Resolved all 11 open questions based on project guidance: Transport: - OQ-01/OQ-07: ACME/Let's Encrypt with domain + IP paths (ADR-008) - OQ-02: Default to n0 relay, --iroh-relay override (ADR-009) - OQ-05: Transport chaining supported natively (ADR-010) Client: - OQ-06: Programmatic-first API, no ~/.ssh/config (ADR-011) Server: - OQ-04: Ed25519 + OpenSSH cert-authority, no password auth (ADR-012) - OQ-08: fail2ban-friendly logging + built-in rate limiting (ADR-013) TUN: - OQ-03/OQ-09: Deferred entirely, recommend tun2proxy (ADR-014) - tun-shim.md marked deprecated NAPI: - OQ-10: Expose both connect() and serve() (ADR-016) - OQ-11: Use napi-rs for FFI bridge (ADR-015) Additional ADRs created during review: - ADR-006: No logging of tunnel destinations (was phantom reference) - ADR-017: Stealth mode protocol multiplexing - ADR-018: Control channel for pubsub over SSH Fixed: ADR-002 status → Superseded, ADR-007 title typo, WRAUTH_SERVER typo, ADR-005 stale wraith-tun refs, undefined ACL feature removed from server.md, --proxy semantic difference documented.
2.7 KiB
ADR-018: Control Channel for PubSub over SSH
Status
Accepted
Context
The NAPI wrapper and pubsub integration need a way to use wraith's SSH channel as a data plane for event routing. When a wraith connect client opens an SSH session to a server, the direct_tcpip channel type is used to reach specific TCP targets (host:port).
For the pubsub use case, the client needs a dedicated bidirectional stream to the server's event bus — not a TCP connection to a random host. There are several approaches:
- Special destination: Use
direct_tcpipwith a reserved destination (e.g.,wraith-control:0) that the server recognizes and routes internally instead of connecting to a TCP target. - Port forwarding: The server runs a pubsub hub on a specific port (e.g., 9736) and the client uses normal port forwarding (
-L 9736:hub:9736). - Custom channel type: Define a new SSH channel type beyond
direct_tcpipandforwarded_tcpip.
Decision
Use approach 1: a reserved direct_tcpip destination string. When the server receives a channel_open_direct_tcpip request for wraith-control:0:
- The
channel_open_direct_tcpiphandler detects the special target via string matching - Instead of connecting to a TCP target, it bridges the channel to the local pubsub event bus
EventEnvelopeJSON flows bidirectionally over the SSH channel
The destination string wraith-control is reserved. Regular TCP targets are hostnames or IP addresses, so there is no collision risk.
Approach 2 (port forwarding to a specific port) is still supported as an alternative — the client can use --forward 9736:localhost:9736 if the server runs a pubsub hub on that port. But the control channel approach is simpler and doesn't require a separate listening port.
Approach 3 (custom channel type) was rejected because russh's direct_tcpip handler is well-understood and adding custom channel types requires modifying russh.
Consequences
- Positive: Simple implementation — just string matching in the server's
channel_open_direct_tcpiphandler. - Positive: No separate port or service needs to run on the server. The control channel is built into wraith.
- Positive: Compatible with the NAPI wrapper's single-duplex-stream model.
- Positive: Port forwarding to a specific port is still available as an alternative.
- Negative: The string
wraith-controlis a magic constant. It should be defined as a constant in the crate. - Negative: Regular TCP destinations accidentally matching
wraith-controlwould be misrouted. Mitigated by reserving the entirewraith-prefix namespace.