S251 Progress Report
Documentation for Sessions
Session 251 — Progress Report
For: Executive team, stakeholders, non-technical readers Date: March 21, 2026 Status: Major milestone completed, ongoing enhancements planned
What This Session Was About
We needed to fix a critical problem: when our AI (Vitto) generated a new platform for a customer, the generated code was supposed to be saved to our own Hetzner server in Germany — but it was silently failing. The files were being generated but never actually saved anywhere, and nobody was being told about the failure.
Additionally, we built a brand-new management dashboard so our team can see, in real-time, what's happening with all platform code repositories on our server — without having to ask an AI agent or check logs manually.
Timeline of Progress
Phase 1: Diagnosis (2 hours)
What we found: Three separate bugs working together to create silent failures:
Size Limit Bug — Our Hetzner server had a default limit of 100KB for incoming data. A typical platform generation sends ~120KB of code files. The server was quietly rejecting these payloads with a "413 Too Large" error that nobody could see.
Wrong Address Bug — When our system tried to read files from the server, it was looking in the wrong folder. GitLab uses 3-level paths (
gograbspace/chrome-space-1/conejo) but our Hetzner server uses 2-level paths (chrome-space-1/conejo). The code was taking the first two parts instead of the last two — so it looked forgograbspace/chrome-space-1instead ofchrome-space-1/conejo.Silent Failure Bug — When saving files failed, the error was written to a log file but never sent back to the user or the UI. So Vitto would say "generation complete!" even though no files were actually saved.
Phase 2: Fixes Applied (1 hour)
| Fix | What Changed | Impact |
|---|---|---|
| Size limit increased | 100KB → 50MB | Platforms with 500+ files now save successfully |
| NGINX limit added | Added client_max_body_size 50m |
The web server in front of our app also allows large payloads |
| Path parsing fixed | Takes last 2 path segments | Files are now read from the correct folder |
| Error visibility added | New SSE event git-commit-failed |
Users and UI are told immediately when saving fails |
Phase 3: Testing & Verification (1 hour)
- Sent 136 files (same size as a real generation): Success (was failing before)
- Sent 500 files / 851KB stress test: Success in 1.7 seconds
- Simulated full platform generation on the "Conejo" universe: All 4 modules saved correctly
- Ran all 177 automated tests: All passing
Phase 4: Git Operations Library (4 hours)
Built a new reusable software library (@libs-structural/git-operations) that provides:
- API connectivity to our Hetzner server's git endpoints
- Real-time state management with automatic polling
- Role-based access control — different users see different features:
- Executives/Developers: full server metrics, cross-space browsing, all management actions
- Admins: management actions within their space, no raw server metrics
- Regular users: read-only view of their own space
Phase 5: Git Operations Dashboard (3 hours)
Built a new page in our developer tools app showing:
- Server health: CPU load, memory usage, disk space, active VMs, uptime
- All repositories: cards showing each platform with branch count, file count, last commit
- Branch management: create, delete, merge branches directly from the UI
- Commit history: full history per branch with expandable diff view (which files changed, lines added/removed)
- File browser: search and browse all files in any repository, view file contents
Phase 6: Documentation & Handoff (current)
Creating comprehensive documentation and handoff materials for the next development session.
What Now Works That Didn't Before
| Before | After |
|---|---|
| Platform generation silently lost files | Files are reliably saved to Hetzner with error reporting |
| No visibility into Hetzner repositories | Full dashboard with live metrics, repos, branches, commits |
| Couldn't manage branches from our tools | Create, delete, merge branches from the UI |
| Couldn't see what changed in a commit | Click any commit to see full diff (files, lines changed) |
| No role-based access for git tools | 4-tier access system (executive → user) |
| Git tools hardcoded to one app | Reusable library for any of our apps |
Infrastructure: Two Hetzner Servers
Current Server: AX42-U (#2938512)
- IP: 144.76.69.55 (
sandbox.gograb.space) - Specs: 8 cores / 16 threads, Ryzen 7 PRO 8700GE, 128 GB DDR5
- Location: Falkenstein, Germany (FSN1-DC10)
- Role: Internal Dev Server (IDS)
- Currently runs: Sandbox orchestrator, platform git repositories, dev/exec tooling
- Monthly cost: ~$124
New Server: AX102-U (#2946196) — Ready for Setup
- IP: 178.63.165.83
- Specs: 16 cores / 32 threads, Ryzen 9 7950X3D, 128 GB DDR5
- Location: Falkenstein, Germany (FSN1-DC21)
- Role: Customer Sandbox Server (planned)
- Will run: Customer Firecracker VMs, production platform deployments
- Monthly cost: ~$124
Why Two Servers?
| Concern | One Server | Two Servers |
|---|---|---|
| Resource contention | Customer VMs compete with dev tools | Completely isolated |
| Security | Customer code shares host with admin tools | Clear boundary |
| Scaling | Can't add capacity without downtime | Add servers independently |
| Cost | $124/mo | $248/mo |
| Reliability | Single point of failure | One server down doesn't affect the other |
The $124/mo increase is justified by the security isolation and the ability to scale customer capacity independently from internal tooling.
What's Coming Next
Immediate (Next Session)
- Set up AX102-U — Install OS, deploy sandbox-orchestrator, configure NGINX + SSL
- Git Graph Visualization — A visual branch topology view (like VSCode's Git Graph) showing all branches, merges, and commits in a beautiful interactive diagram
- Redeploy Railway backends — Push the bug fixes to our cloud services
Short-Term (1-2 Sessions)
- Extract reusable UI components — Move the dashboard pieces into the library so they can be used in the admin panel and Vitto Studio
- Wire into Vitto Studio — Platform builders see their repo state while working
- Wire into Admin Panel — Admins manage all spaces' repositories
Medium-Term
- Production CORS solution — The dev proxy only works locally; production needs a real solution
- Full generation E2E verification — Run a complete platform generation and verify the entire chain
- Live Preview auto-compilation — Fix the race condition where preview shows "Ready to compile" after generation
Key Numbers
| Metric | Value |
|---|---|
| Critical bugs fixed | 3 |
| New Hetzner endpoints | 5 |
| Automated tests passing | 177 |
| Library files created | 8 |
| Dashboard features | 6 (metrics, repos, branches, commits, files, search) |
| Max payload tested | 851 KB (500 files) |
| Response time (500 files) | 1.7 seconds |
| Hetzner uptime | 521+ hours |
| Disk usage | 2.4% of 128 GB |
Where to Find More Information
| Resource | Location |
|---|---|
| Technical handoff | docs/english/sessions/S251/S251-handoff.md |
| Implementation plan | docs/english/Plans/S251: Git Operations Library and Hetzner Pipeline Fixes.md |
| IDS architecture spec | docs/superpowers/specs/2026-03-20-internal-dev-server-architecture-design.md |
| Infrastructure features plan | docs/english/Plans/future-plans/vm-infrastructure-features.md |
| MCP decisions | Use find_similar({ query: "git operations hetzner S251" }) in any agent session |
| Git Operations library | libs/libs-structural/git-operations/src/ |
| Dashboard component | apps/gograb-dev/src/app/pages/infrastructure/git-operations/ |
Generated by Claude Code (Session 251) — March 21, 2026