docs(docker): describe the root start and drop, and keep the override file out of the image

docker/README.md and docs/docker-compose.md now say that the container starts
as root, corrects a daemon-created bind source and drops to PUID:PGID with
setpriv, which capabilities that needs, and that a compose file written
elsewhere must carry them. The README's PowerShell example runs Compose from
inside docker/ so the override file is discovered, instead of the `-f
docker/docker-compose.yaml` form its own Local customisation section warns
silently drops it, and the reverse-proxy section no longer asks for an override
file now that docker-compose.yaml forwards CODEMAN_ALLOWED_HOSTS itself.

.dockerignore excludes docker-compose.override.* everywhere: it is the
documented home for host-specific settings and rode `COPY . .` into the image,
the same shape as the docker/.env exclusion above it (verified with a scratch
build context: the override files and docker/.env are absent, .env.example and
the compose file present).

CLAUDE.md's Compose paragraph carries the corrected cap list, the writability
probe, and the two traps behind it (KILL is for tini, the CLI prefix is
appended to PATH).

Co-Authored-By: Claude Fable 5.1 <noreply@anthropic.com>

.dockerignore

@@ -9,6 +9,9 @@
 **/.env
 **/.env.*
 !**/.env.example
+# Same shape: docker/docker-compose.override.yml is the documented home for
+# host-specific settings, so it must not ride COPY . . into the image either.
+**/docker-compose.override.*
 node_modules
 dist
 coverage

CLAUDE.md

@@ -219,7 +219,7 @@ Codeman is a Claude Code session manager with web interface and autonomous Ralph
 
 **Docker cases**: a case can point at a **container**, with any of the CLI run modes running inside it. Like remote-SSH this is a **LOCATION OVERLAY on cases, never a `SessionMode` of its own**. Exactly one long-lived container **per case**, shared by all its sessions, so killing a session kills only that session's in-container tmux and **never** `docker stop` while siblings remain. The workspace is a real host dir bind-mounted at the **same absolute path**, which is what keeps file-routes/watchers on real host bytes and makes the in-container transcript projHash match the host. Credentials are **seeded** (RO mount, copied into the container once) rather than shared RW, so in-container CLIs never write refreshed tokens back to the host, and bind mounts are excluded from `docker commit` so exports stay secret-free. **NEVER a create-time `-e` for secrets, NEVER `--privileged`, NEVER the docker socket.** Config drift is detected via a label hash and a drifted launch is REFUSED rather than silently launched with stale config. ⚠️ A case may instead **ADOPT** a container the user already runs (`DockerCase.owned === false`, mirror of remote-SSH's `owned:false`): Codeman only `exec`s into it and never creates, starts, stops, restarts or removes it, so a missing or stopped container FAILS CLOSED with an actionable message instead of being fixed. Absent = owned, so existing cases are byte-identical. The guarantee is enforced at four independent layers because it cannot be observed by using the feature: `buildDockerStopCommand`/`buildDockerRemoveCommand` throw during pure STRING CONSTRUCTION, `removeDockerContainer` refuses again, drift reports "none" (an adopted container carries no `codeman.confighash` label, so a real comparison would 409 the launch forever), and the boot reaper skips it. ⚠️ Two lifecycle touches the original design missed and that are easy to re-introduce: the full-image export `docker commit`s the container (refused for an adopted case) and the workspace export `docker pause`s it first (skipped — it freezes the owner's processes for the length of the tar). ⚠️ `owned` is applied AFTER `dockerConfigHash`, which takes an explicit field list, or every pre-existing case would trip the drift gate at once. ⚠️ Run modes for a container case come from the CONTAINER (`availableModes`, live-probed): gating the run menu on HOST CLIs (#201) is right for local sessions and wrong here, since a host with no `claude` may run a container that ships one. ⚠️ **A failed probe means opposite things per ownership** — for an ADOPTED case it is a fault worth reporting, for an OWNED one it is the NORMAL state before the first session (the launch chain creates the container), so treating it as a fault hid every agent mode on every freshly linked Docker case behind "start it yourself first". That is why `CaseInfo.docker.owned` is on the wire. ⚠️ Claude is launched WITHOUT `--dangerously-skip-permissions` when the container's exec user is root (Claude Code refuses the flag as root and the refusal is visible only inside the container); which flag to drop is a per-CLI fact, so it is the registry's `overlays.docker.rootCommand`, never a branch. ⚠️ Adoption is **admin-only in multi-user mode**, unlike `docker-link`: linking creates OUR container, whose one bind mount `isWorkingDirAllowed` has already confined, while an adopted container's mounts belong to its owner and one mounting `/` hands the adopter the host. The same reasoning admin-gates the container listing and the in-container directory browser; the preflight instead admits a non-admin for a container already linked to a case they own, because the run menu probes it for every docker case. ⚠️ On the loopback-only prod bind a container cannot reach 127.0.0.1, so in-container hooks need `CODEMAN_DOCKER_BRIDGE_HOOKS=1`; otherwise idle detection falls back to output-based. → [architecture-invariants#docker-cases](docs/architecture-invariants.md#docker-cases), `docs/docker-cases.md` (user guide), `docs/docker-cases-plan.md` (design)
 
-**Docker Compose deployment** (`docker/`, contributed): Codeman itself runs in a container and spawns Docker cases as **SIBLING** containers through the mounted host socket (Docker-outside-of-Docker), never nested. That inverts one assumption the bare-host path takes for granted: the daemon no longer shares Codeman's filesystem, so a bind source valid *inside* Codeman means nothing to it. `resolveDockerDaemonMountSource()` translates sources under HOME into the daemon's namespace via `CODEMAN_DOCKER_HOST_HOME`, and `CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` points the cases dir at a host-absolute bind mount so a workspace resolves to the SAME absolute path on both sides (which is what keeps the transcript projHash matching, per Docker cases above). ⚠️ **`CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` must move every consumer or none**: it is resolved once in `config/cases-dir.ts` because `src/cli.ts` resolves case paths too, and when only the server's `CASES_DIR` learned the override, `codeman skill install --case <name>` reported "Case not found" on exactly the deployment the override exists for. ⚠️ **`.dockerignore` patterns match the WHOLE context-relative path**, so a bare `.env` line excludes only the ROOT file: `docker/.env` (which holds `CODEMAN_PASSWORD` and any provider keys) rode `COPY . .` into the image until `**/.env` was added — verified in both directions with a real build context. ⚠️ A Compose LONG-form bind (`type: bind`) **creates a missing host source directory ROOT-OWNED** rather than refusing. `Start-Codeman.sh` pre-creates both `CODEMAN_APPDATA_PATH` and `CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` on the host before `up`, which is what keeps the daemon from ever having to materialise either as root in the first place; the container ALSO starts as root (`cap_add: [CHOWN, DAC_OVERRIDE, SETGID, SETUID]` against the base `cap_drop: ALL`) so `docker/entrypoint.sh` can correct a bind source that turns up root-owned anyway (a restored backup, a cleared directory, plain `docker compose up` run without the script) before dropping to `PUID:PGID` via `setpriv` — it refuses instead of chowning a directory owned by neither root nor `PUID:PGID`, since that ownership is not this container's to reassign. `CODEMAN_DOCKER_DISABLE_SWAP_LIMIT=1` drops `--memory-swap` (and filters only that one kernel warning) for hosts without swap accounting; `--memory` still applies. ⚠️ The deployment ALSO self-updates in place (the repo bind mount at `/opt/codeman` + a restart-by-exiting supervisor) — see Self-update below and `docs/docker-self-update.md` before touching `server.Dockerfile`, the compose file or `.env.example`, since each is an input to the updater's environment gate. `docs/docker-compose.md` + `docker/README.md` (user guides)
+**Docker Compose deployment** (`docker/`, contributed): Codeman itself runs in a container and spawns Docker cases as **SIBLING** containers through the mounted host socket (Docker-outside-of-Docker), never nested. That inverts one assumption the bare-host path takes for granted: the daemon no longer shares Codeman's filesystem, so a bind source valid *inside* Codeman means nothing to it. `resolveDockerDaemonMountSource()` translates sources under HOME into the daemon's namespace via `CODEMAN_DOCKER_HOST_HOME`, and `CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` points the cases dir at a host-absolute bind mount so a workspace resolves to the SAME absolute path on both sides (which is what keeps the transcript projHash matching, per Docker cases above). ⚠️ **`CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` must move every consumer or none**: it is resolved once in `config/cases-dir.ts` because `src/cli.ts` resolves case paths too, and when only the server's `CASES_DIR` learned the override, `codeman skill install --case <name>` reported "Case not found" on exactly the deployment the override exists for. ⚠️ **`.dockerignore` patterns match the WHOLE context-relative path**, so a bare `.env` line excludes only the ROOT file: `docker/.env` (which holds `CODEMAN_PASSWORD` and any provider keys) rode `COPY . .` into the image until `**/.env` was added — verified in both directions with a real build context. ⚠️ A Compose LONG-form bind (`type: bind`) **creates a missing host source directory ROOT-OWNED** rather than refusing. `Start-Codeman.sh` pre-creates both `CODEMAN_APPDATA_PATH` and `CODEMAN_CASES_PATH` on the host before `up`, which is what keeps the daemon from ever having to materialise either as root in the first place; the container ALSO starts as root (`cap_add: [CHOWN, DAC_OVERRIDE, KILL, SETGID, SETUID]` against the base `cap_drop: ALL`; `test/docker-entrypoint.test.ts` pins that list) so `docker/entrypoint.sh` can correct a bind source that turns up root-owned anyway (a restored backup, a cleared directory, plain `docker compose up` run without the script) before dropping to `PUID:PGID` via `setpriv` — a directory owned by neither root nor `PUID:PGID` is never re-owned, since that ownership is not this container's to reassign; it is PROBED for writability as the runtime account (`setpriv ... test -w`, so ACLs, group-writable trees and CIFS/NFS mounts pass) and refused with a message naming path, owner and PUID:PGID if that fails. ⚠️ `KILL` is in that list for tini, not the entrypoint: `init: true` keeps tini as root while the server runs as PUID, and without CAP_KILL its SIGTERM forward fails and the server is SIGKILLed on every `compose down`/`restart` instead of flushing state. ⚠️ `/opt/codeman-cli` (the runtime-owned CLI prefix) is APPENDED to `PATH`, never prepended, and the entrypoint pins its own `PATH` to the system dirs: the root part of the start resolves `setpriv` by bare name, and a prefix ahead of `/usr/bin` let a planted `setpriv` run as uid 0 (measured). `CODEMAN_DOCKER_DISABLE_SWAP_LIMIT=1` drops `--memory-swap` (and filters only that one kernel warning) for hosts without swap accounting; `--memory` still applies. ⚠️ The deployment ALSO self-updates in place (the repo bind mount at `/opt/codeman` + a restart-by-exiting supervisor) — see Self-update below and `docs/docker-self-update.md` before touching `server.Dockerfile`, the compose file or `.env.example`, since each is an input to the updater's environment gate. `docs/docker-compose.md` + `docker/README.md` (user guides)
 
 **CLI registry** (`src/config/cli-registry/`): every run mode is a `CliEntry` — discovery (search dirs, version + identity probes), the launch argv template, env handling, the `capabilities` flags that replace per-CLI branching, and the `overlays` that back the remote/docker pane commands. **No code outside `stock.ts` may branch on a CLI id**; behaviour that genuinely differs is either a capability field or a NAMED PROFILE selected by one (`profiles.ts`), and `test/cli-registry-no-id-branching.test.ts` fails the build if an id check reappears — it matches `===`, `!==`, `case '<id>':` and `[...].includes(mode)`, because an earlier `===`-only version let 36 negated branches survive the conversion (including a seven-mode Ralph chain whose own comment asked the next person to keep it in step with `isExternalCliMode()` by hand). ⚠️ Config contains no shell text: an entry declares typed argv tokens, literals are validated against a safe-word pattern at LOAD time (a bad literal rejects the whole entry — a silently dropped `--no-approve` is not cosmetic), and values resolve through patterns NAMED in code, so a user `clis.json` cannot widen its own validation. ⚠️ `external`, `hooks` and `altScreen` are three INDEPENDENT capabilities on purpose; deriving one from another shipped the `until=stop`-hangs-on-shell bug. ⚠️ Two capability fields carry a REGEX from config (`discovery.version.regex` and `capabilities.workDetect.workingLine`) and both must compile through `compileVersionRegex()`, which caps length and refuses nested quantifiers; `workingLine` is the one that runs on the PTY hot path. ⚠️ **`param` is TWO namespaces.** `launch.params` keys, `env.configSetenv[].fromParam` and `capabilities.privilegedParams[].param` all name a LAUNCH PARAM; the legacy `<Mode>Config` wire field is a separate namespace, bridged only by `launch.legacyConfigAliases`. Getting `privilegedParams[].param` wrong is SILENT — it is the multi-user bypass clamp's only handle on a CLI's privilege switch, and a wrong name clamps nothing with no load error and no failing test — so `schema.ts` rejects an entry naming a param it never declared. Codex is the entry where the two names differ (`bypassApprovals` vs `dangerouslyBypassApprovals`) and therefore the one that catches a regression. ⚠️ Six fields are DECLARED-FOR-LATER and read by nothing (`shortBadge`, `accent`, `capabilities.echo`/`wheelForward`/`keyboardAccessory`/`maxFrameBytes`): all frontend behaviour, transcribed rather than measured, so re-measure before wiring one up; the list is pinned so it cannot quietly grow. Spawn commands are pinned as literal strings in `test/cli-registry-spawn-golden.test.ts`, remote/docker pane commands in `test/location-overlay-commands.test.ts`. ⚠️ That second golden no longer covers **remote claude or remote omp**: both now have their own arm in `buildRemoteLaunchCommand` (a `--session-id || --resume` pair, and `--continue`, so a respawn continues the same conversation) and never reach `defaultRemoteCommandForMode`, which is what that test asserts. Their real pins are `toContain` substrings in `test/tmux-manager.test.ts` and `test/remote-shared-sessions.test.ts`; changing either arm will NOT fail the golden. ⚠️ Anything reading the registry resolves it AT CALL TIME (`sessionModeSchema()`, `allowedEnvPrefixes()`, `dependencyRegistry()`, the resolvers' `searchDirs` thunks) — a module-level const freezes at first import, so a CLI enabled while the server ran moved the run menu but not that surface. `~/.codeman/clis.json` overrides any entry (read-only in this release; nothing writes it, so importing the registry has no filesystem side effects). → `docs/cli-registry.md`
 

docker/README.md

@@ -11,15 +11,18 @@ cp docker/.env.example docker/.env
 bash docker/Start-Codeman.sh
 ```
 
-On PowerShell, use the following command instead.
+On PowerShell, use the following commands instead. Running Compose from inside `docker/` with no `-f` lets it discover `docker-compose.override.yml` on its own (see [Local customisation](#local-customisation)); naming the file with `-f docker/docker-compose.yaml` from the repository root silently drops the override unless it is named too.
 
 ```powershell
 Copy-Item docker/.env.example docker/.env
-docker compose --env-file docker/.env -f docker/docker-compose.yaml up --build -d
+Set-Location docker
+docker compose --env-file .env up --build -d
 ```
 
 Every required value is defined and explained in `.env.example`. `GEMINI_API_KEY` is intentionally optional and may remain blank.
 
+The container starts as root so `entrypoint.sh` can correct the ownership of a bind source the Docker daemon created (it creates a missing one as `root:root`), then drops to `PUID:PGID` with `setpriv` before the server starts, so Codeman itself never runs privileged. That drop needs `cap_add: [CHOWN, DAC_OVERRIDE, KILL, SETGID, SETUID]` against the file's `cap_drop: ALL`; a compose file written elsewhere (Unraid's Compose Manager, a hand-written unit) must carry the same additions, and the entrypoint names them when they are missing. A directory owned by neither root nor `PUID:PGID` is never re-owned: it is probed for writability as the runtime account and refused with a clear message if that fails. Setting `user:` in Compose skips the whole step.
+
 On Linux, `Start-Codeman.sh` stops with an error when required paths are missing. It creates the application-data directory when safe, detects its numeric owner as `PUID:PGID`, and detects `DOCKER_SOCKET_GID` from the configured Docker socket. It rejects a root-owned application-data directory because Codeman and its local CLI sessions must remain unprivileged.
 
 Codeman, Claude, OpenCode, and other local sessions run as the unprivileged account named by `CODEMAN_RUNTIME_USER`, which defaults to `codeman`. When Compose is run directly, `PUID` and `PGID` default to `1000:1000`; set them in `.env` when the application-data directory has a different owner. The Bash start script determines them automatically instead.
@@ -68,16 +71,9 @@ Add the domain with `CODEMAN_ALLOWED_HOSTS` in `.env`:
 CODEMAN_ALLOWED_HOSTS='codeman.example.com,.internal.example.com'
 ```
 
-`docker-compose.yaml` does not forward this variable into the container - it
+`docker-compose.yaml` forwards it into the container (Compose only passes
-only passes through the environment keys it explicitly lists, and this is not
+through the environment keys it explicitly lists, and this is one of them, with
-one of them. Forward it yourself in `docker-compose.override.yml`:
+an empty default so the line is optional in `.env`).
-
-```yaml
-services:
-  codeman:
-    environment:
-      CODEMAN_ALLOWED_HOSTS: ${CODEMAN_ALLOWED_HOSTS}
-```
 
 See the application's own `docs/wiki/Remote-Access.md` for the full allowlist
 format and the tunnel providers it accepts by default.

docs/docker-compose.md

@@ -33,12 +33,14 @@ On Linux, run the stack with the start script. It determines `PUID` and `PGID` f
 bash docker/Start-Codeman.sh
 ```
 
-On other platforms, run Compose directly. `PUID` and `PGID` default to `1000:1000`; set them in `docker/.env` when the application-data directory has a different owner.
+On other platforms, run Compose directly. `PUID` and `PGID` default to `1000:1000`; set them in `docker/.env` when the application-data directory has a different owner. Naming the file with `-f` disables Compose's own discovery of `docker/docker-compose.override.yml`, so add a second `-f` for it when you keep one (see `docker/README.md`, Local customisation).
 
 ```sh
 docker compose --env-file docker/.env -f docker/docker-compose.yaml up --build -d
 ```
 
+The container starts as root, corrects the ownership of a bind source the daemon had to create, and drops to `PUID:PGID` with `setpriv` before Codeman starts; the capabilities that needs are declared in `docker/docker-compose.yaml` and named by the entrypoint when a compose file written elsewhere lacks them.
+
 Open `http://localhost:3000` and sign in with the username and password from `docker/.env`.
 
 ## Operations