An admin edits any loaded plugin's configuration from the website and it reloads
automatically. Base tier generates a form from the config VALUES themselves -
boolean to toggle, number to numeric field, string to text, array to list,
nested object to group - so it works for whatever plugins happen to be
installed, including ones added after we ship. Advanced tier is raw JSON.
Same posture as R2, the site as authority over the game host, but a different
SHAPE: R2 is continuously reconciled state pushed on connect, this is
request/reply on demand. It must not be built on the permission mirror.
The mechanics, all verified: configs at oxide/config/<Plugin>.json, oxide.reload
rereads one, and OnPluginLoaded / OnPluginUnloaded are real hooks in the Server
category - so whether a reload actually SUCCEEDED is observable rather than
assumed. That is what makes the feature safe.
The trap that would silently corrupt every float: JavaScript cannot tell 1 from
1.0, and Oxide configs deserialize into typed C# classes. JSON.parse of
{"Rate":1.0} yields the number 1 and JSON.stringify writes it back as 1, so a
naive read-modify-write rewrites every whole-numbered float as an integer, on
fields nobody touched. Newtonsoft may coerce it or may throw, and a throw at
load means the plugin does not come back. So never parse the whole document,
mutate and re-serialize - edit textually, or use a parser that preserves number
literals. The fields at risk are exactly the ones a Rust server tunes: gather
rates, multipliers, scales.
Five more limits of inferring a schema from values are recorded, since the
feature's whole promise is that it works without knowing the plugin: empty
arrays and null carry no type; enum-like strings are indistinguishable from free
text; there are no descriptions, minimums or maximums, so the key name is the
entire label; nested objects need recursion with a depth limit and a raw-JSON
fallback; and the file after a reload may not be what we wrote, because Oxide
merges missing defaults and saves.
Safety needs more than usual here, because a bad config does not fail the write,
it fails the next LOAD and the plugin stays down - and R6/R17 make four plugins
required, so a broken ZoneManager config takes event participation with it. The
write path is: read with a version and require it back on write so a concurrent
on-disk edit conflicts rather than being clobbered; validate it parses; back up,
write, reload; then watch for OnPluginLoaded within a window and, if it does not
arrive, restore the backup and reload again AUTOMATICALLY. That rollback is the
feature's real content - without it this is a web form that can take the shard's
plugins down one typo at a time.
Two more obligations. Plugin configs routinely hold API keys and Discord
webhooks, so a config reader hands those to anyone who can open the page: mask
values whose key matches key/token/secret/password/webhook and treat them
write-only, as the platform already treats the uo-link token. And gate it on its
own site permission with an audit trail of who changed which key from what to
what and whether the reload succeeded - it is an admin writing to the game
host's filesystem, the most powerful thing the site can do to a server.
One distinction kept explicit: editing a config FILE is not a lease. A lease
borrows a convar for a while and the game restores it on a deadline; this writes
a file and is permanent until someone changes it back. They look similar from a
web form and an event should never reach for this one.
Lands as phase 7b, beside permissions, since it shares the admin surface and the
gating.
Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_016wDDVXWMDz82WqE1i969r4
edge → main)' (#232) from edge into main
Runic Gateway — Documentation
Central documentation for the Runic Gateway platform. The docs here were extracted from the two code repositories (with full commit history preserved) so they live in one place, independent of either codebase.
Layout
website/ docs from the website core (Node/Express + MariaDB + React/Vite)
modules/ docs for installable game modules — one directory per module id
link/ docs from the ServUO bridge (C# plugin + Rust sidecar + Node WS)
android/ docs from the native Android client (Kotlin + Jetpack Compose)
installer/ docs for the installer that deploys a shard's bridge components
ci/ cross-cutting CI/quality notes
Setting up a shard? installer/INSTALL.md is the operator guide, and
the installer is the supported path: one binary deploys the plugin overlay, installs the uo-link
sidecar as a service, and hands you the values the website needs.
website/
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| BACKEND_DESIGN.md | API contract, DB schema, security model |
| ARCHITECTURE.md | The system diagram — how core, an installed module, the sidecar and the clients fit together |
| TEAMS.md | Teams as a platform primitive: roster, forums, notifications, Discord slash commands and voice — design of record |
| ENGAGEMENT.md | The engagement system: module-declared event triggers, rules, cooldowns, templates and the email / push / in-app delivery channels — design of record |
| HERO_EDITOR.md | Hero canvas editor feature spec |
| THEMING_AND_NAV.md | Admin-configurable theme, brand assets and navigation — build contract |
| MODULE_SYSTEM.md | Making the site game-agnostic: game logic becomes an installable module — design of record |
| MODULE_API.md | The module ↔ core contract: ctx, the register* calls, the client registry and the loader's obligations |
| UPGRADE_NOTES.md | Operator-facing, newest first — the upgrades that need an operator to do something, or that change behaviour quietly enough to be discovered by accident |
| WIKI_UPGRADE.md | Wiki subsystem upgrade notes |
| SHARD_VISIBILITY.md | Who sees which shard data — the admin-configurable audience framework |
| TRUSTED_DEVICES_MFA.md | TOTP two-factor, trusted devices and recovery codes |
| MODERATION_APPEALS.md | Moderation actions, content reports and the appeals flow |
| SPAWN_ATLAS.md | The bestiary / spawn atlas: what the shard contains, parsed from the shard's own ServUO files — served over the bridge since Protocol 8, so no shared filesystem |
| CLILOCS.md | UO's id → name table, so items have names. The shard decompresses and serves it over the bridge; the desktop conversion it replaced is gone |
| MARKETPLACE.md | The player-vendor index: how it is gathered, what it costs, how to tune it |
| website-README.md | Snapshot of the website repo's README (setup/run reference) |
| test-plan.md | The website's test strategy and harness |
| API_V2_PLAN.md | Router domain split + CSP hardening. The split is complete; only the CSP enforce step remains |
| API_V2_SKELETON.md | Superseded — the /api/v2 scaffold that was never built. Kept as the record of why the split was done in place instead |
| PROJECT_TREE.md | Auto-generated snapshot of the repo's tracked file layout |
modules/
Documentation for installable game modules aggregates here rather than in each module's repo (MODULE_SYSTEM.md §2.10). The website core knows nothing about any particular game; a module is what makes it a site for one.
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| uo/ | module-uo — the Ultima Online module: what it serves, what it owns, and what an operator needs |
| uo/API.md · uo/SCHEMA.md | module-uo's own route surface and the tables it owns |
| kit-acceptance.md | The Integration Kit acceptance run — building a module by following the kit alone, and what it found |
| rust-dryrun.md | A written, deliberately unimplemented module-rust — the test that the module contract generalises past the game it was extracted from |
| rust/ | Reference for the upcoming module-rust — a mirror of the uMod/Oxide ecosystem, scraped from upstream: HOOKS.md (477 Rust hooks), OXIDE_API.md (the plugin framework), DEFINITIONS.md (678 items, 2,590 skins), OPERATING.md (the operator's side), and agent/ — the same facts as TSV/JSONL at ~46% of the tokens |
link/
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| INTEGRATION.md | How the website integrates with the uo-link sidecar |
| PROTOCOL_2.md | Protocol 2.0 / 2.1 design |
| v3.md | Protocol 3.0 design — shard content/standings streams + the visibility framework |
| v4.md | Protocol 4.0 — guild membership on the wire (guild.roster, guild.leave) |
| v5.md | Protocol 5 — three enrichments in one bump: house.decay's decay schedule, vendor.listing's fee state, and account.login.result. Shipped 2026-09-01 as bundle 2026.09.01 (sidecar v2.1.0 + overlay v1.1.0) |
| v6.md | Protocol 6 — idempotent commands, config leases with a shard-side deadline, and the run-scoped participation ledger |
| v7.md | Protocol 7 — the world verbs an event OWNS: creatures, bosses, oracle NPCs, temporary gates, decoration, and the persisted ownership registry behind them. The released protocol, bundle 2026.09.10 (sidecar v2.2.0 + overlay v1.2.0) |
| v8.md | Protocol 8 — the Asset Bridge: the shard reads its own UO client and serves creature art, item and land pictures, the cliloc table and its own spawn files, so nothing is converted on a desktop and the website needs no shared filesystem. On edge |
| ADMIN_CONTROLS.md | Staff write-plane (kick/ban/broadcast, page queue) |
| SHARD_PREREQS.md | Shard-side prerequisites for the bridge |
| PLAN.md | uo-link build plan |
| RESEARCH.md | Research notes |
| link-README.md | Snapshot of the link repo's README |
| PROJECT_TREE.md | Auto-generated snapshot of the repo's tracked file layout |
android/
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| PLAN.md | Android client build plan / milestones |
| COVERAGE_PLAN.md | Test-coverage rollout plan |
| APP_LINKS.md | Android App Links / deep-link setup |
| theme-plan.md | Theming plan |
| THEMING_AND_NAV.md | The app's half of admin-configurable theming and navigation — build contract |
| TRUSTED_DEVICES_APP_HANDOFF.md | Trusted-devices app handoff notes |
| PROJECT_TREE.md | Auto-generated snapshot of the repo's tracked file layout |
installer/
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| INSTALL.md | Start here to set up a shard — the installer deploys the plugin overlay and the uo-link sidecar, registers the service, and connects it to the website. Appendix A is the same thing by hand, still supported |
| PLAN.md | Installer design of record — phases, locked decisions, the bundle/compat-matrix model |
| PROJECT_TREE.md | Auto-generated snapshot of the repo's tracked file layout |
ci/
| Doc | What it covers |
|---|---|
| SONARQUBE.md | The SonarQube setup: project keys, how analysis runs, and how to read a report |
Provenance
website/*was extracted fromRunicGateway/websiteviagit filter-repo.link/*was extracted fromRunicGateway/linkviagit filter-repo.
Commit history and authorship for each doc are preserved. The two source repos retain a short pointer to this repo in their own READMEs; the authoritative copy of each document now lives here.
License
Runic Gateway's documentation is free: licensed under the GNU General Public License v3.0 or later — see LICENSE.md.
Copyright (C) 2026 Runic Gateway
This documentation is distributed in the hope that it will be useful, but
WITHOUT ANY WARRANTY. You may redistribute and/or modify it under the terms of
the GNU General Public License as published by the Free Software Foundation,
either version 3 of the License, or (at your option) any later version.
Contributions are welcome — please read CONTRIBUTING.md (note the AI-usage disclosure requirement) and our Code of Conduct.