision: OpenBao custody with attended write-through. Prepared in source: railiance-platform 2d4a383 adds request type attended-service-credential-delivery (scripts/attended_service_delivery.py, 4 tests; no policy, auth role, ESO or runtime frontdoor allowed) and CCR-2026-0055 (proposed). bind-lane.py svc-privacyidea: setup proves the custody value current by an LLDAP sign-in as svc-privacyidea, fences coding agents and writes KV v1 (CAS=0); verify proves the KV value current the same way, the fence present and no workload role. realm_bootstrap.py --rotate-bind --from-openbao rewrites only BINDPW on the service bind from OpenBao (attended platform-admin) and requires --verify-user. Correction: pi-admin signs in with a password; the MFA proof is the --verify-user login through the resolver.

Done 2026-10-31. svc-privacyidea live: CCR-2026-0055 approved; founder-run setup and verify passed (KV v1, value proven current by LLDAP sign-in, no workload role) and realm_bootstrap.py --rotate-bind --from-openbao wrote the resolver from OpenBao with an admin MFA proof (evidence; a first apply wrote the same value but its check got a code that was not admin's; both MFA prompts now name the user). All four service binds are held in OpenBao: svc-provisioner, svc-authelia and svc-keycape ESO-delivered, svc-privacyidea by attended write-through (founder decision 2026-10-31 amends the done criterion accordingly). No bind rotation needs the custody copy decrypted. The custody copy keeps the current values as a fallback. the env.

Synthetic verification instead of a founder sign-in

id: NK-WP-0056-T05
status: done
priority: medium
assignee: claude-code
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T04]
state_hub_task_id: "bb511d1e-6d5d-56d1-9030-2e0d94006a16"

A synthetic test user with an OTP seed held in OpenBao, and a journey that signs in through Authelia and KeyCape with MFA and resolves through privacyIDEA. Reuse the identity-provider journey acceptance. The executor runs it as the check between consumers and reverts on failure.

2026-10-31, founder decision: split into T05 (runner), T08 (synthetic stack on real pinned images), T09 (synthetic user and seed in OpenBao) and T10 (unattended live run). T05 is now the runner only: a stdlib journey that drives KeyCape /authorize (PKCE, acr_values=urn:netkingdom:aal2), Authelia /api/firstfactor and its OIDC authorization, the KeyCape callback and OTP form (KeyCape validates the code through privacyIDEA), and the KeyCape token exchange, then verifies the ID token's signature and assurance (aal2, otp). Secrets come from files or descriptors, never argv; the receipt is value-free and names the first failed step. All three consumer binds are on the path (svc-authelia at first factor, svc-keycape at the callback, svc-privacyidea at the OTP check); svc-provisioner is not.

Done when: the runner and its tests (in-process fakes per bind, fail-closed at the named step, no secret in the receipt) pass in the identity-provider journey acceptance workflow.

2026-10-31, implemented: sso-mfa/k8s/synthetic-journey/journey.py (stdlib; RS256 verified against KeyCape's JWKS without third-party packages; host_map for an in-cluster executor) with 26 tests in test_journey.py. Each broken bind fails closed at its step (svc-authelia → authelia_first_factor, svc-keycape → keycape_callback, svc-privacyidea → keycape_otp), and a sign-in without an OTP challenge, an aal1 token or a tampered signature fails. Green locally and in the workflow's pinned python:3.12-slim image with the network off; the job is added to identity-journeys.yaml. Done: the workflow's provider job passed on 0b0c6c9 (run 719). Next: T08.

Synthetic identity stack on pinned images

id: NK-WP-0056-T08
status: done
priority: medium
assignee: claude-code
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T05]
state_hub_task_id: "02611880-9ea4-5c9d-a5ab-b50847608f92"

A throwaway stack on the pinned production images (LLDAP, Authelia, privacyIDEA, KeyCape), published on 127.0.0.1 only, with generated values and production-shaped binds (svc-authelia, svc-keycape, svc-privacyidea), a synthetic user with a TOTP token, and the T05 runner against it. Extends the bind-split-rehearsal.py pattern.

Done when: the journey passes on the healthy stack and fails closed, at the expected step, for a deliberately broken bind of each of the three consumers, with value-free receipts.

Done 2026-10-31 (evidence): sso-mfa/k8s/synthetic-journey/stack.py + pi_fixture.py on the four pinned images. Healthy passes (aal2, otp, signature verified); svc-authelia fails closed at authelia_first_factor, svc-keycape at keycape_token (KeyCape binds at token time, not at the callback: mapping corrected), and svc-privacyidea at keycape_otp, but only after privacyIDEA's resolver cache expired (live CACHE_TIMEOUT 120 s; the first journey after the break passed). Each scenario passes again after the password is restored. Also: privacyIDEA refuses a reused TOTP time step, so the runner gained min_time_step. Consequence for T06/T10: the between-consumers check for svc-privacyidea must wait out or clear the resolver cache, and the attended --rotate-bind MFA proof has the same blind spot.

Synthetic user and seed in OpenBao

id: NK-WP-0056-T09
status: done
priority: medium
assignee: claude-code
needs_human: true
decision_id: 91323969-43fa-460f-9e0a-2b8cd44bdc9a
intervention_note: "Founder runs the live setup (LLDAP user, privacyIDEA token, OpenBao KV) under a CCR."
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T08]
state_hub_task_id: "1f788455-f79e-5630-bede-ec3218f6969d"

An unprivileged live user (for example syn-journey, no groups), its own privacyIDEA TOTP token, and password and seed held in OpenBao with coding agents fenced, a dedicated KeyCape public client for the journey, prepared as bind-lane.py-style setup/verify helpers under a CCR. Founder-run.

Done when: setup and verify pass live and one founder-started journey run passes with a receipt.

2026-10-31, prepared for founder decision (sso-mfa/k8s/synthetic-journey/T09-RUNBOOK.md): CCR-2026-0057 (railiance-platform, proposed; attended-service-credential-delivery, KV platform/workloads/net-kingdom/synthetic-journey/syn-journey fields PASSWORD, TOTP_SEED, no workload reader), SecurityCase security-cases/nk-synthetic-journey.yaml (public PKCE client, MFA pinned), and lane.py setup/verify/teardown with 8 fake-backed tests. Identity route: attended owner trial by admin (the route the NK-WP-0049 retirement names for test identities), not User Engine onboarding; name syn-journey under a proposed syn-<check> convention (SI §5), declared SERVICE, status planned. Open, recorded: KeyCape marks every token principal_type: human; KeyCape has no per-client group gate. Waiting on: CCR approval, case acceptance, founder run of the runbook.

Done 2026-10-31 (evidence): CCR-2026-0057 approved; case accepted; client registered; founder-run lane.py setup and verify passed. The live journey reached aal2 (pwd+otp, signature verified) against kc.coulomb.social. Two lane fixes on the way: privacyIDEA tokens are looked up by serial, and enrollment uses a privacyIDEA-generated key, because pi-admin's action=* enables totp_force_server_generate, which silently replaced the supplied key (reproduced on 3.12.2). One partial run was removed with lane.py teardown. Next: T10 needs the executor identity (T03) and a workload-kv-read request for it.

Unattended live journey

id: NK-WP-0056-T10
status: todo
priority: medium
assignee: claude-code
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T03, NK-WP-0056-T09]
state_hub_task_id: "a68252da-46f7-52eb-81d3-942ddd9ecb9b"

The executor identity (T03) reads the journey secrets from OpenBao itself and runs the journey as the check between consumers; failure triggers the revert path.

Done when: the journey runs unattended against live with no person involved, and fails closed against a deliberately broken bind on a synthetic directory (T08).

Pilot: unattended bind rotation under one admission

id: NK-WP-0056-T06
status: todo
priority: high
assignee: claude-code
needs_human: true
intervention_note: "Founder signs the admission for the single live pilot rotation."
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T01, NK-WP-0056-T03, NK-WP-0056-T04, NK-WP-0056-T05, NK-WP-0056-T10]
state_hub_task_id: "6c3939f8-23a9-5f70-a3b1-94f4b291706b"

Rotate svc-authelia's password with no person in the loop beyond the admission: generate into OpenBao, set in LLDAP, let ESO deliver, restart, run the synthetic journey, revert on failure, emit a receipt to audit-core. Rehearse on a synthetic directory first, then one live run under a founder-signed admission.

Done when: the live rotation completes or reverts on its own, within its budget, with a verified receipt, and the founder's only action was the admission.

Budget and risk enforcement

id: NK-WP-0056-T07
status: todo
priority: medium
assignee: claude-code
depends_on: [NK-WP-0056-T06]
state_hub_task_id: "a87c5edb-7604-5eba-9261-b1ed2ed16655"

Enforce the admission's budget and blast radius at run time (attempt and time limits, a kill switch the founder holds, refusal when a check is missing), and feed outcomes and drift into posture feedback (NK-WP-0031) so that recurring admissions can be reviewed in aggregate rather than one by one.

Done when: a run that exceeds its budget or scope stops and reverts in a synthetic test, and the pilot's receipts appear in a posture-feedback report.