The Modules screen as built (website#143), and the three things standing it
up against a live server exposed. Two of them are older than this phase and
neither was reachable from a test.
- A fresh install over a row the previous boot left `startup_failed` rendered
the old failure - "module directory not present on the volume", one second
after the files were written there - and, because that branch is not
pending, suppressed the restart banner the install had just told the
operator to use. Fixed by a derivation rather than a special case: the
loader scans once at require time, so a module on the volume with no live
record arrived after that scan and anything the row says predates it.
- The boot refresh had been nulling every install's provenance. source and
sha256 exist for this screen and never survived a restart, because
lifecycle.boot() re-records with neither and the upsert assigned both
unconditionally. It could not have been found before Phase 4 wrote the first
non-null value those columns ever had - and the model's test fake
reproduced the defect faithfully, assigning exactly like the SQL.
- The restart killed the server outright on Windows. process.kill(pid,
'SIGTERM') reaches the graceful handler on Linux and is unconditional
termination where POSIX signals do not exist, so a Windows host got no
module onShutdown, no pool close and no log flush. process.emit('SIGTERM')
reaches the same listener everywhere. The test had stubbed process.kill and
asserted the call - precisely the call whose meaning differs by platform.
That last one generalises: deployment is Linux containers and would never
have shown it. A smoke that only runs where the code ships cannot find a class
of defect that only bites the people developing it.
Also documents the COALESCE in BACKEND_DESIGN's installed_modules section.
Co-Authored-By: Claude <noreply@anthropic.com>
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 |
| 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 |
| WIKI_UPGRADE.md | Wiki subsystem upgrade notes |
| SHARD_VISIBILITY.md | Who sees which shard data — the admin-configurable audience framework |
| SPAWN_ATLAS.md | The bestiary / spawn atlas: what the shard contains, parsed from its own ServUO tree |
| CLILOCS.md | UO's id → name table: converting one from your client so items have names |
| UOFIDDLER.md | Operator runbook — step-by-step extraction from your own UO client (cliloc table, creature art) |
| 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) |
| 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 |
| rust-dryrun.md | A written, deliberately unimplemented module-rust — the test that the module contract generalises past the game it was extracted from |
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 |
| 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 |
| 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 |
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.