menu-admin was the odd one out: it built from the working directory with a date
tag and a multi-arch manifest, deployed with `-e tag=`, and kept the Docker-era
container name. The other two apps build from `git archive HEAD` and tag with the
commit, so what runs on the host is exactly what git knows about; build only for
the architecture emily actually runs; and use one slug for the container, its
network and its data directory.
The build is now their three lines: `podman build --platform linux/arm64` from
`git archive HEAD`, tagged `:<commit>` and `:latest`, pushed with `podman push`
rather than a manifest. `deploy.sh` pushes the commit first, then refuses a dirty
tracked tree or a HEAD that is not origin/main — which is what makes the commit
tag trustworthy — takes the same `--force` and `--no-push`, and ends in the same
`-u tanshu ... -e image_tag=<commit>`. Its own lint/typecheck/test gate stays,
but behind `--checks`, so a plain deploy behaves as theirs does.
The registry credential moves into vars/default.yml and the role logs in, pulls
and logs out around it, as their roles do. The image is only pulled at deploy
time, so the unit keeps podman's default `Pull=missing` and a reboot never needs
the registry. This is the same plaintext credential the other two repos carry.
One real bug goes with it: the healthcheck gate ran before the handler that
restarts a changed unit, so a run that only changed the unit checked the stale
container. `meta: flush_handlers` before the gate is the fix the sibling repos
already made.
The container, network and data directory are all menu-<site> now. The dotted
Docker-era name and the NetworkAlias it needed are gone, so `podman logs
menu-<site>` and `systemctl --user status menu-<site>` are the same two commands
across all three apps. The Dockerfile keeps its name for the same reason: podman
reads it as readily as a Containerfile, and the siblings use that name too.
The fleet on emily is rootless Podman with Quadlet units under
~/.config/containers/systemd and state in ~/podman-data, all behind one shared
Caddy unit. This brings the menus in line instead of leaving them the last
Docker deployment. The build moves with them: podman reads a Containerfile as
readily as a Dockerfile, so the name now says which toolchain is real.
The app is one .container and one .network file. Two details carry it.
UserNS=keep-id maps the image's own node account onto the user that owns the
units, so data/ and site.env stay owned by tanshu: plain tar backups, no
subuids. provision-site-env.sh writes site.env with the same mapping rather
than --user, which under rootless Podman would have produced a subuid-owned
file the app could not read. And the Site registers its own network with Caddy
by writing a drop-in beside caddy.container, so Caddy never lists its upstreams
and never changes when a Site is added. The unit keeps the Docker-era container
name for the scripts and muscle memory that look it up, while the Caddyfile
proxies to a dotless NetworkAlias, because a container name with dots in it is
a liability in DNS.
The unit keeps podman's Pull=missing, so a restart or a reboot never depends on
the registry being reachable, while the play pulls explicitly at deploy time.
That is also where a missing `podman login` for the private registry now fails,
with the instruction, rather than as a unit that will not start.
copy-site-data.sh moves a Site's data across, and is not a plain rsync:
/var/lib/menu.* on monoco belongs to uid 1000 while the ssh user there is 1001,
so the read needs sudo; monoco cannot ssh to emily, so the workstation relays
the tar; and the extraction runs as tanshu on emily, which is what makes the
files land owned by the user keep-id maps the app onto. It proves the copy by
comparing a SHA-256 of the whole tree against the source and checking every
file's owner.
Not yet done: the copies themselves and the DNS move, which need a human.
~/programming/menu-admin, since it is a project rather than a folder of the
images it serves. The plan's mention of static-menu/Caddyfile stays: that is the
images directory, which does not move.
The script refused anything under ten characters. That is a policy the owner
should hold, not one the tooling invents; the only rule left is that the password
cannot be empty, since an empty one would let anyone in. Resetting is the same
script with --force, which overwrites the hash and generates a fresh session
secret, signing out anyone who was signed in - now written down in the operating
notes and the deployment readme, including the form that prompts on your own
machine instead of the server.
That was the intent of the uncommitted edit, and it is a better location than a
second directory: the app inherits the place the menus were already served from
and only ever reads and writes its own data/ and site.env inside it.
app_root is written as /var/lib/{{ host }}, quoted, because the unquoted form is
what failed to parse. Every documented path follows, and the deployment readme
now says that emptying the old menu files means deleting those files rather than
the directory, which holds the live content.
There is no previous system kept serving, so the playbook no longer knows about
one: the retire flags, the temporary web address, the task that removed the old
nginx snippet and the task that stopped the old container are gone. One run
starts the container and points the Site's web address at it, and deploying an
earlier tag is the rollback. The vars lose vhost, retire_nginx_snippet,
retire_nginx_container and legacy_container; the Caddy role keeps only the
snippet upsert.
The deployment readme drops its staged-rollout sections and the glossary of words
that no longer exist, and the plan's sequence and the operating notes describe
the single run instead.
Three things that needed a rebuild and a redeploy, or had no way in at all, now
have a Site identity panel in the admin: the restaurant's name and tagline, an
SVG icon upload, and a switch for whether a menu says when it was published.
They live in data/site.json and data/brand/icon.svg, extending ADR 0007: what
the owner changes is content, and the config is the seed plus the theme, which
still needs a rebuild.
An uploaded SVG is a document that would run with this origin's authority, so it
is reduced to shapes on the way in and served with default-src 'none'. The
archive list keeps its dates even when the switch is off, because those dates
are how one old menu is told from another.
Also fixes the live check's own trap: the app caches identity in memory, so the
tests drive it through the app rather than a second store instance, which would
be a second writer.
Google Stitch produced an Atelier Dining & Hospitality system for this app: warm
ivory linen and espresso for the guest surfaces, burnished gold for the single
active thing, Playfair Display for the restaurant's voice and Plus Jakarta Sans
for everything transactional, editorial rows with dot leaders, pill controls,
hairline containment instead of drop shadows. The four screens and the system
document are kept in docs/design/stitch/ as the source.
Both fonts are now self-hosted with their licences, the guest stylesheet is
rebuilt on the system, and the admin is the same system in its dark mode
(espresso workspace, obsidian pods, gold actions) by overriding the same tokens
at a higher specificity, since the per-Site theme is injected inline after the
stylesheets. The Site theme in config/ moves to the system's palette, which is
where per-Site branding belongs; the old Archivo font is dropped.
Categories were baked into config/<site>.site.json, so adding one meant a
rebuild and a redeploy. They are now data: data/sections.json, seeded from the
config the first time, and managed in the admin (add, rename, reorder, remove).
A category's web address is fixed when it is created because that is what a QR
code points at, and a category cannot be removed while it still holds menus.
The landing and the top bar were the ugliest parts. The landing was a column of
hairlines with tiny meta — a broadsheet, and the paper that makes this app worth
looking at was nowhere on it. It is now a shelf: each category is a row whose
right edge is a sliver of that menu's first page, bleeding off the screen, with
the shelf edge in brass and the name in heavy tight Archivo. The bar was a row
of teal pills that would not survive more categories: it now names the menu you
are reading and opens a sheet listing the rest, each with its own paper sliver,
and the current one is the only teal thing on screen. The sheet is a link to the
landing page, so navigating still works without the script.
Also fixes the category manager's own layout, which I shipped unstyled, and the
markup contract the route tests described.
A file past the size limit makes the multipart stream itself throw, which
escaped the per-file catch and reached the error handler: the phone that just
sent a 35 MB photo got 'Something went wrong'. Catch the limit errors around the
part loop, say which limit was hit, and report it once rather than twice. Also
asserts that derivatives carry no EXIF while the Original keeps the uploaded
bytes.
tanshu