Let a key move to another vault, and ask whether it goes with the host

Keys sync and keys are shared: SshKey is in the sync registry on both sides, the
material rides in the sealed payload, and every generation of the vault key is
wrapped to a new member. What was missing was the way in. Hosts and groups could
move between vaults and keychain items could not, so a key typed into a personal
vault before the team existed stayed there for good — and moving a host into the
team's vault left it authenticating with something nobody else in that vault can
read. The code said so and could do nothing about it: "the answer is usually to
put a copy of that key in the destination vault", which meant pasting the private
half into a second item and deleting the first. A private key on a clipboard, and
two items nobody can tell apart afterwards.

MoveAsync already existed on the generic repository and is now exposed for keys
and passwords as it is for hosts and groups. What had to be built around it is the
re-aim. An item re-sealed under another vault's key lands with an id of that
vault's making, so every host bound to the old one and every group lending it as a
default is left naming a tombstone — and a host bound to something its vault no
longer holds refuses to connect rather than falling back to a typed password. A
move without the re-aim would look like a success and break every machine on that
key. It runs over every vault this session can write to, because a binding
resolves across all of them, and it counts what it could not rewrite: an item from
a newer client, or one in a vault this account may only read. Those are said in
the sentence afterwards rather than swallowed.

The host's move asks the question rather than deciding it. A binding resolves
across vaults, so the moved host goes on working for the person who moved it
whichever way this is answered; it is the colleagues they have just joined who
hold one vault's key and cannot connect with a host whose key stayed behind.
Unticked, and it stays that way on purpose: moving a key into a team's vault hands
it to everybody holding that key, and this design does not default anybody into a
disclosure. Under the box is the count of everything else that authenticates with
that key, because a key twenty machines use is a different decision from one
nothing else touches, and neither number is visible from the panel otherwise. The
question is answered against the vault in the picker, so choosing a different
destination re-asks it and a key already in the destination offers nothing.

One thing fixed on the way. A host that inherited its key from its group arrived
in the destination naming nothing at all — the group belongs to the vault it left
— so a machine that connected before the move refused after it, with no sentence
anywhere saying why. The resolved binding is now written onto the host as it
crosses, and the stranded-binding warning reads the resolved binding too, which is
the case where somebody is least likely to know a key is involved.

MOVE is on both heads, for keys and passwords only: a tag, a bucket and a pin are
read from the active vault alone, so "another vault" is not a question any of them
has. Four tests cover the move and its re-aim, the host's move with the key
brought and without it, and the inherited binding.
This commit is contained in:
2026-08-06 07:39:15 +02:00
parent 174ef7c420
commit 185790fb14
10 changed files with 1223 additions and 32 deletions
+22 -2
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@@ -424,8 +424,28 @@ The two vaults are encrypted under different keys, so a move is a re-seal into o
other; the host gets a new id, and **its group and its tags stay behind**, because both are items of the
vault it is leaving. A picker inside the form would do all of that as a side effect of correcting a port.
What a move cannot do is reach a machine that has already synced the host, which is the same limit
everything else about revocation has. Keys, passwords and buckets take theirs from a standing "new items go
to" picker on the Keychain screen and cannot be moved yet.
everything else about revocation has. Buckets take theirs from a standing "new items go to" picker on the
Keychain screen and cannot be moved yet.
**The move asks whether the key comes too**, because that is the half a host's move could not settle on its
own. A binding resolves across every vault you can read, so the moved host goes on working for *you* either
way — but the people you have just shared it with hold one vault's key, and a host whose key stayed in your
personal vault is one they cannot connect with. The tick box beside the picker is unticked, and stays that
way on purpose: moving a key into a team's vault hands it to everybody who holds that key, and a disclosure
is chosen rather than defaulted into. Under it is the count of everything else that authenticates with that
key, which is what makes the answer decidable — a key twenty machines use is a different decision from one
nothing else touches. Left unticked, the sentence afterwards names the key that is now outside the
destination. A key the host only *inherits* from its group counts too, and is written onto the host on the
way across: the group stays behind, so a host that arrived naming nothing would authenticate with nothing.
**A key or a password can also be moved on its own** — MOVE beside EDIT and DELETE on the Keychain screen,
on both heads, for keys and passwords only. It is the same re-seal and tombstone, and it takes a new id in
the destination, so **everything that named it is re-aimed at where it went**: every host bound to it and
every group lending it as a default, across every vault you can write to. Without that the move would be a
deletion with extra steps, since a host bound to something its vault no longer holds refuses to connect
rather than falling back to a typed password. Anything that cannot be rewritten here — an item from a newer
client, or one in a vault you can only read — is left naming the old item and is counted in the sentence
afterwards. The panel says what points at the key before you press it, not after.
**A group can be moved too, and it takes its contents with it** — "Move to another vault…" on the group
card's right-click menu, beside Open, Edit and Delete, which is the whole of what can be done to a group on