sow-tools/docs/command-surface.md

# Crucible command surface

`internal/dispatch.Registry` is the single source of truth for Crucible's
builders, visible commands, descriptions, help, and hidden compatibility
aliases.

## Visible commands

| Builder | Command | Purpose |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `hak` | `build` | Build configured HAK archives and their manifest. |
| `hak` | `manifest` | Apply a generated HAK list to module source. |
| `module` | `build` | Build the module and configured project outputs. |
| `module` | `extract` | Extract built archives into configured source trees. |
| `module` | `validate` | Validate project layout, config, and source inventory. |
| `module` | `compare` | Compare source content with built archives. |
| `module` | `manifest` | Apply a generated HAK list to module source. |
| `topdata` | `validate` | Validate topdata source and canonical JSON compatibility. |
| `topdata` | `build` | Compile topdata and refresh the configured package. |
| `topdata` | `package` | Package cached outputs into HAK and TLK files. |
| `topdata` | `compare` | Compare current output with a fresh native build. |
| `topdata` | `convert` | Convert between 2DA and native JSON/module formats. |
| `wiki` | `build` | Render wiki page drafts from compiled topdata. |
| `wiki` | `deploy` | Deploy generated wiki pages to NodeBB. |
| `assets` | `compile` | Compile ASCII `.mdl` models to binary in place. |
| `assets` | `convert` | Convert textures to/from NWN DDS (flips vertically). |
| `assets` | `upscale` | Upscale textures through an installed backend. |
| `assets` | `check-mdl` | Report uncompiled ASCII `.mdl` and model-name mismatches. |
| `assets` | `fix-mdl` | Lowercase `.mdl` names and rewrite model identity to match. |
| `assets` | `check-dupes` | Report runtime-name (basename) collisions across dirs. |
| `assets` | `clean-dupes` | Delete clean-tree files whose basename collides with primary. |
| `depot` | `status` | Report referenced-vs-present drift against a backend. |
| `depot` | `push` | Upload referenced-but-absent blobs from a local depot. |
| `depot` | `verify` | Existence sweep plus sampled download re-hash. |
| `depot` | `get` | Fetch one blob with sha re-verify. |
| `depot` | `pull` | Incremental verified pull of every referenced blob. |
| `nwsync` | `emit` | Explode one artifact into NWSync blobs plus its own NSYM manifest. |
| `nwsync` | `assemble` | Merge per-artifact NSYM manifests into one merged manifest. |
| `nwsync` | `verify` | Decompress and hash a published manifest's blobs through the pull zone. |

`depot status` and `depot get` pick their backend either with `--out DIR`, a
depot tree on disk, or with `--target bunny|cdn`, a remote backend. The two
flags are mutually exclusive.

`nwsync emit` runs where an artifact is born (a `.hak`/`.erf`, or a loose file
such as the TLK); `nwsync assemble` runs at module release and reads only the
small per-artifact indexes. Both take **depot keys**: an artifact's index lives
beside the artifact itself with the extension replaced, so `emit` and
`assemble` agree on where it is without being told.

```
nwsync emit     [--as NAME] [--out DIR] [--jobs N] [--verify] <artifact-key> <file>
nwsync assemble --group-id N [--tlk-key KEY] [--out DIR] <artifact-key>...
nwsync verify   [--sample N] [--base URL] [--jobs N] <manifest-sha1>
```

`emit` is latency-bound, not CPU-bound: every blob costs an existence probe
plus an upload, and a measured backfill spent 26 seconds of CPU across 9.5
minutes of wall clock. `--jobs N` (default 16) sets how many resources are in
flight at once. The manifest is byte-identical at any value — the number of
workers is never observable in the output. Peak memory is `N` times the
per-resource limit of 15 MB plus its compressed copy, so raising `N` far past
the default costs real memory for little gain: the transport keeps 16 idle
connections per host, and past that a worker pays a fresh TLS handshake.

Both verbs upload by default; nothing bulky is ever written to the runner's
disk. `--out DIR` writes a local repository tree instead, which is the
conformance path against upstream `nwn_nwsync_write`. The zone comes from
`NWSYNC_STORAGE_ZONE` and `NWSYNC_STORAGE_PASSWORD`, with the host from
`BUNNY_STORAGE_HOST` — NWSync data is a separate zone from the asset depot.

`assemble`'s artifact keys are in `Mod_HakList` order, highest priority first: a
resref in more than one artifact resolves to the earliest one, the way the game
resolves it. `--tlk-key` has its own slot because the TLK shadows nothing.
`--group-id` is per channel — 1 is current, 2 is testing, and 0 leaves the field
out of the sidecar.

`nwsync verify` is the only check on a published blob upstream of a player's
client. It reads the **pull zone**, not the storage API, and needs no
credential: what matters is the bytes a client is served, edge behaviour
included. Every blob is decompressed and hashed, and the zstd frame is asserted
to declare its content size. Neither half is optional — a `Content-Length` check
passes a byte-correct-looking object whose contents are short, and a round-trip
check alone passes a frame the game client cannot decode but Go's decoder can.
Failures are reported per blob as missing, malformed framing, size mismatch or
hash mismatch, and the exit code is 1.

A full sweep of the live manifest is roughly 69,000 blobs and 15 GB, so
`--sample N` exists to make verifying routine; the default is a full sweep.
`--base URL` (or `NWSYNC_PULL_BASE`) overrides the public host.

`emit --verify` applies the same check where `emit` would otherwise skip. `emit`
normally reads a blob's presence as proof of its contents, decided by a 1-byte
range GET, so an object written truncated — or written by an emitter since found
broken — is skipped by every later run forever and no backfill repairs it. With
`--verify` the stored copy is read back, unwrapped, hashed against its own name,
and replaced when it does not match. It costs a full GET per existing blob, so
it is a repair pass, not the default.

**After a repair, `verify` is what tells you which keys to purge.** A repair is
the one thing that makes a key serve different bytes than it did before, and the
edge caches these objects for 30 days precisely because that normally cannot
happen. The two commands look at different copies on purpose: `emit --verify`
repairs the **origin**, `verify` reads the **edge**. So a `verify` run straight
after a repair is not a verdict — it is a survey, and every blob it still calls
bad is one the edge is serving stale. Purge exactly those, then re-run it; only
that second run is the verdict.

Purging the keys `verify` names beats purging the zone, because the edge only
ever cached what somebody actually fetched: the 2026-08-01 repair rewrote 2,603
blobs at the origin and left 8 stale at the edge. The purge belongs in the
repair procedure rather than in `emit`, which reports how many blobs it wrote
and never which ones — so it could not target one even with a CDN credential,
which it deliberately does not hold (#89; the procedure itself is in
sow-platform's NWSync runbook).

`emit` uploads blobs first and the index last, so the presence of an index is
the publication marker: an artifact whose emit died halfway leaves real blobs in
the zone and no index. Blob names are content hashes, so re-running skips
whatever already landed, and `assemble` fails closed on an artifact with no
index rather than publishing a manifest that is missing a hak.

### What an emitted tree looks like

`--out DIR` produces the same tree `emit` would upload, which makes it the way
to check a zone by hand without touching one:

```
<artifact-sha>.nsym          binary index
<artifact-sha>.nsym.json     the same index, readable
data/sha1/a7/4a/a74aa84a...  one blob per resource, two-level fanout
```

A blob's name is the SHA-1 of the resource's **original** bytes, but the file on
disk is not those bytes: each blob is wrapped in NWCompressedBuffer framing, a
24-byte `NSYC` header followed by a zstd frame. Hashing the file directly will
not match its name, which is the obvious
first thing to try and the obvious first thing to be confused by. Strip the
header first:

```
tail -c +25 <blob> | zstd -dc | sha1sum   # == the blob's filename
```

The header carries the uncompressed length as a little-endian `uint32` at offset
12, so the decompressed size is checkable without decompressing. Compression is
worth roughly a 4:1
saving on hak content: a 250 MB hak emitted 2296 blobs totalling 59 MB on disk
against 249 MB of resources, as recorded in the sidecar's `on_disk_bytes` and
`total_bytes`.

The zstd frame always declares its `Frame_Content_Size`. The game client sizes
its output buffer from that field and cannot decode a frame without one, but the
Go encoder omits it below 256 bytes, so `emit` re-headers those frames into the
shape reference libzstd emits: `Single_Segment_flag` set, `Window_Descriptor`
dropped, and a one-byte content size in its place. `zstd -l <frame>` must print a
decompressed size; a blank column there is the fault, and it is invisible to any
check that only decompresses, because both `zstd -dc` and Go's decoder stream
such a frame happily. This is what the sidecar's `emitter_version` counts:
version 1 omitted the field and no client could sync past such a blob, version 2
declares it. `assemble` refuses to merge indexes that disagree.

## Hidden compatibility aliases

Existing scripts may continue using these names indefinitely. They are accepted
but omitted from routine help and the interactive menu:

| Builder | Hidden alias | Implementation |
| --- | --- | --- |
| `hak` | `build-haks` | `build-haks` |
| `hak` | `apply-hak-manifest` | `apply-hak-manifest` |
| `module` | `build-module` | module-only `build-module` |
| `module` | `apply-hak-manifest` | `apply-hak-manifest` |
| `topdata` | `validate-topdata` | `validate-topdata` |
| `topdata` | `build-topdata` | `build-topdata` |
| `topdata` | `build-top-package` | `build-top-package` |
| `topdata` | `compare-topdata` | `compare-topdata` |
| `topdata` | `convert-topdata` | `convert-topdata` |
| `depot` | `--target local` | `--out $DEPOT_DIR` on `status`/`get` |
| `wiki` | `build-wiki` | `build-wiki` |
| `wiki` | `deploy-wiki` | `deploy-wiki` |

`module build-module` deliberately retains its narrower module-only behavior;
it is not redirected to the broader `module build`.

## Global commands

```text
crucible help | -h          usage + builder list
crucible version | -V       build version
crucible list               name<TAB>binary<TAB>summary
crucible config [args]      inspect and validate effective configuration
crucible changelog [args]   generate a release changelog
```

## HAK build options

```text
crucible hak build
  [--hak <hak-name> ...]
  [--archive <archive-name> ...]
  [--source-manifest <path>]
  [--content-addressed-root <path>]
  [--plan-only]
  [--quiet|--verbose|--debug]
```

When a source manifest contains `asset_sources`, pass
`--content-addressed-root <directory>`. Crucible resolves each declared SHA-256
under `sha256/<first-two>/<next-two>/<full-sha256>` and verifies streamed bytes
while writing selected HAK archives. Authored `.bmu` files are ordinary assets
and require no conversion pipeline.