secret/TODO.md

Workflow

• branch (from main)
• do the work in Next Step
• move Next Step to the top of Completed Steps
• move the top item of Future Steps into Next Step
• commit (TODO.md changes in the same commit as the work)
• merge to main if the branch is not protected, otherwise open a PR
• push

Status

pre-1.0. No git tags. TODO.md carries open 1.0 security blockers. Work in flight on branch secure-enclave-unlocker (clean tree as of 2026-07-06).

Next Step

Bring the repo into policy compliance in one commit:

• Add fmt-check and hooks targets to the Makefile (test/lint/fmt/check/ docker already exist).
• Add REPO_POLICIES.md and .editorconfig.
• Add .gitea/workflows/check.yml running make check.
• Verify Dockerfile base images are pinned by sha256.

Completed Steps

• 2026-10-04: A crash while an unlocker is being replaced no longer leaves a current unlocker that cannot open the vault (#71). Every new unlocker gets a directory of its own, named with the time to the nanosecond: passphrase-<time>, <host>-pgp-<time>, and for a keychain or Secure Enclave unlocker the keychain item or Secure Enclave key, which names the directory, carries the time instead of the day. secret.WriteDir fails on a directory that exists instead of writing into it. unlocker add passphrase writes the new unlocker, makes it current, and only then removes the vault's other passphrase unlockers; a crash between the last two steps leaves the old one beside the new, and the old passphrase still opens the vault through it until the next unlocker add passphrase or an unlocker remove removes it. A PGP, keychain or Secure Enclave unlocker added on the same host and day as another of its type is added beside it instead of replacing it.
• 2026-10-04: secret unlocker add pgp works on Linux (#88). CreatePGPUnlocker gets the vault's long-term key as adding a passphrase unlocker does, with the vault's GetOrDeriveLongTermKey, now part of VaultInterface: from the mnemonic, checked against the vault, or else from the current unlocker. Before, it used the keychain unlocker's helper, which on every platform but macOS always failed. A test adds a PGP unlocker for a throwaway GPG key, getting the long-term key once from the mnemonic and once from a passphrase unlocker, and reads a secret through the new unlocker.
• 2026-10-04: A vault name may use only lowercase ASCII letters, digits, ., - and _, and must not be empty, . or .. (#68); the error and README.md state the rule. vault create, vault import, vault select, vault remove, both vault names of mv and shell completion of a vault:secret argument check the name as typed with vault.ValidateVaultName before building any path from it. Before, vault import .. wrote a long-term key and an unlocker into the state directory itself, and vault select .. made that the current vault.
• 2026-10-04: script/cibuild runs the checks again on an unchanged tree (#54). It passes the current time as the CHECK_EPOCH build argument, which both the lint and the build stage of the Dockerfile declare after their module download, so the RUN steps below the argument run again on each build while the base images and module downloads stay cached. Before, a second run on the same tree took every check from the build cache and reported success having run nothing.
• 2026-10-04: A failed unlocker add no longer leaves a partial unlocker directory (#48). secret unlocker add pgp resolves the GPG key's fingerprint once, for its duplicate check, and passes it to CreatePGPUnlocker to record. CreatePGPUnlocker and CreateKeychainUnlocker get the long-term key and encrypt everything before writing anything. All four unlocker types write their files through secret.WriteDir: a new unlocker is built in a temporary directory, renamed into place when complete and removed on a failure.
• 2026-10-04: secret unlocker select and secret unlocker remove skip, with the warning unlocker list gives, an unlocker directory whose metadata file cannot be checked for, read or parsed, instead of failing when it sorts before the unlocker asked for. Such a directory, or one without a metadata file, is removed by its directory name, the name the warning gives; only the directory is removed, since its type is unknown. Removing one whose metadata file is missing or corrupt never counts as removing the last unlocker. Removing one whose metadata file cannot be checked for or read always does, since it may be the only working unlocker, so in a vault with secrets it needs --force.
• 2026-10-04: A failed command prints its error once, without the usage text after it (#41). Usage is still printed for a command called wrongly: wrong number of arguments, unknown flag, bad flag value, missing required flag, or flags that break a flag group (mutually exclusive, required together, one required). The root command's PersistentPreRunE turns usage off. Cobra checks arguments and flag values before that hook but required flags and flag groups only after it, so the hook checks those two first. Root SilenceUsage would have hidden usage for all of these.
• 2026-10-04: secret get keeps the secret in locked memory until it writes it out (#37): Vault.GetSecret and Vault.GetSecretVersion return a *memguard.LockedBuffer, which every caller destroys, and secret get writes its bytes straight to stdout, still with no trailing newline. Before, the value was copied into ordinary memory that nothing wiped, and get --version also wrote it to the debug log.
• 2026-10-04: The Makefile no longer sets DOCKER_HOST, so its docker targets use the local docker daemon, or whatever DOCKER_HOST the environment sets. make build calls the new script/build, which stamps the version (VERSION from the environment, else git describe) and the git commit as before. build, clean, install and docker-run are in .PHONY; make install depends on build. The vet target is gone: script/test runs go vet first.
• 2026-10-04: .gitignore is the org's standard file, which ignores .env, .env.*, *.pem and *.key and editor and OS files, plus this repo's /secret, *.log, *.test and settings.local.json (#40). .dockerignore also leaves out node_modules; .git stays in the build context for the version stamp.
• 2026-10-04: secret init refuses when the default vault exists, and secret vault create NAME when NAME does, with "vault NAME already exists", before writing anything. The check is in vault.CreateVault, which both commands call while holding the state directory lock, so two creates of one vault at once cannot both pass the check. Before, either command replaced the vault's metadata, passphrase unlocker and longterm.age, so none of its secrets could be decrypted any more. Both commands now ask for the unlocker passphrase before creating the vault, so one stopped at that prompt leaves no vault behind.
• 2026-10-04: The internal/cli tests are back to about their time before the state directory lock (#80). The test that each changing command waits for the lock releases it as soon as it sees the command waiting there, instead of after a fixed 100 ms. The two vaults with passphrase unlockers that the path and move tests start from are made once and copied for each test.
• 2026-10-04: secret mv rejects a move whose destination is the source under another name, such as foo for Foo on a case-insensitive filesystem (the macOS default) or a name reached through a symbolic link, before changing anything, with or without --force, within a vault and between vaults; before, --force removed the destination and so deleted the secret. A rename that changes only letter case works on a case-sensitive filesystem as before.
• 2026-10-04: Lint runs only in docker: script/lint builds Dockerfile.lint, where golangci-lint is a build step rebuilt on every run (--no-cache-filter), so an unchanged tree is linted too; the module download stays cached. script/bootstrap no longer installs golangci-lint, and the Dockerfile lint stage calls it directly instead of make lint. golangci-lint config verify is not run: it fetches its schema live over unpinned HTTPS.
• 2026-10-04: A PGP unlocker whose metadata has no usable GPG key ID no longer panics: GetID() warns with the unlocker's directory and returns pgp-unknown. ListUnlockers skips, with a warning, an unlocker whose metadata file cannot be checked for, read or parsed instead of failing, so secret unlocker list still lists the others; the listing's ID lookup no longer warns about that directory again.
• 2026-10-03: secret mv rejects a move whose destination is the source (mv --force x x, mv --force work:x work:, or an empty destination, which defaults to the source name) before changing anything; before, --force removed the destination first and so deleted the secret. Every vault name given with vault: must be one of the existing vaults by exact name, so work:x work/:x is rejected instead of being taken for a move between two vaults. A move within a named vault no longer makes that vault the current one, whether it succeeds or fails.
• 2026-10-03: Commands that change the state directory hold one lock (flock on lock in the state directory; a mutex on the in-memory test filesystem), so concurrent commands no longer lose versions or race on the current pointers. Every file is written through secret.WriteFileAtomic (temporary file, sync, rename), so no file is ever half-written and current, currentvault and current-unlocker never go missing. New versions, new secrets and cross-vault copies are built in a temporary directory and renamed into place, and removals rename out of the way first, so a version or secret is never half-added and never half-removed. An interrupted command can still leave:
  • from init or vault create killed after the passphrase prompt but before the unlocker is written, a vault with no unlocker, which vault create has already made the current vault;
  • data under a .tmp- name in the state directory: a secret, version or unlocker being added, or the secret, version, unlocker or vault being removed, encrypted keys included. Nothing deletes it; it must be deleted by hand (#75).
• 2026-10-03: The checks run before changing a vault now stop with an error naming the path and cause when they cannot read what they inspect, instead of reading the failure as "nothing there": the duplicate check before unlocker add pgp (an unreadable unlockers.d or unlocker metadata file), the secret count that guards removing the last unlocker and removing a vault, and the existing long-term key check before vault import.
• 2026-10-03: version rm, version promote and get --version accept a version only if it is one of the versions version list lists for that secret, compared as typed before any path is built (secret.VersionExists), and touch nothing otherwise. An empty --version is rejected instead of meaning the current version. Before, secret version rm x ../../.. deleted the whole vault, secret version rm x .. the secret, and . or "" every version.
• 2026-10-03: Key material is wiped on every exit: Entry() returns the exit code after its deferred memguard.Purge() has run, and only main calls os.Exit. SIGINT and SIGTERM go through memguard's handler, which wipes every buffer before exiting; when the process is in the terminal's foreground process group it first restores the terminal settings from startup, so an interrupted passphrase prompt no longer leaves echo off.
• 2026-10-03: Every command that builds a path from a secret name checks the name first with vault.ValidateSecretName and touches nothing when it is invalid: rm, mv (both names, within a vault and between vaults, before switching the current vault), import, version list/promote/rm, encrypt and decrypt. The error and README.md state the naming rule. Before, secret rm .. deleted the whole vault and secret rm . every secret in it.
• 2026-10-03: The keychain unlocker's age key passphrase stays in locked memory: it is generated into a locked buffer, and the keychain JSON is written and read by KeychainData code in internal/secret/keychaindata.go (tested on Linux) without encoding/json holding it; the JSON field names are unchanged.
• 2026-10-02: A plain docker build . builds again: the size tests skip a case that needs more locked memory than the process can lock, and run every case under script/cibuild. The image stamps the VERSION build argument, else git describe --tags --always, into Version, and fails if .git is present but yields no version; make build stamps git describe too, not a fixed 0.1.0. .dockerignore keeps .git/config out; script/docker is the canonical copy.
• 2026-08-07: Updated golangci-lint to v2.12.2 with the canonical .golangci.yml (all linters enabled minus the standard disable list, lll 88, tests linted); bumped the Dockerfile lint-stage image to the tagged v2.12.2 Debian digest; fixed all ~1550 new findings across internal/ and pkg/ (line wrapping, wsl_v5 blank lines, sentinel errors for err113, t.Parallel() where safe, _test package conversions, complexity/dupl helper extraction) on branch golangci-v2.12.2. Reworked after review: the err113 sentinels in internal/vault, internal/secret, internal/cli and pkg/bip85 were reshaped so every composed error message is byte-identical to main, and findUnlockerIDByMetadata now returns an error so unlocker list skips an unreadable unlockers.d entry with a warning instead of emitting a fabricated fallback ID.
• 2026-07-07 Adopted scripts-to-rule-them-all: script/ entrypoints, Makefile shims, README Entrypoints section
• 2026-03-11: Secure Enclave unlocker for hardware-backed secret protection, plus review fixes (stub panics, derivation index, tests, README) on branch secure-enclave-unlocker.
• 2026-02-28: Repo cleanup, removed stale .cursorrules and coverage.out.
• Audit fix wave (issues #1, #2, #3, #13, #14): skip unlockers with missing metadata, allow uppercase secret names, fix hardcoded derivation index, validate names in GetSecretVersion against path traversal, return errors instead of panicking, add Warn() on silent anomalies.
• Memory security hardening: LockedBuffer used through encrypt/decrypt paths (Save/EncryptWithPassphrase/GetValue/gpg helpers), deprecated bare-[]byte APIs removed.
• Per-secret keypair architecture, vault package refactor, versioning with --version, comprehensive test suite with in-memory filesystem.
• Debug logging system (slog, GODEBUG flag, TTY-aware output).
• Renamed SEP unlocker to Keychain, reorganized import commands.
• 2025-05-28: Initial implementation (vault, age encryption, mnemonic, CLI).

Future Steps

• Compliance (after Next Step lands): keep main green under the new .gitea workflow; run make check before every merge.
• Implement version-number shell completion for the second arg of secret version promote and secret version rm (internal/cli/version.go; was an in-code TODO removed for godox).
• Cover mnemonic-vs-xprv identity consistency in pkg/agehd/agehd_test.go TestMnemonicVsXPRVConsistency (was an in-code FIXME removed for godox).
• Darwin-gated files (internal/secret/keychainunlocker.go, seunlocker_darwin.go, internal/macse/macse_darwin.go, related tests) are not linted on the Linux CI runner and still contain lines over the new 88-column limit; they will surface if lint ever runs on macOS.
• Merge secure-enclave-unlocker to main once review is done.
• 1.0 critical security blockers (from repo TODO.md):
  • Command injection: GPG key IDs passed unescaped to exec.Command (pgpunlocker.go:323-327); data.String() passed unescaped to the security command (keychainunlocker.go:472-476).
  • Memory security: age identity .String() creates unprotected copies (keychainunlocker.go:356, pgpunlocker.go:256, version.go:155); age secret key held in a plain string in cli/crypto.go:86,91,113; private keys exposed via buffer.Bytes() to GPGEncryptFunc and EncryptWithPassphrase.
  • Input validation: no maximum secret size (DoS).
  • Timing attacks: bytes.Equal passphrase compare (cli/init.go: 209-216); non-constant-time public key compare (vault.go:95-100).
• High priority:
  • Secure temporary file handling and cleanup.
  • Initialize a default unlock key at vault creation.
  • Confirmation prompts for destructive operations (keys rm, vault deletion).
  • Add secret rm and vault deletion commands.
• Medium priority:
  • Standardize error messages; stop leaking internals.
  • Graceful handling of corrupted or missing key files with recovery suggestions.
  • Validate GPG key existence before creating PGP unlock keys.
  • Split oversized CLI functions.
  • Document env var security (SB_UNLOCK_PASSPHRASE, SB_SECRET_MNEMONIC); clear after use.
  • mlock/munlock for sensitive allocations.
• Cleanups: read statedir from environment or default instead of passing it around.
• Enhancements: help examples, shell completion, colored output, --quiet flag, name suggestions on miss, audit logging, hardware integration tests (Keychain, GPG), naming consistency, vault export/import, batch operations, search, secret metadata (descriptions, tags).