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LLeMbas/deploy/README.md
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Jaroslav Beneš c3d6660881 Agents run over SSH only; put the hardening back
The local sandbox is dropped before it was built. Every hard problem in it
came from running on the machine that holds the database and the encryption
key: the service user cannot traverse /home, granting it needs ACLs,
RLIMIT_NPROC is counted per uid so a fork bomb starves the server too,
--size only applies to tmpfs so there is no disk quota, and the bind list
is a standing invitation to widen until the sandbox is decoration.

Over SSH, isolation is somebody's considered choice of host -- a throwaway
container with one project mounted into it -- using tools far better at it
than anything that could be built here. It is also the only version that is
honestly multi-user: each person brings their own credentials and their own
machine, and picks a project directory on it.

So ProtectKernelTunables goes back. It was removed for exactly one reason,
that bubblewrap cannot mount /proc without it, and that reason is gone. The
agents settings group loses everything bwrap-shaped with it.

What this costs, and the admin copy has to say so: there was a network:False
switch that made exfiltration from a compromised reply impossible, and over
SSH there is no equivalent, because the network belongs to the far side.
The security of an agent chat is now the security of the host behind its
profile, and LLeMbas cannot tell a scratch container from a live server.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5 (1M context) <noreply@anthropic.com>
2026-08-01 22:12:48 +02:00

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# Deployment
Installs LLeMbas as a **system** service behind nginx with a self-signed
certificate. Written for a systemd + nginx host; tested on Arch.
| | Default |
|---|---|
| Service user | `lembas` (system account, `nologin`) |
| Home | `/home/lembas` |
| Install prefix | `/srv/lembas` (bind mount of the home) |
| Checkout | `$PREFIX/app` |
| Virtualenv | `$PREFIX/venv` |
| Database | `$PREFIX/data/lembas.db` |
| Environment | `$PREFIX/lembas.env` (mode 600) |
| Unit | `/etc/systemd/system/lembas.service` |
| Vhost | `/etc/nginx/conf.d/<host>.conf` |
| Listens on | `127.0.0.1:8080` — reachable only through nginx |
The prefix defaults to a bind mount of the service user's home because on many
machines the root filesystem is small while `/home` is not, and the virtualenv
plus database belong on the larger volume. Set `PREFIX=$HOME_DIR` to skip it.
## First install
```bash
SITE_HOST=chat.example ./deploy/install.sh
```
Idempotent — safe to re-run. It creates the user and bind mount, clones the
repo, builds the venv, generates `lembas.env` with a fresh `LEMBAS_SECRET_KEY`,
installs the unit and vhost, issues a self-signed certificate, adds a
`/etc/hosts` entry if the name does not already resolve, and enables the
service.
Then open `https://<SITE_HOST>`, accept the certificate warning, and create the
first account — it becomes the administrator.
Everything is overridable from the environment:
| Variable | Default | |
|---|---|---|
| `SITE_HOST` | `lembas.local` | nginx `server_name` and certificate CN |
| `APP_PORT` | `8080` | loopback port the service binds |
| `SERVICE_USER` | `lembas` | system account to run as |
| `HOME_DIR` | `/home/lembas` | that account's home |
| `PREFIX` | `/srv/lembas` | install root (bind mount of `HOME_DIR`) |
| `REPO_URL` | this checkout's `origin` | so a fork deploys itself |
| `LEMBAS_BRANCH` | `main` | branch to deploy |
## Deploying a change
```bash
git push
./deploy/update.sh
```
`update.sh` fetches, hard-resets the deployment checkout to `origin/main`,
reinstalls dependencies and restarts, printing the commits it pulled. The hard
reset is deliberate: nothing is ever edited in place there, so there is no local
work to preserve and no conflicts to resolve.
## Operating it
```bash
systemctl status lembas
journalctl -u lembas -f
sudo -u lembas /srv/lembas/venv/bin/lembas info # paths and counts
```
Configuration lives in `$PREFIX/lembas.env`. Edit it and restart.
## Notes
**The secret key is generated once.** `install.sh` will not overwrite an
existing `lembas.env`. Rotating `LEMBAS_SECRET_KEY` signs every user out *and*
makes stored upstream API keys unreadable — they would have to be re-entered.
**nginx buffering is off for a reason.** Replies stream as server-sent events.
With `proxy_buffering on` (the default) nginx holds the entire reply and
delivers it in one lump at the end, which is indistinguishable from streaming
being broken. `proxy_read_timeout` is raised to an hour because a model can
think for minutes before the first token.
**Nothing an agent does runs on this machine.** Agent chats execute their
commands over SSH, on a host somebody added and prepared — a container, a VM,
another machine. That is the whole isolation story, and it is why the unit can
stay locked down instead of being opened up to make room for a sandbox.
`ProtectSystem=full` rather than `strict` only because the data directory must
be writable and `strict` would mean listing every path.
The practical consequence for whoever runs this: **the security of an agent
chat is the security of the host behind its SSH profile.** A throwaway
container with the one project mounted into it is a very different thing from a
key to a production server, and LLeMbas cannot tell them apart.
**Use a real certificate if this is exposed beyond a trusted LAN.** The
self-signed cert exists so the install works with no external dependencies;
point `ssl_certificate` at a real one and nothing else needs to change.