# Steid

The source of truth for everything in a developer's or organization's portfolio.

## Vision

Steid is a developer/org identity and portfolio platform. It's where you host your
code, your writing, your projects — everything you do, in one place, under your
control.

Git repos are a core feature, not the whole product. Blogs, documentation, project
showcases, and anything else a dev or org wants to present lives here too.

Personal-first, but organizations can collaborate on it.

**What makes it different from Gitea/Forgejo:** those are GitHub clones scaled down.
Steid is portfolio-first — the profile page is the product, and repos are one kind of
thing that appears on it. That framing should win any tie-break.

## Core Principles

- **Fast** — Rust, minimal overhead
- **Reliable** — correct first, then optimize
- **Personal-first** — great for a single dev, scales to orgs
- **Identity-centric** — everything is built around who you are (user/org); auth is
  designed in from day one, not bolted on

## Stack

Starting intent, not settled decisions. Each one gets a record in
[decisions/](decisions/) when it's actually made and confirmed in this build.

| Concern | Choice | Decision |
|---|---|---|
| Web framework | Topcoat (tokio-rs) | — |
| Git transport | smart HTTP via `git http-backend` | [0001](decisions/0001-git-over-http-not-ssh.md) |
| Git auth | personal access tokens over HTTP Basic | [0001](decisions/0001-git-over-http-not-ssh.md) |
| Git operations | the `git` binary, behind narrow ports | [0006](decisions/0006-git-binary-behind-narrow-ports.md) |
| Crate layout | single crate | — |
| Ownership | personal org owns repos | — |
| URLs | root handles, grouped routes | [0004](decisions/0004-root-handles-grouped-routes.md) |
| Database | SQLite via sqlx | — |

Architecture and conventions: [architecture.md](architecture.md).

## Milestone Ladder

A from-scratch rebuild on Topcoat. Much of this was built and verified end-to-end in a
previous attempt — see [progress.md](progress.md). Treat that code as reference, not as
a baseline.

| # | Milestone | Status |
|---|---|---|
| 0 | **Skeleton** — Topcoat app boots, config, one page, SQLite wired | done |
| 1 | **Identity, thin** — claim on first run, login, session | done |
| 2 | **Profile page** — `/{handle}` as the real profile | done |
| 3 | **Repo model** — records + bare repos on disk | done |
| 4a | **Clone over HTTP** — `git http-backend`, public repos, no auth | done |
| 4b | **Push and tokens** — PATs over HTTP Basic, push, private clone | done |
| 5 | **Repo browsing** — tree, blob, commit log | done |
| 5b | **Deployable by anyone** — binary release, installer, TLS proxy | active |
| 6 | **Writing** — posts, markdown | not started |
| 7 | **Identity, full** — multi-user, orgs, invites, registration policy | not started |
| 8+ | Projects/showcases · issues & PRs · CI/CD · SSH transport · federation | not started |

**CI/CD is a milestone, eventually, and it is 8+.** Push-to-release — a repository that
builds and publishes itself on push — is the obvious end state for a forge that already
receives pushes, and it is what "source code integration" means for anyone arriving from
GitHub. It needs receive-pack hooks, a job model, isolation to run untrusted code, and
somewhere to keep artefacts, so it is a milestone in its own right rather than a feature.
Recorded now because it was asked for; deliberately not scheduled.

`/api` is not a milestone. It's a standing practice: every milestone that adds a use
case exposes it under `/api` where that makes sense. An API isn't a feature, it's a
second surface on work already being done — and having a third consumer keeps the use
case layer honest.

### Why this order

The vision calls Steid portfolio-first, but every previous ladder put portfolio behind
four milestones of git plumbing. Across two attempts and ~6,000 lines, Steid has
shipped identity, repo records, clone, push, and key auth — and not one portfolio
feature. Attempt #2 ended with all the git infrastructure working and nothing that
distinguishes it from Gitea.

The differentiator therefore shipped early: the profile page is milestone 2, not
milestone 6. Full multi-user identity stays deferred to 7 — personal-first means one
user, and there is nothing to collaborate on until there is something worth
collaborating on.

**Git moved ahead of writing after milestone 2 shipped**, deliberately reversing the
original order. Two reasons. The profile has a Repositories section that a visitor
expects to be full, and a gitforge whose repo list is permanently empty is its own kind
of wrong. And git-over-HTTP is the least-understood work left — everything else is CRUD
over SQLite, while that is pack data streamed through a subprocess — so learning what
Topcoat makes awkward is worth more now than after three more features are stacked on
top.

The risk being run knowingly: disappearing into protocol work is what ended both
previous attempts. Milestone 3 is deliberately small and ships something visible on the
profile; if milestone 4 starts to sprawl, that is the signal to bank it and go back to
writing.

**Milestone 5b was inserted rather than renumbered.** Deployment became urgent the
moment Steid could host its own source: a gitforge nobody can install is a demo. It is
lettered rather than numbered for the same reason 4a/4b were — decisions
[0003](decisions/0003-scoped-urls.md) and [0004](decisions/0004-root-handles-grouped-routes.md)
both refer forward to "Milestone 7" meaning multi-user identity, and renumbering would
quietly falsify accepted records to save a table row.

**Milestone 4 was split before it started**, acting on that warning rather than waiting
to be surprised by it. It bundled two subsystems — personal access tokens and the smart
HTTP protocol — and neither shipped anything until both were done. Split, 4a is
anonymous clone of a public repository with no authentication code at all, which is a
working `git clone` in one small milestone; 4b adds tokens, push, and private clone on
top. If 4b sprawls, 4a has already banked the capability.

**One numbering scheme.** The previous attempt kept two (a roadmap ladder and a
separate build log with conflicting numbers) and they drifted apart within three
milestones. If the plan changes, edit this table — don't start a second list.

The active milestone is broken into steps in [current.md](current.md).