201. The persistent runtime is the authority; every operator surface, Lumen included, is a client of it
Context
On 2026-10-18 the owner asked for a skill that auto-updates, joins the mesh, acts as the mesh's control pane and reports periodically, and named it prismatic-lumen. A session ends, a phone disconnects, a prompt is not a running service (10-11), and the critique rated the risk of false authority and a hidden second orchestrator highest.
Decision
The Majordomus runtime executes and authorises (mesh, scheduler, supervision, events, state, governance). An operator surface interprets and controls: it reads canonical state with provenance, subscribes from a revision, and sends typed operations. It owns no scheduler, event bus, identity provider, capability inventory or source of truth; Majordomus never depends on it. A deterministic path (typed operation, no model) exists for every action; a natural-language path only proposes a typed operation, and a model's proposal is never its own authorisation.
Alternatives rejected
- A separate Lumen backend with its own scheduler or inference
- Skill text that holds periodic duties
- An LLM on the critical path of health or restarts
Consequences
the-mesh-is-operated-from-one-page builds on /ui and executions; reports need the runtime (I3193).
Sources
Promoted on 2026-10-18 from the owner's ChatGPT project (workspace chatgpt-majordomus, issue I3100). The owner has not accepted it; it is proposed for the owner's decision.
chatgpt-majordomus:c296#1chatgpt-majordomus:c296#9chatgpt-majordomus:c296#14chatgpt-majordomus:c296#18chatgpt-majordomus:c220#5