@serfab/cadre-core 0.11.0 → 0.13.0

package/dist/cadre-node.js

@@ -4,7 +4,7 @@ import { peerIdFromString, peerIdFromPrivateKey } from '@libp2p/peer-id';
 import { createLibp2pNode } from '@optimystic/db-p2p';
 import { wrapStorageWithCache, disposeStorageCache } from '@serfab/quereus-plugin-sereus';
 import { multiaddr } from '@multiformats/multiaddr';
-import { CONTROL_CLUSTER_POLICY, CONTROL_REPLICATION_BREADTH, DEFAULT_CHECKIN_WINDOW_MS } from './types.js';
+import { controlClusterPolicy, CONTROL_REPLICATION_BREADTH, DEFAULT_CHECKIN_WINDOW_MS } from './types.js';
 import { sign } from '@optimystic/quereus-plugin-crypto';
 import { ed25519KeyPairFromLibp2p, ed25519PublicKeyFromPrivate, requireEd25519PublicKeyB64 } from './ed25519-key.js';
 import { strandTransportKey } from './strand-transport-key.js';
@@ -12,26 +12,30 @@ import { DEFAULT_IDENTITY_KEY_ID } from './key-store.js';
 import { loadOrCreateIdentityKey } from './identity-key.js';
 import { MemoryTrustedOwnerStore } from './trusted-owner-store.js';
 import { MemoryBootstrapPeerStore } from './bootstrap-peer-store.js';
+import { MemoryEnrolledMachineStore } from './enrolled-machine-store.js';
 import { mergePeerAddrs, groupAddrsByPeerId } from './peer-addr-book.js';
 import { verifyCadrePeerVoucher } from './peer-authorization.js';
 import { ed25519PublicKeyB64FromPeerId } from './seed-bootstrap.js';
-import { signPeerRecord, verifyPeerRecordSignature, isPeerRecordFresh, orderSignalingFirst, isSignalingAddr, trailingPeerId, currentMemberTrustPolicy, DEFAULT_PEER_RECORD_MAX_AGE_MS, DEFAULT_PEER_RECORD_HEARTBEAT_MS } from './peer-record.js';
+import { signPeerRecord, verifyPeerRecordSignature, isPeerRecordFresh, orderSignalingFirst, isSignalingAddr, withTrailingPeerId, currentMemberTrustPolicy, DEFAULT_PEER_RECORD_MAX_AGE_MS, DEFAULT_PEER_RECORD_HEARTBEAT_MS } from './peer-record.js';
 import { signDeviceTokenRecord, verifyDeviceTokenSignature, isPushPlatform } from './device-token.js';
 import { StrandWatcher } from './strand-watcher.js';
 import { StrandInstanceManager } from './strand-instance-manager.js';
+import { PeerJoinBackfill } from './peer-join-backfill.js';
 import { deriveCohortMembers } from './strand-cohort.js';
 import { selectControlCohortDials, DEFAULT_CONTROL_COHORT_DIAL_TIMEOUT_MS, DEFAULT_CONTROL_COHORT_RECONCILE_MS, DEFAULT_CONTROL_COHORT_TARGET_DEGREE } from './control-cohort.js';
 import { withDeadline } from './control-stream.js';
 import { EnrollmentService } from './enrollment.js';
 import { HibernationManager } from './hibernation-manager.js';
-import { ControlDatabase } from './control-database.js';
+import { ControlDatabase, isStrandIdConflict } from './control-database.js';
 import { SeedBootstrapService } from './seed-bootstrap.js';
 import { StrandSolicitationService } from './strand-solicitation.js';
-import { createMembershipConnectionGater, DEFAULT_ENROLLMENT_WINDOW_MS } from './membership-connection-gater.js';
+import { MAX_STRAND_ADDRS } from './strand-formation-protocol.js';
+import { createMembershipConnectionGater, DEFAULT_ENROLLMENT_WINDOW_MS, UnauthorizedReservationBudget } from './membership-connection-gater.js';
 import { StrandWakeService, dialWake } from './strand-wake-protocol.js';
 import { StrandAddrService, collectStrandAddrs } from './strand-addr-protocol.js';
 import { DelegateAdmissionStore, extractCircuitRelayTargets, dueRelayAnnounces, pruneStoppedStrandAnnounces, peerStrandKey } from './delegate-admission.js';
-import { resolveListenAddrs } from './relay-addrs.js';
+import { relayCircuitAddrs, resolveListenAddrs, resolveTransportOptions, RelayReservationFailedError } from './relay-addrs.js';
+import { replacesAdvertisedAddrs, resolveAnnounceAddrs } from './announce-addrs.js';
 import { superviseRelayReservation, resolveRelayReservationState } from './relay-reservation.js';
 import { PushFanoutService } from './push-fanout.js';
 import { summarizeConnectionPaths, classifyTransport } from './diagnostics/connection-path.js';
@@ -63,6 +67,30 @@ export const STRAND_PEER_ADDR_REFRESH_MS = 10 * 60 * 1000;
 function relayStrandAddrPeer(relay) {
     return { peerId: relay.relayPeerId, addrs: [multiaddr(relay.relayAddr)] };
 }
+/**
+ * `primary` followed by the entries of `extra` it does not already contain, de-duplicated
+ * and order-preserving.
+ *
+ * Used wherever a strand's discovery seed unions two sources of address strings — the
+ * freshly-RPC'd sibling answers and the cross-party addresses learned at formation. The
+ * caller passes the FRESHER source as `primary`, so a stale entry can only ever be
+ * appended, never promoted ahead of a current one, and each source keeps whatever
+ * signaling-first ordering it arrived with.
+ */
+function unionAddrs(primary, extra) {
+    if (extra.length === 0) {
+        return [...primary];
+    }
+    const out = [...primary];
+    const seen = new Set(primary);
+    for (const addr of extra) {
+        if (seen.has(addr))
+            continue;
+        seen.add(addr);
+        out.push(addr);
+    }
+    return out;
+}
 /**
  * Build the signing callback the `ControlDatabase` writers expect: they hand it the
  * canonical row-bound message BYTES (see `buildAuthorizationMessage`), and it ed25519-signs
@@ -83,6 +111,56 @@ function requireNonBlank(value, label) {
     }
     return trimmed;
 }
+/**
+ * Is the live `Strand` row the one a publish of `desired` would have produced?
+ *
+ * "Identical content" means `(Type, MemberPrivateKey)` and deliberately NOT
+ * `FounderOwnerKey`: that column is provenance (WHICH machine published the row), not
+ * content. Two machines of one party racing to found the same id must keep resolving as
+ * "the winner's row stands" — the loser adopts the row and, since the winner's key is on
+ * it, correctly comes up as a joiner (see `launchStrand`'s founder derivation). Comparing
+ * it here would turn that benign race into a hard throw. `Id` is the lookup key and
+ * `StampId` is a single-use nonce, so the two compared columns are all the content there
+ * is. A live row matching on both is, by construction, the state a repeat publish would
+ * have reached, whichever branch of `Strand.AuthorizedInsert` seated it (owner-signed, or
+ * the unsigned consent branch an invite redemption uses).
+ *
+ * Returns the mismatching column names, empty when the row matches. The KEY's value is
+ * deliberately never returned or logged — it is the closed strand's read-gating secret.
+ */
+function strandRowMismatches(live, desired) {
+    const mismatches = [];
+    if (live.Type !== desired.Type) {
+        mismatches.push(`Type is '${live.Type}', not the requested '${desired.Type}'`);
+    }
+    if ((live.MemberPrivateKey ?? null) !== (desired.MemberPrivateKey ?? null)) {
+        mismatches.push('MemberPrivateKey differs from the one supplied');
+    }
+    return mismatches;
+}
+/**
+ * The live row when it matches `desired` ({@link strandRowMismatches}); otherwise throw
+ * naming the columns that differ.
+ *
+ * A mismatch must stay a hard error: accepting one would let a retry reopen a strand the
+ * party closed, or swap the key that gates its reads — so the two cases the raw
+ * `UNIQUE constraint failed: Strand.Id` could not distinguish ("already done, carry on"
+ * vs. "genuine conflict, stop") are separated here rather than left to the caller.
+ *
+ * @param situation - How the row came to be there, as a verb phrase completing
+ *   `Strand <id> …`, e.g. `'is already published'`.
+ */
+function requireMatchingStrandRow(live, desired, situation) {
+    const mismatches = strandRowMismatches(live, desired);
+    if (mismatches.length > 0) {
+        throw new Error(`Strand ${desired.Id} ${situation} with DIFFERENT content, so this publish is a ` +
+            `conflict, not a repeat: ${mismatches.join('; ')}. Reconcile deliberately — attach ` +
+            'the existing strand with addStrand/foundStrand to keep it, or unpublishStrand first ' +
+            'to re-seat it (destructive for a closed strand: its MemberPrivateKey is stored ' +
+            'nowhere else).');
+    }
+    return live;
+}
 /**
  * CadreNode is the main entry point for a cadre member.
  * It manages:
@@ -105,6 +183,14 @@ export class CadreNode {
         this.trustedOwnerStore = null;
         this.controlNode = null;
         this.controlDatabase = null;
+        /**
+         * The CONTROL network's peer-join block catch-up — same module as the
+         * per-strand ones, but membership-gated (see {@link startControlBackfill}).
+         * Created in {@link start} after the control node and database are up, stopped
+         * and dropped in {@link cleanup} before either is torn down, so a stop()→
+         * start() cycle rebuilds it with a fresh caught-up-peer memo.
+         */
+        this.controlBackfill = null;
         this.strandWatcher = null;
         this.seedBootstrapService = null;
         this.strandSolicitationService = null;
@@ -148,10 +234,11 @@ export class CadreNode {
         this.windowWaiters = new Set();
         this.eventHandlers = new Map();
         /**
-         * Relay multiaddrs the caller asked {@link reserveRelays} to reserve through.
-         * Empty (the default) means nobody asked, so {@link getRelayReservationState}
-         * reports `none` — this whole surface is opt-in and dormant for the CLI/host
-         * nodes, which use the configured `network.relayAddrs` route instead.
+         * Relay multiaddrs the caller asked {@link reserveRelays} to reserve through —
+         * or, on a node that names `network.relayAddrs`, the ones
+         * {@link driveControlRelayReservation} asked for at the end of {@link start}.
+         * Empty (the default) means neither happened, so {@link getRelayReservationState}
+         * reports `none`.
          */
         this.relayReserveAddrs = [];
         /**
@@ -166,6 +253,23 @@ export class CadreNode {
          * supervisor to hold one — i.e. the pre-start `control node unavailable` case.
          */
         this.relayReserveError = null;
+        /**
+         * True from just before the control libp2p node is created until
+         * {@link ControlDatabase.initialize} has settled — the connection gate's
+         * BRING-UP QUIET PERIOD (`membership-connection-gater.ts`), during which this
+         * node refuses every control connection in both directions.
+         *
+         * The invariant: the control database is built while this node holds zero
+         * control connections. Every same-party sibling connected in that window joins
+         * the Optimystic cohort the bring-up's block probes consult, and a sibling that
+         * has not yet replicated this node's `CadrePeer` row refuses them all — which
+         * fails `start()` outright and cannot be retried into convergence (writing the
+         * row that would clear the refusal needs the database being built).
+         *
+         * Cleared on FAILURE as well as success ({@link cleanup} clears it), so
+         * teardown is never gated.
+         */
+        this.controlBringUpInFlight = false;
         /** Map of strandId -> sAppConfig for sAppId filtering and management */
         this.sAppConfigs = new Map();
         /**
@@ -226,10 +330,12 @@ export class CadreNode {
         /**
          * In-memory delegate admission grants (see `delegate-admission.ts`): the
          * strand-node transport peerIds this party's members have announced over the
-         * strand-addr RPC, admitted at the CONNECTION level so a member's NAT'd
-         * strand node can hold a circuit-relay reservation on this node. Consulted
-         * ONLY by {@link admitInboundControlConnection}; the fail-closed per-stream
-         * gate ({@link authorizeInboundControlStream}) never honors it.
+         * strand-addr RPC, admitted at the CONNECTION and RESERVATION levels so a
+         * member's NAT'd strand node can hold a circuit-relay reservation on this
+         * node (without spending the unauthorized-reservation budget). Consulted
+         * ONLY by {@link admitInboundControlConnection} and
+         * {@link admitControlRelayReservation}; the fail-closed per-stream gate
+         * ({@link authorizeInboundControlStream}) never honors it.
          */
         this.delegateAdmission = new DelegateAdmissionStore();
         /**
@@ -251,6 +357,36 @@ export class CadreNode {
          * stale stamp.
          */
         this.strandPeerAddrRefreshAt = new Map();
+        /**
+         * CROSS-PARTY strand-network addresses learned at formation, keyed by strandId — the
+         * responder's live strand addrs, carried back on the formation result
+         * (`FormationResultMessage.strandAddrs`) and recorded by {@link formStrand}.
+         *
+         * This is the ONLY cross-party discovery input there is. The strand-addr RPC that
+         * resolves a strand's addresses is membership-gated and answers own-party siblings
+         * only, so without this map a joiner's cohort seed for a two-party strand is empty and
+         * the mesh never forms.
+         *
+         * Read by {@link resolveCohortSeed} (launch + hibernation resume) and re-merged by
+         * every {@link refreshStrandPeerAddrs} pass — the re-merge is what keeps the entries
+         * alive past the peerStore's one-hour address expiry, since nothing can re-resolve
+         * them.
+         *
+         * IN-MEMORY and ONE-SHOT, deliberately (see `docs/strands.md`): the addresses die with
+         * the process, and a restarted initiator with no sibling running the strand is back to
+         * an empty seed until the durability work lands
+         * (`backlog/feat-cross-party-strand-addr-durability`). They are also never refreshed,
+         * so a responder whose relay reservation rotates before the initiator dials leaves a
+         * dead entry behind; recovery today is a fresh invitation.
+         *
+         * NOTE: entries are kept for the node's lifetime, including across a
+         * {@link stopStrand} — a stopped strand may be rediscovered by the watcher and must
+         * still get its seed. Each strand's list is capped at `MAX_STRAND_ADDRS`, but the
+         * number of KEYS is bounded only by the strands this node has ever formed as an
+         * initiator (not by time); if a node ever forms strands at scale, evict on
+         * `unpublishStrand` or cap the map.
+         */
+        this.crossPartyStrandAddrs = new Map();
         /**
          * Cold-start bootstrap dial targets: the owner-flagged peers of every seed
          * this node has applied, keyed by peer id, valued by the seed's multiaddr
@@ -285,6 +421,16 @@ export class CadreNode {
          * the party if it is ever stranded again.
          */
         this.bootstrapPeerStore = null;
+        /**
+         * Node-local record of the party's enrolled-machine count (see
+         * `enrolled-machine-store.ts`), kept so the CONTROL node can declare a
+         * block-repair yardstick at bring-up. Constructed (or adopted from
+         * `config.enrolledMachines.store`) by {@link initializeEnrolledMachineStore};
+         * written by {@link refreshAuthorizedControlPeers}. Like
+         * {@link bootstrapPeerStore} it is deliberately NOT cleared by {@link cleanup},
+         * so it survives a stop()→start() cycle of the same node instance.
+         */
+        this.enrolledMachineStore = null;
         /** Initial self-registration timer (see {@link scheduleSelfRegistration}). */
         this.selfRegistrationTimer = null;
         /** TTL heartbeat that re-publishes the self record before it goes stale. */
@@ -390,6 +536,7 @@ export class CadreNode {
         this.config = config;
         this.strandManager = new StrandInstanceManager();
         this.enrollmentService = new EnrollmentService();
+        this.unauthorizedRelayReservations = new UnauthorizedReservationBudget(config.network?.unauthorizedRelayReservationCap);
         // Create hibernation manager with callbacks
         const hibernationCallbacks = {
             onIdle: async (strandId) => this.handleStrandIdle(strandId),
@@ -501,16 +648,12 @@ export class CadreNode {
             return;
         }
         log('Starting CadreNode for party: %s', this.config.controlNetwork.partyId);
-        // NOTE: the only direct `console.*` in this library — a boot-time operator warning, not a
-        // diagnostic trace (those use `debug`, which an operator never sees without `DEBUG=`). If a
-        // second such warning ever appears here, route both through a `CadreNodeEvents` entry the
-        // embedder surfaces instead of growing a console surface inside a library.
-        if (this.config.network?.announceAddrs && this.config.network.announceAddrs.length > 0) {
-            console.warn('network.announceAddrs is set but not yet supported (no upstream db-p2p option to apply it) ' +
-                '— this node will keep advertising its listen/relay addresses instead.');
-        }
         try {
             const tTotal = performance.now();
+            // Config pre-flight, inside the guarded region: resolving the listen addrs it reads
+            // throws on a malformed `relayAddrs` entry, and that failure belongs on the same
+            // logged-and-cleaned-up path as every other one in start().
+            this.warnIfAnnounceAddrsDiscardRelay();
             // Install the WebRTC TURN-relay tracker BEFORE any libp2p bring-up, so it
             // wraps globalThis.RTCPeerConnection before the control node can create one.
             // Inert on Node.js (no RTCPeerConnection); disposed in cleanup().
@@ -529,6 +672,31 @@ export class CadreNode {
             // closed before any network bring-up, and the retained dial targets are
             // loaded before the first reconcile pass could consult them.
             this.initializeBootstrapPeerStore();
+            // Read the party's enrolled-machine count out of its node-local record and
+            // capture it for buildControlNodeOptions below. This MUST precede
+            // createControlNode: Optimystic freezes the cluster policy when the node is
+            // built, and the ControlDatabase that could answer the question live does not
+            // exist until after that. Remembering the number across the restart is the
+            // only way to declare it at all — see `enrolled-machine-store.ts`.
+            this.initializeEnrolledMachineStore();
+            // Arm the connection gate's BRING-UP QUIET PERIOD before the libp2p node
+            // exists, so no connection can form ahead of it: `@libp2p/bootstrap` emits
+            // its discovery events ~1 s after `libp2p.start()` and the connection
+            // manager auto-dials from there, which is INSIDE createControlNode below.
+            // The invariant being protected is "zero control connections during
+            // control-database bring-up" — see the field's doc and
+            // `membership-connection-gater.ts` → "The bring-up quiet period".
+            //
+            // NOTE: without this gate the bootstrap arm is a RACE, not a guarantee — its
+            // safety margin is bring-up duration versus @libp2p/bootstrap's 1 s discovery
+            // fuse, and bring-up duration is (raw-storage operations) × per-operation
+            // latency. The cold-start operation count and the 50-90 ms/op figure a loaded
+            // phone actually sees live in `control-database.ts`'s `loadSchema` note (and
+            // are pinned by `control-start-storage-op-budget.spec.ts`): at the top of that
+            // range bring-up is 9-15 s, far past the fuse. So if this gate is ever removed
+            // or bypassed, that arm reopens for exactly the nodes most likely to hit it —
+            // phones joining a party, whose membership row has not replicated yet.
+            this.controlBringUpInFlight = true;
             // Create the control network libp2p node
             let t0 = performance.now();
             this.controlNode = await this.createControlNode();
@@ -549,6 +717,21 @@ export class CadreNode {
             });
             await this.controlDatabase.initialize();
             timing('[start] controlDatabase.initialize: %dms', Math.round(performance.now() - t0));
+            // The database exists locally now, so the quiet period has done its job and
+            // this node can be in the conversation. A failure above never reaches here —
+            // `cleanup()` on the catch path opens the gate instead, so teardown (and a
+            // retry by the embedder) is not gated.
+            //
+            // NOTE: the window ends HERE, not at the end of start(), so the awaited control-DB
+            // work that follows — `strandWatcher.start()`'s first poll — can run against a
+            // cohort a connection just joined. Fine now: every block that poll reads was
+            // created locally by the initialize() above, so a refusing sibling has nothing to
+            // refuse. If a boot ever fails with `BlockUnavailableError` from BELOW this line,
+            // that assumption broke. Do not simply move this clear later without measuring:
+            // `handleStrandAdded` runs inside `strandWatcher.start()` and seeds each strand
+            // node from CONNECTED siblings (`resolveCohortSeed`), so a longer window trades a
+            // bring-up hazard for boot-time strand seeds that are always empty.
+            this.controlBringUpInFlight = false;
             log('Control database initialized');
             // Attach the per-stream gate to the control DB's membership hub, so every
             // committed `CadrePeer` write re-materializes the authorized snapshot on its
@@ -609,17 +792,38 @@ export class CadreNode {
             // delayed refresh path) so no early `connection:open` is missed — the
             // write-while-alone re-replication drain must fire on the first 0→≥1 edge.
             this.wireControlConnectionListeners();
+            // Arm the control network's peer-join block catch-up now that the control
+            // DB (which the push-time membership gate reads) is up. Armed even when
+            // this node is alone — like the strand one, it only does work when the
+            // control libp2p node reports a peer connection, and arming it at start is
+            // what closes the "genesised alone, headers never replicate" hole.
+            this.startControlBackfill();
             // Seed the per-stream gate's materialized authorized set now that the
             // control DB is up (non-blocking; the helper never rejects). Until it
             // lands the snapshot is empty, which the stream gate treats as cold
             // start and admits.
             void this.refreshMembershipGate('start');
+            // Reserve the configured relays LAST, so every step above ran against a
+            // cohort of one (see driveControlRelayReservation). Ahead of
+            // scheduleSelfRegistration, so this node's first published `CadrePeer` row
+            // already carries the `/p2p-circuit` address the reservation earns it.
+            // Throws on a relay that will not have us — start() is fail-fast for a node
+            // whose operator named a relay.
+            await this.driveControlRelayReservation();
             // Schedule self-registration in background
             this.scheduleSelfRegistration();
         }
         catch (error) {
             log('Failed to start CadreNode: %o', error);
+            // `driveControlRelayReservation` throws AFTER `control:connected` was emitted,
+            // so a subscriber can have seen this node come up. Balance the edge rather than
+            // leaving it dangling — `cleanup()` has torn the node down either way, and the
+            // events are what an embedder drives its "am I connected" UI from.
+            const wasConnected = this._running;
             await this.cleanup();
+            if (wasConnected) {
+                this.emit('control:disconnected', undefined);
+            }
             throw error;
         }
     }
@@ -657,19 +861,7 @@ export class CadreNode {
             return;
         }
         log('Stopping CadreNode');
-        // Stop the retry loop BEFORE tearing the node down, not after: `cleanup()`
-        // stops the control node partway through, and a tick that fires during it
-        // would dial and then poll a half-torn-down node for the whole reserve
-        // timeout — logging spurious dial failures and holding the process open.
-        this.relayReserveSupervisor?.stop();
-        this.relayReserveSupervisor = null;
         await this.cleanup();
-        // Drop the rest of the relay-reservation posture: a stopped node holds no
-        // reservation, so a restarted instance must not report the previous run's
-        // `reserved`.
-        this.relayReserveAddrs = [];
-        this.relayReserveError = null;
-        this._running = false;
         this.emit('control:disconnected', undefined);
         log('CadreNode stopped');
     }
@@ -792,6 +984,46 @@ export class CadreNode {
         }
         this.bootstrapPeerStore = store;
     }
+    /**
+     * Construct (or adopt) the node-local enrolled-machine store and capture the
+     * count this run will declare into {@link declaredEnrolledMachines}.
+     *
+     * Synchronous for the same reason {@link initializeBootstrapPeerStore} is: an
+     * injected store has already loaded its persisted count by the time it is handed
+     * in (its `open` is the async part), and the in-memory default has nothing to
+     * load. Must run BEFORE {@link createControlNode} — that is the whole point of
+     * the record; see `enrolled-machine-store.ts`.
+     *
+     * The store instance is kept across stop()→start() (so a count recorded during
+     * the previous run is not lost with the ephemeral default), but the DECLARED
+     * count is re-read every time — which is how a restart applies a number the
+     * previous run learned.
+     *
+     * A store scoped to a different party is a configuration error, fail closed. It
+     * is only a repair hint, but a hint sized by a foreign party's membership is a
+     * number nobody chose, and the mismatch always means a miswired embedder.
+     */
+    initializeEnrolledMachineStore() {
+        const partyId = this.config.controlNetwork.partyId;
+        const store = this.enrolledMachineStore
+            ?? this.config.enrolledMachines?.store
+            ?? new MemoryEnrolledMachineStore(partyId);
+        if (store.partyId !== partyId) {
+            throw new Error(`CadreNodeConfig: enrolledMachines.store is scoped to party ${store.partyId}, ` +
+                `but this node serves party ${partyId} — refusing to size a repair yardstick from a foreign party`);
+        }
+        this.enrolledMachineStore = store;
+        this.declaredEnrolledMachines = store.count();
+        log('control repair yardstick will be declared from %o enrolled machine(s)', this.declaredEnrolledMachines);
+    }
+    /**
+     * The node-local enrolled-machine store (null before {@link start}) — what this
+     * node last knew about its party's size. Exposed for diagnostics and for a host
+     * that wants to show which repair yardstick the next launch will declare.
+     */
+    getEnrolledMachineStore() {
+        return this.enrolledMachineStore;
+    }
     /**
      * The node-local cold-start bootstrap-peer store (null before {@link start}) —
      * the retained owner addresses {@link reconcileControlCohort}'s cold-start
@@ -838,6 +1070,90 @@ export class CadreNode {
     async createControlNode() {
         return await createLibp2pNode(this.buildControlNodeOptions());
     }
+    /**
+     * The control libp2p node's Optimystic network name — ONE binding for every
+     * derivation from it (`db-p2p` namespaces all of the node's protocol ids as
+     * `/optimystic/<networkName>/...`), so the node options and the block-transfer
+     * protocol prefix the control backfill dials can never drift apart.
+     */
+    controlNetworkName() {
+        return `control-${this.config.controlNetwork.partyId}`;
+    }
+    /**
+     * Arm the CONTROL network's peer-join block catch-up: push every block in the
+     * control database's own raw store to each newly connected AUTHORIZED member
+     * this runtime has not yet caught up. This is what physically replicates
+     * control blocks committed while the writer was alone — the named
+     * collection-header blocks written once at genesis above all, whose revision
+     * never moves again, so no later commit ever carries them to a member that
+     * joined after them. Without it, such a member that restarts offline reads
+     * the affected control tables as EMPTY, silently (`isMember()` answers false
+     * for peers it knew about before the restart).
+     *
+     * Unlike the per-strand instances (see `strand-instance-manager.ts`), pushes
+     * are gated on {@link isAuthorizedMember}, judged at push time: the control
+     * network's inbound connection gate deliberately admits non-members in
+     * several states (seed delivery to an un-enrolled node, an open enrollment
+     * window, an outstanding invitation, configured bootstrap/relay peers), and
+     * pushing the whole control store to such a peer would hand a stranger the
+     * party's entire membership, addresses and strand list. The receiving side
+     * needs no work of its own: `createLibp2pNode` registers the block-transfer
+     * handler on every node it builds, control node included, and this node's
+     * per-stream gate (`authorizeInboundControlStream`) covers the inbound
+     * direction. A denied peer is retried on its next `connection:open`, and —
+     * because the production join order is connect-then-authorize — on every
+     * committed membership change via {@link refreshAuthorizedControlPeers}'s
+     * `scheduleConnectedPeers()` call.
+     *
+     * No-ops (logged) when the embedder configured no control storage or the
+     * node exposes no key network — the backfill would have nothing to read or
+     * no way to dial.
+     */
+    startControlBackfill() {
+        if (this.config.controlBackfill?.enabled === false || !this.controlNode) {
+            return;
+        }
+        // Through the resolver, not the {@link controlStorage} memo field: the resolver is
+        // idempotent (it returns the same wrapped store `buildControlNodeOptions` already
+        // resolved), so the catch-up cannot be silently disarmed by a future reordering that
+        // moves this call ahead of the one that populated the field.
+        const storage = this.resolveControlStorage();
+        const keyNetwork = this.controlNode.keyNetwork;
+        if (!storage || !keyNetwork) {
+            log('Control peer-join block catch-up is inert: %s', !storage ? 'no control storage configured' : 'control node exposes no keyNetwork');
+            return;
+        }
+        const networkName = this.controlNetworkName();
+        this.controlBackfill = new PeerJoinBackfill({
+            label: networkName,
+            libp2p: this.controlNode,
+            peerNetwork: keyNetwork,
+            storage,
+            // The same prefix the receiver registered its block-transfer handler
+            // under — derived from the same networkName binding the node options
+            // used, never re-spelled here.
+            protocolPrefix: `/optimystic/${networkName}`,
+            authorizePeer: (peerId) => this.isAuthorizedMember(peerId)
+        }, {
+            // A shorter settle window than the strand default (1000 ms): the control
+            // store is small (a party's membership — dozens of blocks), a re-push is
+            // idempotent, and the window a joiner is connected before going offline
+            // can be short (converge one row, then stop) — a slow debounce is the
+            // difference between that joiner holding the collection headers and
+            // reading its own membership as empty after an offline restart.
+            //
+            // NOTE: 250 is reasoned, not swept — the delete-while-alone scenario's
+            // phases 1-3 finish in about a second, so the 1000 ms strand default left
+            // the push racing the joiner's stop, and 250 gives margin. Nobody measured
+            // the shape of the curve either side of it. If the control gates start
+            // flaking on a joiner that stopped before being caught up, lower this
+            // before looking anywhere else; if catch-up pushes start showing up as
+            // connection-churn noise, raise it.
+            debounceMs: 250,
+            ...this.config.controlBackfill
+        });
+        this.controlBackfill.start();
+    }
     /**
      * The control database's cache-wrapped raw storage, resolved from
      * `config.storage.provider` on first use and then held in {@link controlStorage}
@@ -868,6 +1184,42 @@ export class CadreNode {
         this.controlStorage = wrapStorageWithCache(resolved, 'control');
         return this.controlStorage;
     }
+    /**
+     * Warn the operator when `network.announceAddrs` will silently cost this node the
+     * relay reachability it also configured.
+     *
+     * A non-empty announce set REPLACES everything libp2p advertises, so the
+     * `/p2p-circuit` address earned by a relay reservation is dropped from the node's
+     * advertised addresses even though the reservation itself is still held — peers
+     * behind NAT stop being able to reach it through that relay. Not an error: an
+     * operator whose relay slot is decorative may genuinely want only the announced
+     * address, so this reports and proceeds.
+     *
+     * Keyed off the RESOLVED listen addrs rather than `relayAddrs` alone, so a
+     * hand-written `/p2p-circuit` entry in `listenAddrs` — the same reservation by the
+     * longer route — is caught too.
+     *
+     * NOTE: the only direct `console.*` in this library — a boot-time operator warning, not a
+     * diagnostic trace (those use `debug`, which an operator never sees without `DEBUG=`). If a
+     * second such warning ever appears here, route both through a `CadreNodeEvents` entry the
+     * embedder surfaces instead of growing a console surface inside a library.
+     */
+    warnIfAnnounceAddrsDiscardRelay() {
+        const network = this.config.network;
+        if (!replacesAdvertisedAddrs(network)) {
+            return;
+        }
+        const listensOnCircuit = (resolveListenAddrs(network) ?? [])
+            .some((addr) => addr.includes('/p2p-circuit'));
+        if (!listensOnCircuit) {
+            return;
+        }
+        console.warn('network.announceAddrs is set alongside a circuit-relay listener (from network.relayAddrs, ' +
+            'or a /p2p-circuit entry in network.listenAddrs). A non-empty announce set REPLACES every ' +
+            'address this node advertises, so the /p2p-circuit address earned from the relay reservation ' +
+            'will not be advertised and peers will stop reaching this node through that relay. ' +
+            'Use network.appendAnnounceAddrs instead to advertise an extra address without discarding the rest.');
+    }
     /**
      * Map this node's config onto the control network's libp2p node options.
      *
@@ -879,17 +1231,24 @@ export class CadreNode {
     buildControlNodeOptions() {
         const { controlNetwork, network, profile } = this.config;
         const identityKey = this.identityKey;
-        const listenAddrs = resolveListenAddrs(network);
-        // Determine relay mode: if explicitly set in config, use that;
-        // otherwise default to true for storage profile nodes (better connectivity/uptime)
-        const enableRelay = network?.enableRelay ?? (profile === 'storage');
+        // `'search'`: `network.relayAddrs` contributes the bare `/p2p-circuit` SEARCH
+        // entry, which opens no connection — the reservation is driven explicitly at
+        // the END of `start()`, so the control database is built while this node holds
+        // zero control connections. See `relay-addrs.ts` and `start()`.
+        const listenAddrs = resolveListenAddrs(network, 'search');
+        // The transports those listen entries imply. A `/ws` entry switches db-p2p's
+        // WebSocket transport on (without it the entry binds nothing and libp2p reports
+        // nothing); anything outside {tcp, ws/wss, p2p-circuit} throws here rather than
+        // being silently dropped at bring-up. See `relay-addrs.ts`.
+        const transportOptions = resolveTransportOptions(network, listenAddrs);
+        const enableRelay = this.relayServerEnabled();
         // The control node's own storage, resolved once per runtime (see
         // {@link resolveControlStorage}) rather than per call.
         const controlStorageProvider = this.resolveControlStorage();
         const nodeOptions = {
             port: 0,
             bootstrapNodes: controlNetwork.bootstrapNodes,
-            networkName: `control-${controlNetwork.partyId}`,
+            networkName: this.controlNetworkName(),
             storage: controlStorageProvider,
             fretProfile: profile === 'storage' ? 'core' : 'edge',
             relay: enableRelay,
@@ -900,19 +1259,41 @@ export class CadreNode {
             // CONTROL_CLUSTER_POLICY: only the admission gate defaults to 2, while the read-repair
             // corroboration floor would otherwise fall back to this clusterSize of 16.
             clusterSize: CONTROL_REPLICATION_BREADTH,
-            clusterPolicy: CONTROL_CLUSTER_POLICY,
+            // The base control policy with the block-repair corroboration yardstick declared
+            // from the machines this party had enrolled at this node's last look
+            // ({@link declaredEnrolledMachines}, read in start() before this runs). Handed
+            // `undefined` — a brand-new node, an unreadable record, or an embedder that
+            // injected no store — this returns the frozen CONTROL_CLUSTER_POLICY object
+            // itself, so the unknown case is provably byte-for-byte the old behaviour.
+            // The yardstick moves ALONE: `assumedClusterSize` stays pinned at 2, because a
+            // party of phones cannot promise three quarters of its machines are awake.
+            clusterPolicy: controlClusterPolicy(this.declaredEnrolledMachines),
             arachnode: { enableRingZulu: profile === 'storage' },
             ...(identityKey && { privateKey: identityKey }),
             ...(network?.transports && { transports: network.transports }),
-            // Configured `listenAddrs`, plus a `/p2p-circuit` listener for every
-            // `network.relayAddrs` entry — that listener is what reserves the relay slot.
+            // `{ wsPort }` when a listen entry names WebSocket, otherwise `{}` — and always
+            // `{}` when `network.transports` is set, since the embedder owns transport policy
+            // then. Spread NEXT to `transports` because the two answer the same question.
+            ...transportOptions,
+            // Configured `listenAddrs`, plus the bare `/p2p-circuit` search listener when
+            // `network.relayAddrs` is set — that listener registers the pending reservation
+            // `driveControlRelayReservation` fills after bring-up.
             ...(listenAddrs && { listenAddrs }),
+            // What this node ADVERTISES, which is not the same question as what it binds.
+            // Either field is present only when configured non-empty; a non-empty
+            // `announceAddrs` replaces the advertised set (see warnIfAnnounceAddrsDiscardRelay).
+            ...resolveAnnounceAddrs(network),
             // The CONTROL node composes the membership admission gate onto any
-            // caller-supplied gater (deny from either wins on inbound; all other
-            // hooks pass through). Strand cohort nodes keep the raw configured gater
-            // (see strand-instance-manager.ts) — their peers are legitimately
+            // caller-supplied gater (deny from either wins on the inbound-encrypted
+            // and relay-reservation hooks; all other hooks pass through). Strand
+            // cohort nodes keep the raw configured gater (see
+            // strand-instance-manager.ts) — their peers are legitimately
             // cross-party, so cadre membership must not gate them.
-            connectionGater: createMembershipConnectionGater({ admitInbound: (remotePeerId) => this.admitInboundControlConnection(remotePeerId) }, network?.connectionGater),
+            connectionGater: createMembershipConnectionGater({
+                admitInbound: (remotePeerId) => this.admitInboundControlConnection(remotePeerId),
+                admitRelayReservation: (remotePeerId) => this.admitControlRelayReservation(remotePeerId),
+                bringUpInFlight: () => this.controlBringUpInFlight
+            }, network?.connectionGater),
             // Fail-closed per-stream authorization for the four Optimystic control-DB
             // protocols — the members-only layer the connection gater's stranger
             // carve-outs cannot express (see authorizeInboundControlStream). Control
@@ -921,6 +1302,17 @@ export class CadreNode {
         };
         return nodeOptions;
     }
+    /**
+     * Does this node's CONTROL libp2p run the circuit-relay server? An explicit
+     * `network.enableRelay` wins; otherwise storage-profile nodes default to on
+     * (better connectivity/uptime). Shared by {@link buildControlNodeOptions}
+     * (which configures the server from it) and
+     * {@link admitInboundControlConnection} (whose deny/admit-for-relay branch
+     * must agree with whether a reservation is even servable here).
+     */
+    relayServerEnabled() {
+        return this.config.network?.enableRelay ?? (this.config.profile === 'storage');
+    }
     /**
      * Decide whether an inbound CONTROL-network connection from `remotePeerId`
      * should be admitted — the policy behind the connection gater wired in
@@ -930,7 +1322,7 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * `membership-connection-gater.ts` for the layer's rationale and the
      * stranger-open protocol allowlist).
      *
-     * Admits when ANY of:
+     * Returns `'admit'` when ANY of:
      *  1. a shared-baseline check admits ({@link admitControlPeerUnconditionally}
      *     — not running / DB torn down, absent-or-empty trusted-owner anchor, or
      *     configured bootstrap/relay infrastructure);
@@ -967,44 +1359,117 @@ export class CadreNode {
      *    this node yet is denied even though the formation handler would have
      *    accepted it, exactly like the unreplicated-membership-row case below.
      *
+     * When every check falls through, the verdict depends on whether this node
+     * runs the circuit-relay server ({@link relayServerEnabled}): without one,
+     * `'deny'`; with one, `'admit-for-relay'` — a circuit-relay reservation is
+     * established by the reserving peer DIALING the relay, so a connection deny
+     * here kills the reservation, and that deny is NOT self-healing: an outbound
+     * reconcile re-dial re-establishes a data link, but no outbound dial can
+     * grant the remote peer a reservation, and a relay-only peer has no address
+     * of its own to dial back — the reservation IS its address. The gater admits
+     * such a connection, decides the reservation via
+     * {@link admitControlRelayReservation}, and drops the connection if no
+     * reservation is admitted in time (see `membership-connection-gater.ts` →
+     * "The relay-reservation seam").
+     *
      * NOTE: check 4/5 runs a control-DB read per inbound connection
      * (`listAuthorizedMembers`); connections are rare and cadres small, and this
      * layer is fail-open behind `ADMISSION_DECISION_TIMEOUT_MS`, so the live
      * read is safe here — unlike the per-stream gate, which must consult the
      * materialized {@link authorizedControlPeers} snapshot instead.
-     * NOTE: a sibling whose membership row has not yet replicated to
-     * this node is denied until the row converges (typically via the owner);
-     * either side's next outbound reconcile dial (outbound is never gated)
-     * re-establishes the link — self-healing, but visible as a transient deny.
+     * NOTE: on a relay-DISABLED node, a sibling whose membership row has not yet
+     * replicated here is denied until the row converges (typically via the
+     * owner); either side's next outbound reconcile dial (outbound is never
+     * gated) re-establishes the DATA link — self-healing for data, visible as a
+     * transient deny. That self-healing story never covered a reservation, which
+     * is exactly why the relay-enabled path above exists.
      */
     async admitInboundControlConnection(remotePeerId) {
         if (this.admitControlPeerUnconditionally(remotePeerId)) {
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
         }
         if (Date.now() < this.enrollmentWindowUntil) {
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
         }
         if (this.delegateAdmission.has(remotePeerId)) {
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
         }
         const authorized = await this.listAuthorizedMembers();
         if (authorized.length === 0) {
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
         }
         if (authorized.some((m) => m.peerId === remotePeerId)) {
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
         }
         try {
             if (await this.strandSolicitationService?.hasOutstandingInvitation()) {
-                return true;
+                return 'admit';
             }
         }
         catch (error) {
             log('admitInboundControlConnection: outstanding-invitation check threw for %s — admitting (fail-open): %o', remotePeerId, error);
-            return true;
+            return 'admit';
+        }
+        if (this.relayServerEnabled()) {
+            log('admitInboundControlConnection: admitting %s FOR RELAY ONLY — not an authorized member and no enrollment path open; the gater drops the connection unless a reservation is admitted', remotePeerId);
+            return 'admit-for-relay';
         }
         log('admitInboundControlConnection: DENYING inbound from %s — not an authorized member and no enrollment path open', remotePeerId);
-        return false;
+        return 'deny';
+    }
+    /**
+     * Should `remotePeerId` be granted a circuit-relay reservation slot on this
+     * node's relay server? The policy behind the gater's
+     * `denyInboundRelayReservation` hook (see `membership-connection-gater.ts` →
+     * "The relay-reservation seam"); the circuit-relay server consults it per
+     * RESERVE request, so it is never called on a node whose relay server is off.
+     *
+     * Admits when ANY of:
+     *  1. a shared-baseline check admits ({@link admitControlPeerUnconditionally}
+     *     — not running / DB torn down, absent-or-empty trusted-owner anchor, or
+     *     configured bootstrap/relay infrastructure);
+     *  2. the peer holds a live delegate admission grant — a member's strand
+     *     node reserving here (see `delegate-admission.ts`); never counted
+     *     against the unauthorized budget;
+     *  3. the authorized-member set is empty (cold start) or the peer IS an
+     *     authorized member — members are never counted against the budget; or
+     *  4. the peer takes (or already holds) a slot in the bounded
+     *     unauthorized-reservation budget — the boot-ordering window where a
+     *     genuine member reserves before its `CadrePeer` row replicates here.
+     *     Cap via `network.unauthorizedRelayReservationCap` (0 = refuse every
+     *     unauthorized reservation).
+     *
+     * Every uncounted admission also RELEASES the budget slot the peer may hold
+     * from an earlier reservation taken while it was still unplaceable — a member
+     * that boots, reserves, and only then has its row replicate here would
+     * otherwise keep that slot spent for the rest of the entry's TTL.
+     *
+     * The connection gate's stranger carve-outs (an open enrollment window, an
+     * outstanding formation invitation) deliberately do NOT extend here: they
+     * exist so a stranger's SEED or FORMATION stream can ride a connection, and
+     * neither needs relay capacity. A genuine invitee that does need a relay slot
+     * takes one from the budget like any other unplaced peer, so an open window
+     * never becomes an unbounded grant of this node's forwarding capacity.
+     */
+    async admitControlRelayReservation(remotePeerId) {
+        if (this.admitControlPeerUnconditionally(remotePeerId)) {
+            return this.admitReservationUncounted(remotePeerId);
+        }
+        if (this.delegateAdmission.has(remotePeerId)) {
+            return this.admitReservationUncounted(remotePeerId);
+        }
+        const authorized = await this.listAuthorizedMembers();
+        if (authorized.length === 0 || authorized.some((m) => m.peerId === remotePeerId)) {
+            return this.admitReservationUncounted(remotePeerId);
+        }
+        const admitted = this.unauthorizedRelayReservations.tryAdmit(remotePeerId);
+        log('admitControlRelayReservation: %s %s under the unauthorized-reservation budget', admitted ? 'admitting' : 'REFUSING', remotePeerId);
+        return admitted;
+    }
+    /** Admit a reservation on the peer's own merits, giving back any budget slot it still holds. */
+    admitReservationUncounted(remotePeerId) {
+        this.unauthorizedRelayReservations.release(remotePeerId);
+        return true;
     }
     /**
      * Hold the control-network inbound gate open for not-yet-authorized peers
@@ -1020,7 +1485,8 @@ export class CadreNode {
     /**
      * Record (or refresh) a delegate admission grant: `delegatePeerId` is the
      * transport peerId of `announcerPeerId`'s strand-`strandId` node, admitted
-     * at the CONNECTION level (all a circuit-relay reservation needs) for
+     * at the CONNECTION and RESERVATION levels (all a circuit-relay reservation
+     * needs, without spending the unauthorized-reservation budget) for
      * `DELEGATE_GRANT_TTL_MS`. Called by the strand-addr responder after its
      * authorized-membership gate has passed; public so tests can drive the
      * admission policy without a full strand launch. A re-announce for the same
@@ -1123,15 +1589,83 @@ export class CadreNode {
      *
      * The SOLE caller is {@link drainMembershipGate}, which serializes refreshes —
      * so two reads can no longer settle out of order.
+     *
+     * Reads WITHOUT the transient-failure retry, deliberately: `ControlDatabase` drives
+     * this listener with its write lock HELD (`notifyMembershipChanged`), so a retrying
+     * read here would sleep its backoff holding the lock and stall every other local
+     * writer. Nothing is lost — this refresh already keeps the previous snapshot on
+     * failure and is re-driven by the next membership write and by the timed reconcile.
      */
     async refreshAuthorizedControlPeers(reason) {
         if (!this._running || !this.controlDatabase) {
             return;
         }
         try {
-            const members = await this.listAuthorizedMembers();
+            const members = await this.listAuthorizedMembers(false);
             this.authorizedControlPeers = new Set(members.map((m) => m.peerId));
             log('refreshAuthorizedControlPeers(%s): %d authorized peer(s)', reason, this.authorizedControlPeers.size);
+            // Remember the party's size for the NEXT launch's control-node repair yardstick
+            // (see `enrolled-machine-store.ts`): this is the only place the count is known,
+            // and the control node that needs it was built long before this ran. Recorded
+            // from the snapshot just materialized — no second membership query.
+            //
+            // CONTROL-NETWORK ONLY, and that scope is load-bearing. Every enrolled machine
+            // runs the control node by construction, so here the party's machine count IS
+            // the count of machines serving the network — the quantity
+            // `resolveRepairYardstick` asks for. It is NOT that quantity for a strand, which
+            // launches only on machines whose embedder registered its sApp config (see
+            // {@link addStrand}), so this number must never be routed to a strand node:
+            // over-declaring pins Optimystic's repair corroboration floor at two peers and a
+            // strand that can field only one can then never repair. `launchStrand` therefore
+            // declares nothing; see the NOTE there.
+            //
+            // `+ 1` for this node, which is not in its own authorized set. An EMPTY snapshot
+            // is recorded as 1 rather than skipped. That is deliberate, and the reason
+            // is a party that genuinely SHRANK: if empty meant "record nothing", a party
+            // whose other machines were all revoked would keep declaring its old, larger
+            // number forever, and over-declaring is the unsafe direction — at a yardstick of
+            // 3 or more Optimystic pins the repair corroboration floor at two peers, so a
+            // cohort that can only field one peer could never repair at all. Recording 1
+            // lets the number come back down; the floor then turns it into 2, which is
+            // exactly what declaring nothing resolves to.
+            //
+            // NOTE: the cost of that choice is that a TRANSIENT empty read overwrites a good
+            // remembered count with 1 — a membership snapshot is legitimately empty early in
+            // a run on a node whose rows have not replicated yet or whose trusted-owner
+            // anchor is still unseeded (`listAuthorizedMembers` authorizes no one without an
+            // anchor). Bounded and safe: the next refresh once rows land re-records the real
+            // count, and the only node that loses anything is one stopped inside that window,
+            // which then declares 2 — today's behaviour — on its next launch. If a node ever
+            // needs to declare the right number on its FIRST post-restart launch, the fix is
+            // to distinguish "no rows yet" from "no members" at this site, not to skip empty.
+            //
+            // A removed peer stops counting at REVOCATION, not at reap: `queryCadrePeers`
+            // drops rows whose `StampId` is retired, and `listAuthorizedMembers` reads
+            // through it. That is why there is no reap hook writing this record.
+            //
+            // `void`: the store never rejects and logs its own persist failures, and this
+            // method's contract is never-rejects. A failed write leaves the in-memory count
+            // correct for this session and re-lands on the next refresh.
+            void this.enrolledMachineStore?.record(this.authorizedControlPeers.size + 1);
+            // Membership moved: give the control backfill another look at every
+            // connected peer. The production join order is connect-then-authorize, so
+            // a joiner's first catch-up pass was denied at the gate while its
+            // connection stays up — without this re-arm it would wait for a
+            // reconnect. Cheap and idempotent: caught-up peers are skipped before any
+            // timer is set, a peer whose pass is in flight is deferred to the end of
+            // that pass (the pass may already be past its gate check — this very
+            // commit is what would authorize it), and the gate re-judges at push time.
+            //
+            // NOTE: every refresh re-arms every connected peer that is not yet caught
+            // up, and each re-armed pass costs one `CadrePeer` query at the gate. A
+            // connection that is admitted but never authorized — a configured
+            // bootstrap or relay peer, the steady state for a NAT'd node — is
+            // therefore re-judged on every membership write and every timed reconcile
+            // tick, forever. Negligible at a cadre's handful of connections; if a node
+            // ever holds many such connections, or refreshes get frequent, skip
+            // re-arming peers whose last pass was denied under the SAME membership
+            // snapshot instead of re-arming unconditionally.
+            this.controlBackfill?.scheduleConnectedPeers();
         }
         catch (error) {
             log('refreshAuthorizedControlPeers(%s) failed — keeping previous snapshot: %o', reason, error);
@@ -1351,6 +1885,29 @@ export class CadreNode {
         }
         return null;
     }
+    /**
+     * Does the `Strand` row name THIS machine as its founder — i.e. is its
+     * `FounderOwnerKey` this node's own owner key (the key behind its PeerId)?
+     * A null/absent column (a consent-seated strand, or a hand-built row) and a
+     * node with no owner key both derive `false`: without a positive match this
+     * machine must attach, never bootstrap. Pure key derivation, no I/O — cheap
+     * enough for {@link launchStrand}'s tracked-instance early return.
+     *
+     * NOTE: reads "one owner key per machine" — the reference model, where the owner
+     * key IS the key behind the PeerId. Two machines running the SAME identity key
+     * would both derive `true` and each bootstrap on its own replica, which is the
+     * double-`Header` hazard this derivation exists to avoid. Unreachable today: that
+     * configuration also gives both machines one PeerId, which already breaks control
+     * networking well before any strand launches. Revisit if machines ever share an
+     * owner key while holding distinct transport identities — the derivation would
+     * then need a per-machine discriminator (the `CadrePeer` PeerId) on the row.
+     */
+    isSelfFoundedRow(strand) {
+        if (strand.FounderOwnerKey == null) {
+            return false;
+        }
+        return strand.FounderOwnerKey === this.getSelfSigningKey()?.publicKeyB64;
+    }
     /**
      * The owner keypair (base64url Ed25519) derived from this node's resolved
      * identity key. In the single-key reference model the owner signing key is
@@ -1411,6 +1968,20 @@ export class CadreNode {
             reconcile('self:peer:update');
         };
         this.controlNode.addEventListener('self:peer:update', this.selfPeerUpdateHandler);
+        // NOTE: a node AUTHORIZED AFTER IT BOOTED can wait a whole heartbeat (7.5 min)
+        // to publish its address. `registerSelf` no-ops while a node has no readable
+        // `CadrePeer` row, so its boot-time publish does nothing, and the two triggers
+        // wired here are the only ones after that: `self:peer:update` needs an ADDRESS
+        // CHANGE, and a relay-only node's addresses stop changing the moment its
+        // reservation lands — inside `start()`, before this listener exists. Harmless
+        // where a late-authorized node's addresses keep churning (NAT/relay rotation
+        // fire the event anyway), and invisible while parties authorize members before
+        // they boot. If late enrollment becomes the normal path — an invited phone is
+        // exactly that — republish on the membership-change seam that already exists
+        // (`ControlDatabase.setMembershipChangeListener`) rather than lengthening this
+        // list of triggers. Measured while writing
+        // `relay-only-control-addr.integration.ts` case 4, which drives `registerSelf()`
+        // explicitly because neither trigger is dependable there.
         this.recordRefreshTimer = setInterval(() => republish('heartbeat'), DEFAULT_PEER_RECORD_HEARTBEAT_MS);
         this.recordRefreshTimer?.unref?.();
         const reconcileMs = this.config.network?.controlCohort?.reconcileMs ?? DEFAULT_CONTROL_COHORT_RECONCILE_MS;
@@ -1485,6 +2056,10 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * Survivors are returned signaling (`/p2p-circuit`) first, filtered to
      * signaling-only when requested, as parsed `Multiaddr`s (unparsable addrs
      * dropped). Any gate failure yields an empty array rather than throwing.
+     *
+     * Every returned address is normalized to terminate in `/p2p/<peerId>` — see
+     * {@link normalizeDialAddrs} for why that invariant, not each dial site's own
+     * handling, is what keeps a mixed list from taking a whole peer offline.
      */
     async resolvePeerAddrs(peerId, opts = {}) {
         if (!this.controlDatabase) {
@@ -1529,12 +2104,76 @@ export class CadreNode {
         }
         // Order signaling-first (the on-record order was what we verified above),
         // optionally restrict to signaling addrs, then parse — dropping any addr
-        // that does not parse as a multiaddr.
+        // that does not parse as a multiaddr — and finally normalize every survivor
+        // onto `/p2p/<peerId>` so no caller ever sees a mixed list.
         let addrs = orderSignalingFirst(record.addrs);
         if (opts.signalingOnly) {
             addrs = addrs.filter(isSignalingAddr);
         }
-        return this.parseMultiaddrs(addrs);
+        return this.normalizeDialAddrs(this.parseMultiaddrs(addrs), peerId);
+    }
+    /**
+     * Guarantee every address handed to a control-network dial terminates in
+     * `/p2p/<peerId>`, with no duplicates — the invariant every dial path
+     * downstream relies on.
+     *
+     * `libp2p.dial(addrs)` requires that the addresses in ONE dial either all name
+     * a peer id or none do; a list mixing a circuit address (which ends in
+     * `/p2p/<target>`) with a bare direct one (which ends in `/tcp/…`) makes that
+     * call throw, and the whole peer is then silently skipped rather than one bad
+     * address.
+     *
+     * Applied by ALL THREE sources of control-dial candidates, so no call site
+     * invents its own rule and none can produce a mixed list: the signed record
+     * ({@link resolvePeerAddrs}), the libp2p address book
+     * ({@link peerStoreAddrs}), and a seed's retained owner addresses
+     * ({@link bootstrapDialAddrs}).
+     *
+     * An address naming a DIFFERENT trailing peer id is dropped: it does not reach
+     * `peerId`, so it does not belong in this peer's candidate list (libp2p's own
+     * dial queue filters the same shape out one layer lower).
+     */
+    normalizeDialAddrs(addrs, peerId) {
+        // Keyed by the NORMALIZED string, so two entries differing only by the suffix
+        // (`/ip4/…/tcp/4001` and `/ip4/…/tcp/4001/p2p/<peerId>`) collapse into one.
+        // Normalization is what makes them equal; a surviving duplicate would cost a
+        // real dial attempt — a whole slice of `dialWake`'s budget — on an address
+        // already being tried.
+        const out = new Map();
+        for (const addr of addrs) {
+            const bound = this.bindAddrToPeer(addr, peerId);
+            if (bound) {
+                out.set(bound.toString(), bound);
+            }
+        }
+        return [...out.values()];
+    }
+    /**
+     * One address bound to `peerId`, or `null` when it cannot be — logged either
+     * way, never thrown, so every caller's list-shaping stays total.
+     *
+     * Used both to normalize addresses this node DIALS (a `CadrePeer` row, a
+     * seed-supplied bootstrap addr) and to normalize the ones it ANNOUNCES
+     * ({@link getStrandMultiaddrs}); the rule is the same either way — an address
+     * that does not reach `peerId` is not an address for `peerId`.
+     *
+     * `withTrailingPeerId` encapsulates `/p2p/<peerId>`, which throws on a peer id
+     * that does not parse. Unreachable for a `CadrePeer` row (the binding gate
+     * above parsed it already) and for our own node's id, reachable for a
+     * seed-supplied one ({@link bootstrapDialAddrs}).
+     */
+    bindAddrToPeer(addr, peerId) {
+        try {
+            const bound = withTrailingPeerId(addr, peerId);
+            if (!bound) {
+                log('bindAddrToPeer: dropping addr %s — it names a peer other than %s', addr.toString(), peerId);
+            }
+            return bound;
+        }
+        catch (error) {
+            log('bindAddrToPeer: cannot bind %s to %s: %o', addr.toString(), peerId, error);
+            return null;
+        }
     }
     /** Parse multiaddr strings, dropping (and logging) any that fail to parse. */
     parseMultiaddrs(addrs) {
@@ -1851,6 +2490,16 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * Cold-start fallback: the libp2p peerStore multiaddrs for `peerId` (seeded by
      * {@link SeedBootstrapService.applySeed}). Returns `[]` on a missing entry or any
      * parse/lookup failure — never throws.
+     *
+     * Normalized through {@link normalizeDialAddrs} for the same reason
+     * {@link resolvePeerAddrs} is, and with more cause: the address book hands back
+     * a list that is inherently MIXED. `@libp2p/peer-store`'s
+     * `dedupeFilterAndSortAddresses` strips a trailing `/p2p/<peerId>` only when
+     * that id is the address's FIRST `/p2p/` component, so a direct address
+     * round-trips bare while a relayed one — whose first `/p2p/` names the relay —
+     * keeps its suffix (the same asymmetry `peer-addr-book.ts`'s `addrKey` exists
+     * to absorb). Feeding both to one `dial()` is exactly the
+     * `InvalidParametersError` that skipped the whole peer.
      */
     async peerStoreAddrs(peerId) {
         if (!this.controlNode) {
@@ -1860,7 +2509,7 @@ export class CadreNode {
             const peer = await this.controlNode.peerStore.get(peerIdFromString(peerId));
             // Re-parse through the top-level multiaddr parser so the returned type matches
             // resolvePeerAddrs (the peerStore bundles its own @multiformats/multiaddr copy).
-            return this.parseMultiaddrs(peer.addresses.map((a) => a.multiaddr.toString()));
+            return this.normalizeDialAddrs(this.parseMultiaddrs(peer.addresses.map((a) => a.multiaddr.toString())), peerId);
         }
         catch (error) {
             log('reconcileControlCohort: peerStore lookup for %s failed: %o', peerId, error);
@@ -1949,6 +2598,13 @@ export class CadreNode {
             if (!this._running || !this.controlNode) {
                 return;
             }
+            // NOTE: a connection this node still holds in `status: 'open'` after the remote
+            // has already aborted it counts as connected here, so the cold-start retry stays
+            // suppressed for that peer until the connection monitor's next ping notices the
+            // abort — measured at ~9 s in `control-cohort-cold-start-retry.integration.ts`.
+            // Bounded and self-healing today; it would start to matter if the connection
+            // monitor's ping interval were lengthened, or if recovery ever had to meet a
+            // deadline tighter than one ping interval.
             if (connected.has(peerId)) {
                 continue;
             }
@@ -1962,32 +2618,15 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * Bind a bootstrap peer's seed addresses to its peer id, so the dial
      * authenticates the peer it is aiming at rather than trusting whoever answers.
      *
-     * An address that already carries `/p2p/<id>` must carry THIS peer's id or it
-     * is dropped (a seed that disagrees with itself is not a dial target); one
-     * that carries none — an `addressOverrides`-published record, say — gets the
-     * id encapsulated. Unencapsulatable addresses are dropped rather than dialed
-     * bare.
+     * The same {@link normalizeDialAddrs} rule the resolved and address-book paths
+     * use, on the third and last source of control-dial candidates: an address that
+     * already terminates in `/p2p/<id>` must carry THIS peer's id or it is dropped
+     * (a seed that disagrees with itself is not a dial target); one that does not —
+     * a bare listen addr, or a relay hop with the destination missing — gets the id
+     * encapsulated; an unencapsulatable one is dropped rather than dialed bare.
      */
     bootstrapDialAddrs(peerId, addrs) {
-        const out = [];
-        for (const addr of this.parseMultiaddrs(addrs)) {
-            const embedded = trailingPeerId(addr);
-            if (embedded === peerId) {
-                out.push(addr);
-                continue;
-            }
-            if (embedded !== null) {
-                log('reconcileControlCohort(cold-start): addr %s names peer %s, not %s; dropping', addr.toString(), embedded, peerId);
-                continue;
-            }
-            try {
-                out.push(addr.encapsulate(`/p2p/${peerId}`));
-            }
-            catch (error) {
-                log('reconcileControlCohort(cold-start): cannot bind %s to %s: %o', addr.toString(), peerId, error);
-            }
-        }
-        return out;
+        return this.normalizeDialAddrs(this.parseMultiaddrs(addrs), peerId);
     }
     /** Dial one cold-start bootstrap peer, best-effort. Returns whether it connected. */
     async dialBootstrapPeer(peerId, addrs) {
@@ -2705,7 +3344,30 @@ export class CadreNode {
             });
         }
     }
+    /**
+     * Return this node to its pre-{@link start} state. The ONE teardown — `stop()` and
+     * a failed `start()` both come here, so anything a stopped node must not still be
+     * doing belongs in this method and not in `stop()`. `stop()` adds only the
+     * `control:disconnected` emit, which a never-connected start has no edge for.
+     */
     async cleanup() {
+        // Open the connection gate's bring-up quiet period unconditionally: teardown
+        // must never be gated, and this is the path a FAILED start() takes.
+        this.controlBringUpInFlight = false;
+        // Stop the relay retry loop BEFORE tearing the node down, not after: the control
+        // node is stopped partway through below, and a tick that fires during it would
+        // dial and then poll a half-torn-down node for the whole reserve timeout —
+        // logging spurious dial failures on a `.unref()`'d timer that nothing ever
+        // clears. `driveControlRelayReservation` starts this supervisor from inside
+        // `start()`, so a start that fails ON the reservation leaves one running unless
+        // it is stopped here.
+        this.relayReserveSupervisor?.stop();
+        this.relayReserveSupervisor = null;
+        // Drop the rest of the relay-reservation posture: a torn-down node holds no
+        // reservation, so neither a restarted instance nor a caller inspecting a failed
+        // start reports the previous attempt's `reserved`.
+        this.relayReserveAddrs = [];
+        this.relayReserveError = null;
         // Resolve + clear any in-flight wake windows first, so an in-flight check-in
         // or serviceWake unblocks and tears down cleanly rather than firing a stale
         // window timer (or hanging) after the strand manager is stopped below.
@@ -2759,6 +3421,14 @@ export class CadreNode {
         // announce timestamps that would suppress the next session's refresh.
         this.delegateAdmission.clear();
         this.delegateAnnounceAt.clear();
+        // Control backfill first — before the database closes and the control node
+        // stops — so no NEW catch-up push is issued against a torn-down transport.
+        // A push already in flight is not awaited; it fails into the module's own
+        // per-chunk catch. (Mirrors releaseRuntime in strand-instance-manager.ts.)
+        if (this.controlBackfill) {
+            this.controlBackfill.stop();
+            this.controlBackfill = null;
+        }
         // Close control database (this also shuts down the collection factory).
         // Detach the membership hub first: nothing this teardown does should drive a
         // gate refresh, and a notification arriving after this point is a no-op.
@@ -2773,16 +3443,23 @@ export class CadreNode {
             await this.controlNode.stop();
             this.controlNode = null;
         }
-        // Release the control store's cache registration LAST — after the database and
-        // node that write through it are down. Dropping the field is what lets a
-        // stop()/start() cycle re-resolve the provider against a live cache instead of
-        // handing the restarted node a retired wrapper. Logged, never thrown: a
-        // cache-bookkeeping failure must not abort a teardown.
+        // Release the control store's claim on its cache LAST — after the database and
+        // node that write through it are down. The wrapper counts holders, so this empties
+        // and unregisters the cache only if no other scope still holds it. Dropping the
+        // field is what lets a stop()/start() cycle re-resolve the provider against a live
+        // cache instead of handing the restarted node a retired wrapper. Logged, never
+        // thrown: a cache-bookkeeping failure must not abort a teardown.
         if (this.controlStorage) {
             const controlStorage = this.controlStorage;
             this.controlStorage = null;
             await disposeStorageCache(controlStorage).catch((err) => log('Failed to dispose control storage cache: %o', err));
         }
+        // LAST, so every step above still ran against a node that considered itself up
+        // (several of them early-return while `_running` is false). A failed `start()`
+        // that had already flipped it — the reservation drive throws after that point —
+        // must not leave `isRunning` true over a torn-down node, which would report
+        // healthy and make the embedder's retry a no-op ("already running").
+        this._running = false;
     }
     // Hibernation callbacks
     async handleStrandIdle(strandId) {
@@ -2852,8 +3529,8 @@ export class CadreNode {
     /**
      * Rebuild a quiesced strand's runtime, re-resolving the volatile cohort input
      * first: the discovery seed may have grown since the strand last ran. Shared by
-     * the wake (`handleStrandWake`) and check-in (`handleStrandCheckIn`) paths so
-     * both apply the same fresh seed resolution. `resumeStrand` is idempotent
+     * the wake (`handleStrandWake`) and check-in (`handleStrandCheckIn`) paths so both
+     * apply the same fresh resolution. `resumeStrand` is idempotent
      * (returns the live instance unchanged) as a backstop against double-resume.
      */
     async resumeStrandRuntime(strandId) {
@@ -2864,6 +3541,9 @@ export class CadreNode {
             ? peerIdFromPrivateKey(await strandTransportKey(this.identityKey, strandId)).toString()
             : undefined;
         const bootstrapNodes = await this.resolveCohortSeed(strandId, delegatePeerId);
+        // NOTE: no `servingMachines` override — see `launchStrand` for why a strand node
+        // declares no repair yardstick, and `StartStrandConfig.servingMachines` for the
+        // count that would legitimately go here once one exists.
         const instance = await this.strandManager.resumeStrand(strandId, { bootstrapNodes });
         // Same reason as the launch path: `bootstrapNodes` only reaches the address
         // book through @libp2p/bootstrap discovery, so merge it directly as well.
@@ -2997,6 +3677,14 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * Add a strand with its sApp configuration.
      * The hosting application must provide the sApp schema when creating a strand.
      *
+     * This is the ATTACH half only — it starts the local instance and never publishes the
+     * `Strand` row. A joiner (the row arrived over the control network) wants exactly this; a
+     * FOUNDER wants {@link foundStrand}, which publishes and attaches in one resumable call.
+     * With no explicit `founder` flag, founder-ness is derived from the row's
+     * `FounderOwnerKey` (see {@link StrandConfig.founder}) — so attaching a row THIS machine
+     * published (e.g. re-attaching its own orphan after a restart) founds it, and attaching
+     * anyone else's row joins, without the caller needing to know which it is.
+     *
      * A rejected call leaves nothing running but DOES leave the sApp config
      * registered, deliberately: both an explicit retry and the {@link StrandWatcher}'s
      * automatic relaunch need it. So once the strand's row is visible on the control
@@ -3012,9 +3700,11 @@ export class CadreNode {
         const { strandRow, sAppConfig, founder } = config;
         // Store sApp config for this strand
         this.sAppConfigs.set(strandRow.Id, sAppConfig);
-        log('Registered sAppConfig for strand %s (sApp: %s, founder: %s)', strandRow.Id, sAppConfig.id, founder ?? false);
-        // `founder` only flows from the explicit addStrand path — the control-discovered
-        // join path never founds, so its rows arrive via sync (see handleStrandAdded).
+        log('Registered sAppConfig for strand %s (sApp: %s, founder: %s)', strandRow.Id, sAppConfig.id, founder ?? 'derived');
+        // An unset `founder` is DERIVED from the row inside launchStrand (this node founds
+        // iff the row's FounderOwnerKey is its own owner key); an explicit flag wins — the
+        // formation/responder flows pass one deliberately, since their consent-seated rows
+        // carry a null column. See StrandConfig.founder.
         return await this.launchStrand(strandRow, sAppConfig, founder);
     }
     /**
@@ -3022,16 +3712,41 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * owner identity, so other cadre members discover it via control-network
      * sync (their {@link StrandWatcher} fires `strand:discovered`).
      *
-     * This is the owner-signed `Strand` INSERT that {@link addStrand}
-     * deliberately omits: `addStrand` only starts the LOCAL strand instance,
-     * whereas publishing makes the strand visible cadre-wide. A typical creator
-     * does both (start locally + publish); a discovering peer only does
-     * `addStrand` (the row already exists).
+     * **Founding a strand is TWO steps** — this one (publish the row cadre-wide) and
+     * {@link addStrand} (start the local instance, `founder: true` to write the strand's
+     * `Header`/founding membership). `addStrand` deliberately omits the insert: it only
+     * starts the LOCAL instance, whereas publishing makes the strand visible cadre-wide. A
+     * discovering peer only does `addStrand` (the row already exists). Callers founding a
+     * strand should use {@link foundStrand}, which performs both steps and is safe to
+     * re-run — hand-rolling the pair is what left strands half-founded when an app was
+     * killed between them.
+     *
+     * **Idempotent for identical content.** A live row whose `(Type, MemberPrivateKey)` match
+     * the arguments is the state this call would have produced, so the call logs and returns
+     * that row instead of writing — a publish interrupted after it committed can be repeated.
+     * DIFFERENT content on the same id throws, naming the columns that differ, rather than
+     * surfacing the raw `UNIQUE constraint failed: Strand.Id`: silently accepting it would
+     * let a retry reopen a closed strand or swap the key gating its reads. The read and the
+     * insert are not atomic, so a concurrent founder (two machines of one party, same id) is
+     * caught on the insert's uniqueness rejection and resolved the same way — re-read, no-op
+     * on a match, rethrow otherwise. Never an overwrite either way.
+     *
+     * A tombstoned strand is NOT resurrected here: {@link unpublishStrand} deletes the row, so
+     * the idempotent branch is unreachable and the ordinary publish path re-seats it, exactly
+     * as that method documents.
+     *
+     * **Already stuck on `UNIQUE constraint failed: Strand.Id`?** The row is already published
+     * — attach, do NOT republish: `addStrand` (or {@link foundStrand}) with the id and, for a
+     * closed strand, the `MemberPrivateKey` read back from the row. `unpublishStrand` + a
+     * fresh publish also clears it for an OPEN strand, but is destructive for a closed one
+     * (the key exists nowhere else). No app-data wipe is needed for either.
      *
      * The insert is signed with the ed25519 key behind this node's PeerId — which
      * {@link ed25519KeyPairFromLibp2p} also exposes as the node's owner keypair,
-     * so peer identity and owner key are one and the same. That key must be
-     * enrolled in `OwnerKey` (e.g. via {@link ControlDatabase.ensureOwnerKey}
+     * so peer identity and owner key are one and the same. That key is also persisted on the
+     * row as `FounderOwnerKey` (the schema pins the column to the verified signer), which is
+     * what later lets any launch derive "this machine is the founder" from the row alone.
+     * The key must be enrolled in `OwnerKey` (e.g. via {@link ControlDatabase.ensureOwnerKey}
      * at genesis) or the schema's `Strand.AuthorizedInsert` constraint rejects the write.
      * Failing loudly here is intentional: a silently-unpublished strand would run
      * as a local-only island that no peer could ever discover or join.
@@ -3040,16 +3755,148 @@ export class CadreNode {
      *   {@link addStrand}).
      * @param type - `'o'` for open (default) or `'c'` for closed.
      * @param memberPrivateKey - Optional membership key for a closed strand.
-     * @throws if the node is not started, exposes no owner signing key, the id is blank, or
-     *   the control DB rejects the (unauthorized) insert.
+     * @returns The live `Strand` row — the one just inserted, or the matching one already
+     *   there. A closed strand's caller should carry THIS row's `MemberPrivateKey` forward:
+     *   on a repeat it is the stored key, not the argument.
+     * @throws if the node is not started, exposes no owner signing key, the id is blank, a
+     *   row with the same id holds different content, or the control DB rejects the
+     *   (unauthorized) insert.
      */
     async publishStrand(strandId, type = 'o', memberPrivateKey) {
         const signingKey = this.requireOwnerSigningKey(`publish strand ${strandId}`);
         // Trim/reject here so the id that lands matches the one unpublishStrand looks up: it
         // trims too, and an untrimmed row would be unreachable by the same string.
         const trimmed = requireNonBlank(strandId, 'strand id');
-        await this.controlDatabase.insertStrand(trimmed, type, signingKey.publicKeyB64, signMessageWith(signingKey.privateKeyB64), memberPrivateKey);
+        // FounderOwnerKey records THIS machine as the row's publisher (the schema pins it to
+        // the signing owner), which is what later lets a relaunch derive founder-ness.
+        const desired = {
+            Id: trimmed,
+            Type: type,
+            MemberPrivateKey: memberPrivateKey ?? null,
+            FounderOwnerKey: signingKey.publicKeyB64,
+        };
+        // Read first rather than leaning on the insert's collision for BOTH readings. The
+        // ordinary resume (an app killed after its own publish committed) then needs no error
+        // matching at all: the collision path can only recognise itself by the engine's message
+        // TEXT (see isStrandIdConflict), and an upstream reword there must degrade the RARE race,
+        // not the common resume. It also spends no stamp or signature on a known no-op.
+        const existing = await this.controlDatabase.queryStrand(trimmed);
+        if (existing) {
+            // NOTE: reads local converged state, and `queryStrand` does not filter rows whose
+            // StampId a Revocation has retired. So on a sibling that still physically holds a row
+            // deleted elsewhere while ALONE (the delete-while-alone gap in docs/architecture.md),
+            // an owner-signed republish now no-ops onto that doomed row instead of re-seating the
+            // id under a fresh stamp. Harmless while that gap is itself unresolved — both
+            // behaviours end at the same unconverged state — but if delete-while-alone ever gains
+            // real replay, filter retired stamps here (queryStrandStampId + the Revocation read)
+            // so a re-seat is not mistaken for a repeat.
+            const matched = requireMatchingStrandRow(existing, desired, 'is already published');
+            log('publishStrand(%s): already published (type %s) with identical content — no-op', trimmed, type);
+            return matched;
+        }
+        try {
+            await this.controlDatabase.insertStrand(trimmed, type, signingKey.publicKeyB64, signMessageWith(signingKey.privateKeyB64), memberPrivateKey);
+        }
+        catch (error) {
+            // Only the uniqueness collision is a candidate for the idempotent reading; every
+            // other rejection (unauthorized signer, retired stamp) must keep surfacing.
+            if (!isStrandIdConflict(error)) {
+                throw error;
+            }
+            const landed = await this.controlDatabase.queryStrand(trimmed);
+            if (!landed) {
+                // Collided, yet no row is readable: not the race this branch handles (a row
+                // deleted between the rejection and the re-read, or a stale local view). Surface
+                // the original rather than guessing.
+                throw error;
+            }
+            log('publishStrand(%s): lost a concurrent founding race; re-read the landed row', trimmed);
+            return requireMatchingStrandRow(landed, desired, 'landed concurrently from another founder');
+        }
         log('Published strand %s (type %s) to control DB under owner %s', trimmed, type, signingKey.publicKeyB64);
+        return desired;
+    }
+    /**
+     * Found a strand — publish its row cadre-wide AND start the local instance as its
+     * founder — in one resumable call. The single entry point for creating a strand; a
+     * caller joining one someone else founded uses {@link addStrand} alone.
+     *
+     * Safe to re-run from any point of interruption, which hand-rolling
+     * {@link publishStrand} + {@link addStrand} is not. Either half can already have
+     * happened:
+     *
+     * - **row already published** → the stored row is adopted rather than re-published, so a
+     *   run killed after the insert committed no longer dies on
+     *   `UNIQUE constraint failed: Strand.Id`. For a closed strand the row's STORED
+     *   `MemberPrivateKey` wins over `config.memberPrivateKey`: a caller that mints a key per
+     *   attempt (as the reference apps do) would otherwise present a key that does not match
+     *   the membership already seated in the strand.
+     * - **instance already running** → the tracked instance is returned, and — because the
+     *   `Strand` row records its publishing machine (`FounderOwnerKey`) — a founder request
+     *   against an instance that was first launched as a joiner now runs the (idempotent,
+     *   insert-if-absent) founder bootstrap on it rather than silently skipping it
+     *   ({@link StrandInstanceManager.foundExistingStrand}). So a strand that something else
+     *   attached first — the reference RN app's `strand:discovered` handler after a restart,
+     *   or this node's own {@link StrandWatcher} poll winning `launchStrand`'s
+     *   `resolveCohortSeed` window — still ends up with its `Strand.Header` written.
+     *
+     * Founder-ness is resolved FROM THE ROW, not assumed: this machine founds iff the
+     * resolved row's `FounderOwnerKey` is its own owner key. A fresh publish records this
+     * machine, so the common path founds; a machine that lost a concurrent founding race to
+     * a sibling adopts the sibling's row and ATTACHES instead — deliberately, since two
+     * machines bootstrapping the same strand on separate replicas is the double-`Header`
+     * hazard. The returned {@link FoundStrandResult.founded} says which happened.
+     *
+     * `Type` is compared, not adopted: a stored row of the other type means the caller and
+     * the control plane disagree about what this strand IS, so it throws.
+     *
+     * @returns The instance AND the row the strand actually runs under — read the membership
+     *   key from the returned row, not from a freshly minted one ({@link FoundStrandResult}).
+     * @throws if the node is not started, the id is blank, a published row of the same id has
+     *   a different `Type`, or either half rejects.
+     */
+    async foundStrand(config) {
+        const { strandId, type = 'o', memberPrivateKey, sAppConfig } = config;
+        if (!this._running || !this.controlDatabase) {
+            throw new Error(`CadreNode must be started before attempting to found strand ${strandId}`);
+        }
+        const trimmed = requireNonBlank(strandId, 'strand id');
+        const published = await this.controlDatabase.queryStrand(trimmed);
+        const strandRow = published
+            ? this.adoptPublishedStrand(published, type, memberPrivateKey)
+            : await this.publishStrand(trimmed, type, memberPrivateKey);
+        // Derived, not hardcoded `true`: adopting a row another machine published means that
+        // machine runs the bootstrap — this one must attach or it would write a second Header.
+        const founded = this.isSelfFoundedRow(strandRow);
+        if (!founded) {
+            log('foundStrand(%s): the stored row was published by a different machine ' +
+                '(FounderOwnerKey is not this node\'s owner key) — attaching as a joiner; ' +
+                'the founder bootstrap runs on the publishing machine', trimmed);
+        }
+        const instance = await this.addStrand({ strandRow, sAppConfig, founder: founded });
+        return { instance, strandRow, founded };
+    }
+    /**
+     * Resume onto an already-published `Strand` row: keep its stored content, reject a type
+     * disagreement. The stored `MemberPrivateKey` is authoritative — see {@link foundStrand}
+     * for why a caller-minted key must lose here (and why that is NOT the same rule as
+     * {@link publishStrand}'s, which throws on a key mismatch because it is being asked to
+     * WRITE that key, not to resume onto what already exists).
+     */
+    adoptPublishedStrand(published, type, memberPrivateKey) {
+        if (published.Type !== type) {
+            throw new Error(`Cannot found strand ${published.Id} as type '${type}': it is already published as ` +
+                `type '${published.Type}'. Reconcile deliberately rather than re-founding — a ` +
+                'published open strand cannot be closed, nor a closed one opened, by re-publishing.');
+        }
+        if (memberPrivateKey !== undefined && memberPrivateKey !== published.MemberPrivateKey) {
+            log('foundStrand(%s): already published — resuming on the STORED MemberPrivateKey; ' +
+                'the supplied key is discarded (read it back from the returned instance)', published.Id);
+        }
+        else {
+            log('foundStrand(%s): already published (type %s) — adopting the stored row', published.Id, type);
+        }
+        return published;
     }
     /**
      * Remove this party's `Strand` row from the shared control database — the owner-signed
@@ -3254,19 +4101,49 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * seed, starts the strand, and registers it with the hibernation manager
      * before emitting `strand:started`.
      *
-     * Idempotent no-op when the strand manager already tracks `strand.Id` — the
-     * ordinary founding sequence is `addStrand` (starts it locally) followed by
-     * `publishStrand` (makes it visible), so this node's own `StrandWatcher`
-     * rediscovers a row it already started and calls this again via
-     * `handleStrandAdded`. Without the guard that re-entry would resolve a fresh
+     * Founder-ness: an explicit `founder` argument wins (the formation/responder flows pass
+     * one deliberately — their consent-seated rows carry a null `FounderOwnerKey`); when
+     * unset it is DERIVED from the row, so the control-discovered path
+     * (`handleStrandAdded`) and a restart's re-attach found this machine's own strands
+     * without the caller having to know. The derivation is pure key comparison — no I/O.
+     *
+     * Idempotent when the strand manager already tracks `strand.Id` — the watcher
+     * rediscovers a row this node already started and calls this again via
+     * `handleStrandAdded`; without the guard that re-entry would resolve a fresh
      * (already-connected) cohort seed and re-emit `strand:started` for an
      * instance that never stopped. The guard runs before the cohort-seed RPC
-     * fan-out, so a rediscovery costs nothing beyond the map lookup.
+     * fan-out, so a rediscovery costs nothing beyond the map lookup plus the (pure)
+     * founder derivation. NOT a silent no-op any more when the launch resolves as a
+     * FOUNDER: the tracked instance may have been launched first as a joiner (an app
+     * attach, or this node's own watcher poll winning the `resolveCohortSeed` window
+     * below), which used to drop the founder request and leave the strand headerless —
+     * now the tracked instance is founded in place
+     * ({@link StrandInstanceManager.foundExistingStrand}), waking it first if quiesced
+     * so the bootstrap actually runs before this resolves.
      */
     async launchStrand(strand, sAppConfig, founder) {
+        const resolvedFounder = founder ?? this.isSelfFoundedRow(strand);
         const existing = this.strandManager.getInstance(strand.Id);
         if (existing) {
-            log('launchStrand: strand %s already tracked locally — skipping re-launch', strand.Id);
+            if (resolvedFounder) {
+                const outcome = await this.strandManager.foundExistingStrand(strand.Id);
+                if (outcome === 'needs-resume') {
+                    // Quiesced instance: the retained config now founds, but founding promises
+                    // the bootstrap has RUN by the time the caller resolves — wake through the
+                    // hibernation manager (coalesced with any in-flight wake, timer-aware) so
+                    // the rebuild executes it now rather than at some eventual wake.
+                    await this.wakeStrand(strand.Id);
+                    // The wake's rebuild founds — UNLESS a wake was already in flight when the
+                    // config flipped, in which case it had already read the pre-flip config and
+                    // rebuilt as a joiner, and `wakeStrand` merely coalesced onto it. Re-run the
+                    // (insert-if-absent) bootstrap so founding never resolves headerless.
+                    await this.strandManager.ensureFounderBootstrap(strand.Id);
+                }
+                log('launchStrand: strand %s already tracked — founder request honored (%s)', strand.Id, outcome);
+            }
+            else {
+                log('launchStrand: strand %s already tracked locally — skipping re-launch', strand.Id);
+            }
             return existing;
         }
         // Each strand node gets its own transport identity, derived from the cadre
@@ -3304,8 +4181,18 @@ export class CadreNode {
             bootstrapNodes,
             requireSignedSchemas: this.config.requireSignedSchemas,
             clusterSize: this.config.strandClusterSize,
+            // NOTE: deliberately NO `servingMachines`, so the strand node declares no repair
+            // yardstick and runs the frozen STRAND_CLUSTER_POLICY. The only count this node holds
+            // is the party's enrolled machines (`authorizedControlPeers`), and passing that here
+            // is the regression `bug-strand-yardstick-counts-party-machines` removed — a strand
+            // runs on a subset of the party, and over-declaring makes repair impossible rather
+            // than merely weak. The full argument, and the count that will legitimately go here,
+            // are on `StartStrandConfig.servingMachines`.
             backfill: this.config.strandBackfill,
-            founder
+            revocationEnforcement: this.config.strandRevocationEnforcement,
+            onSelfRevoked: (revokedStrandId) => this.emit('strand:revoked', { strandId: revokedStrandId }),
+            // The RESOLVED flag, never the raw argument — see the doc comment above.
+            founder: resolvedFounder
         });
         // The seed reached the node as `bootstrapNodes`, which only enters the
         // address book via @libp2p/bootstrap discovery. Merge it directly too, so a
@@ -3345,6 +4232,20 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * for a relay we are not yet connected to.
      */
     async resolveCohortSeed(strandId, delegatePeerId) {
+        const siblings = await this.resolveSiblingSeed(strandId, delegatePeerId);
+        // Sibling answers FIRST: they were resolved just now, while a contact-map entry is as
+        // old as the formation that produced it. `unionAddrs` appends only what the siblings
+        // did not already name, so a fresher answer is never displaced and each source keeps
+        // its own signaling-first ordering.
+        return unionAddrs(siblings, this.crossPartyStrandAddrs.get(strandId) ?? []);
+    }
+    /**
+     * The own-party half of {@link resolveCohortSeed}: strand-network addresses resolved
+     * from CONNECTED cohort siblings over the control-mesh strand-addr RPC, doubling as
+     * the delegate announcement when `delegatePeerId` is given. Empty when the control DB
+     * or node is absent (not yet started / torn down).
+     */
+    async resolveSiblingSeed(strandId, delegatePeerId) {
         if (!this.controlDatabase || !this.controlNode) {
             return [];
         }
@@ -3406,11 +4307,25 @@ export class CadreNode {
     }
     /**
      * The circuit relays this node's strand nodes would reserve through: the
-     * union of the RESOLVED listen addrs' circuits — a hand-written
-     * `network.listenAddrs` circuit entry or a `network.relayAddrs` entry, which
-     * the strand node inherits verbatim either way — and the control node's own
-     * live `/p2p-circuit` multiaddrs (a reservation this node discovered rather
-     * than configured).
+     * union of CONFIGURED relays — `network.relayAddrs`, plus any hand-written
+     * `network.listenAddrs` circuit entry, both of which a strand node inherits
+     * verbatim — and the control node's own live `/p2p-circuit` multiaddrs (a
+     * reservation this node discovered rather than configured).
+     *
+     * The CONFIGURED half reads `network.relayAddrs` and `network.listenAddrs`
+     * directly rather than going through {@link resolveListenAddrs}: the control
+     * node's resolution takes the `'search'` route, whose bare `/p2p-circuit` entry
+     * names no relay, so a configured relay would be unannounceable here until this
+     * node's own reservation landed — and the announce must be in place BEFORE a
+     * strand node dials its reservation, since the relay's membership gate does not
+     * know the strand's derived peerId (see delegate-admission.ts). Configuration is
+     * authoritative; the live multiaddrs only ADD relays nobody configured.
+     *
+     * The `listenAddrs` half is now unreachable on a control node — `relay-addrs.ts`
+     * rejects a hand-written `<relay>/p2p-circuit` listen entry outright, because the
+     * bring-up quiet period denies the dial that listener makes from inside
+     * `libp2p.start()`. Kept because it costs one spread and this is the one place
+     * that would silently stop announcing if that rejection is ever relaxed.
      *
      * NOTE: a relay the STRAND node discovers on its own (autorelay — in neither
      * source) gets no announcement, and a membership-gated one will deny it; fine
@@ -3418,7 +4333,8 @@ export class CadreNode {
      */
     circuitRelayTargets() {
         return extractCircuitRelayTargets([
-            ...(resolveListenAddrs(this.config.network) ?? []),
+            ...relayCircuitAddrs(this.config.network?.relayAddrs ?? []),
+            ...(this.config.network?.listenAddrs ?? []),
             ...(this.controlNode?.getMultiaddrs().map(String) ?? [])
         ]);
     }
@@ -3536,35 +4452,41 @@ export class CadreNode {
         if (due.length === 0) {
             return;
         }
-        // A due strand with nobody to ask leaves its throttle unstamped (see below),
-        // so this pass re-enters on EVERY 15 s reconcile tick for as long as the node
-        // is alone — which is the steady state of a solo node running a strand.
         // `connectedSiblingTargets`' membership read is unbounded, and with zero
-        // connections its answer is empty whatever the table holds, so decide it here
-        // from the connection list instead of paying for the read once a tick.
-        if (this.controlNode.getConnections().length === 0) {
-            return;
-        }
+        // connections its answer is empty whatever the table holds, so decide it from the
+        // connection list instead of paying for the read once a tick. Note this only skips
+        // the RPC: a strand carrying cross-party contact addresses still refreshes below,
+        // because those never came from a sibling in the first place.
+        //
         // NOTE: one strand-addr RPC per (due strand × connected sibling) per refresh
         // interval — each a tiny request/response on an already-open control
         // connection. If a node ever runs MANY strands at once, batch the RPC to
         // carry several strand ids per request rather than one fan-out per strand.
-        const targets = await this.connectedSiblingTargets().catch((error) => {
-            log('refreshStrandPeerAddrs: sibling enumeration failed (skipping pass): %o', error);
-            return [];
-        });
-        // No sibling to ask (or a shutdown landed mid-enumeration): leave every stamp
-        // untouched so the next reconcile tick retries, rather than sitting out the
-        // whole refresh interval having asked nobody.
-        if (targets.length === 0 || !this._running || !this.controlNode) {
+        const targets = this.controlNode.getConnections().length === 0
+            ? []
+            : await this.connectedSiblingTargets().catch((error) => {
+                log('refreshStrandPeerAddrs: sibling enumeration failed (skipping pass): %o', error);
+                return [];
+            });
+        // A shutdown landed mid-enumeration.
+        if (!this._running || !this.controlNode) {
             return;
         }
         await Promise.all(due.map((strandId) => this.refreshOneStrandPeerAddrs(strandId, targets, now)));
     }
     /**
-     * One strand's share of {@link refreshStrandPeerAddrs}: RPC the siblings, then
-     * merge their answers into this strand's address book. Errors are logged and
-     * swallowed so one strand's failure never costs the others their refresh.
+     * One strand's share of {@link refreshStrandPeerAddrs}: RPC the siblings, union their
+     * answers with this strand's cross-party contact addresses, and merge the lot into the
+     * strand's address book. Errors are logged and swallowed so one strand's failure never
+     * costs the others their refresh.
+     *
+     * `targets` may be EMPTY — a solo node, or one whose only control peers are strangers.
+     * The cross-party addresses still have to be re-merged in that case: they were learned
+     * at formation and can never be re-resolved, so this periodic re-merge is the ONLY
+     * thing standing between them and the peerStore's one-hour expiry. A strand with
+     * neither a sibling to ask nor a contact entry does nothing and leaves its throttle
+     * unstamped, so the next reconcile tick retries rather than sitting out the whole
+     * refresh interval having done nothing.
      */
     async refreshOneStrandPeerAddrs(strandId, targets, now) {
         const controlNode = this.controlNode;
@@ -3572,13 +4494,19 @@ export class CadreNode {
         if (!controlNode || !strandNode) {
             return;
         }
+        const contactAddrs = this.crossPartyStrandAddrs.get(strandId) ?? [];
+        if (targets.length === 0 && contactAddrs.length === 0) {
+            return;
+        }
         try {
             // The running strand node's own peerId is the delegate to announce — see
             // the relationship note on refreshStrandPeerAddrs.
-            const addrs = await collectStrandAddrs(controlNode, [...targets], strandId, {
-                delegatePeerId: strandNode.peerId.toString()
-            });
-            // Stamped on the RPC having happened, not on its answer: the fan-out is
+            const siblingAddrs = targets.length === 0
+                ? []
+                : await collectStrandAddrs(controlNode, [...targets], strandId, {
+                    delegatePeerId: strandNode.peerId.toString()
+                });
+            // Stamped on the pass having happened, not on its answer: the fan-out is
             // what the throttle exists to bound, and an all-empty round is a normal
             // steady state for a strand no connected sibling currently runs.
             this.strandPeerAddrRefreshAt.set(strandId, now);
@@ -3587,7 +4515,7 @@ export class CadreNode {
             if (!this._running || this.strandManager.getInstance(strandId)?.libp2pNode !== strandNode) {
                 return;
             }
-            await this.mergeStrandPeerAddrs(strandNode, addrs, strandId);
+            await this.mergeStrandPeerAddrs(strandNode, unionAddrs(siblingAddrs, contactAddrs), strandId);
         }
         catch (error) {
             log('refreshStrandPeerAddrs: strand %s refresh failed (continuing): %o', strandId, error);
@@ -3611,6 +4539,15 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * handshake, and a bad entry costs one failed dial that ages out at the
      * peerStore's one-hour expiry. No new gating here — cross-party strand trust is
      * `backlog/strand-network-nat-relay-reachability`.
+     *
+     * NOTE: one input does NOT age out — the cross-party addresses a formation
+     * carried back ({@link crossPartyStrandAddrs}). Nothing can re-resolve them, so
+     * {@link refreshStrandPeerAddrs} re-merges the same stored list every pass, which
+     * also means a junk entry from a responder survives for the node's lifetime rather
+     * than an hour. Bounded to {@link MAX_STRAND_ADDRS} per strand, from a party this
+     * node deliberately formed a strand with, and still authority-free — so the
+     * exposure is a handful of failed dials, not a trust hole. Evict on
+     * `unpublishStrand` if that ever stops being an acceptable price.
      */
     async mergeStrandPeerAddrs(strandNode, addrs, strandId) {
         const counts = { merged: 0, restamped: 0, skipped: 0, failed: 0 };
@@ -3652,7 +4589,29 @@ export class CadreNode {
         if (!node) {
             return [];
         }
-        return orderSignalingFirst(node.getMultiaddrs().map((ma) => ma.toString()));
+        // Every entry is bound to THIS strand node's id, because both consumers — the
+        // strand-addr RPC answer and the formation result's `strandAddrs` — are attributed
+        // per peer on arrival (`groupAddrsByPeerId`) and an entry naming no destination is
+        // dropped there. libp2p already appends the id to its announced addresses, so this
+        // is normally a no-op; it is the guard for a bare listen addr and for a relay hop
+        // whose trailing `/p2p/` names the RELAY. An addr terminating in a DIFFERENT id is
+        // dropped rather than announced — it does not reach this node, and announcing it
+        // would file our address under someone else's id in the receiver's book.
+        //
+        // Re-parsed through this package's own `multiaddr` rather than passed straight in:
+        // libp2p hands back its nested `@multiformats/multiaddr` copy, a structurally
+        // different type from the one `withTrailingPeerId` takes (see
+        // `backlog/reference-app-web-libp2p-interface-dedup`). Re-parsing a string libp2p
+        // itself produced cannot fail.
+        const selfId = node.peerId.toString();
+        const addrs = [];
+        for (const ma of node.getMultiaddrs()) {
+            const bound = this.bindAddrToPeer(multiaddr(ma.toString()), selfId);
+            if (bound !== null) {
+                addrs.push(bound.toString());
+            }
+        }
+        return orderSignalingFirst(addrs);
     }
     /**
      * Stop a strand on THIS node only: untrack it from hibernation, drop its sApp config,
@@ -3869,16 +4828,60 @@ export class CadreNode {
     getControlNode() {
         return this.controlNode;
     }
+    /**
+     * The boot-path half of {@link reserveRelays}: reserve through every
+     * `network.relayAddrs` entry, or fail `start()`.
+     *
+     * WHY IT RUNS HERE, AT THE END. `network.relayAddrs` used to resolve to a
+     * CONFIGURED circuit listener, which libp2p dials from inside `libp2p.start()`
+     * — so the relay was already a connected peer, and therefore already in this
+     * node's Optimystic cohort, before `ControlDatabase.initialize()` ran. Building
+     * that database is a long chain of cohort-consulting block probes (catalog
+     * hydration, then one per table, then the indexes), and a sibling that has not
+     * yet replicated this node's `CadrePeer` row correctly refuses every one of
+     * them, so bring-up died on `BlockUnavailableError` — deterministically, on
+     * every boot of a relay-only node. Retrying could not converge either: the
+     * condition that clears the refusal is this node's own row reaching the
+     * sibling, and writing that row needs the database the retry is building.
+     *
+     * So the invariant is ordering, not retrying: the control database is built
+     * while this node holds ZERO control connections (a cohort of one, entirely
+     * local), and only then does it reach out. Everything above in {@link start}
+     * has completed by the time this runs.
+     *
+     * BUDGET: the supervisor's first attempt — `relay-reservation.ts`'s
+     * `DEFAULT_RELAY_RESERVE_TIMEOUT_MS`, 10 s — is what `start()` waits on — deliberately the module default rather
+     * than a boot-specific one. A healthy dial-plus-reserve is sub-second even over
+     * a WAN, so 10 s is slack for a slow link; going much longer would make a dead
+     * relay indistinguishable from a hung start, and much shorter would fail nodes
+     * on links that were merely slow. The retries carry on in the background after
+     * this resolves, exactly as they do for a {@link reserveRelays} caller.
+     */
+    async driveControlRelayReservation() {
+        const relayAddrs = this.config.network?.relayAddrs ?? [];
+        if (relayAddrs.length === 0) {
+            return;
+        }
+        const t0 = performance.now();
+        const state = await this.reserveRelays([...relayAddrs]);
+        timing('[start] reserveRelays: %dms', Math.round(performance.now() - t0));
+        if (state.status !== 'reserved') {
+            throw new RelayReservationFailedError(relayAddrs, state);
+        }
+        log('Reserved a relay slot: %o', state.circuitAddrs);
+    }
     /**
      * Start keeping a relay reservation: dial the given relay(s) from the control
      * node, ask the first one that answers for a reservation slot, wait until the
      * resulting `/p2p-circuit` address makes this node dialable — and keep a
      * supervisor running that re-drives whenever the reservation is later lost.
      *
-     * For nodes that listen on the bare `/p2p-circuit` SEARCH addr (a browser tab)
-     * rather than a configured `network.relayAddrs` circuit listener — see
-     * `relay-reservation.ts` for why the two are alternatives and why configuring
-     * both is a regression. Opt-in: nothing calls this for the CLI/host nodes.
+     * The FAIL-SOFT entry point, for a caller that discovers its relay at runtime
+     * (a browser tab, a host UI). A node that names `network.relayAddrs` gets the
+     * same drive from {@link driveControlRelayReservation} at the end of
+     * {@link start}, which is fail-fast instead. Both fill the pending reservation
+     * the bare `/p2p-circuit` search listener registered; calling this afterwards
+     * simply replaces the supervisor with one over the new list.
      *
      * Resolves once the FIRST attempt has settled, exactly as it did when it drove
      * once; the retries continue in the background until {@link stop} or the next
@@ -4011,6 +5014,10 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * Push the multiaddrs that future invites should advertise. Pass `null` to
      * revert to the libp2p-reported addresses (the default). The host calls this
      * at spawn and on every NAT change.
+     *
+     * Entries need NOT carry a `/p2p/<peerId>` suffix — {@link resolveInviteAddresses}
+     * appends this node's own before anything publishes or dials them (see
+     * {@link normalizeSelfAddrs}). Passing them suffixed is equally fine.
      */
     setInviteAddresses(addresses) {
         this.latestInviteAddresses = addresses;
@@ -4018,17 +5025,59 @@ export class CadreNode {
     }
     /**
      * Resolve the addresses to embed in invites. Prefers pushed addresses, then
-     * any config-supplied resolver, then the libp2p-observed multiaddrs.
+     * any config-supplied resolver, then the libp2p-observed multiaddrs. The two
+     * app-supplied sources are normalized onto `/p2p/<self>` (see
+     * {@link normalizeSelfAddrs}) so neither hook has to remember the suffix;
+     * libp2p's own addresses already carry it.
      */
     async resolveInviteAddresses() {
         if (this.latestInviteAddresses !== null) {
-            return this.latestInviteAddresses;
+            return this.normalizeSelfAddrs(this.latestInviteAddresses);
         }
         if (this.config.network?.inviteAddressResolver) {
-            return this.config.network.inviteAddressResolver();
+            return this.normalizeSelfAddrs(await this.config.network.inviteAddressResolver());
         }
+        // Not normalized: this branch is libp2p's own output, which already
+        // encapsulates the peer id into every address it reports. Only the two app
+        // hooks above take arbitrary strings and therefore need the guarantee.
         return this.getMultiaddrs();
     }
+    /**
+     * Normalize addresses an app handed us for THIS node onto `/p2p/<self>`, the
+     * same invariant {@link normalizeDialAddrs} enforces on the way out.
+     *
+     * `setInviteAddresses` (the admin API `PUT /admin/invite-addresses`) and
+     * `network.inviteAddressResolver` both take arbitrary strings, and whatever
+     * they return ends up in this node's published `CadrePeer` record — so ONE
+     * unsuffixed entry from either hook is enough to give every sibling in the
+     * party a mixed candidate list for this peer. Establishing the suffix here,
+     * where those strings enter the system, means neither hook has to know the
+     * rule; `cadre-host`'s `buildInviteAddresses` already appends it, and
+     * re-normalizing an already-suffixed address is a no-op.
+     *
+     * Unparsable and other-peer-addressed entries are passed through untouched
+     * rather than dropped: publication is not the place to police an address's
+     * validity, and {@link resolvePeerAddrs} already drops both on the read side.
+     * Before `start()` resolves an identity there is no peer id to append, so the
+     * list is returned as given.
+     */
+    normalizeSelfAddrs(addrs) {
+        const selfPeerId = this.peerId?.toString();
+        if (!selfPeerId) {
+            return addrs;
+        }
+        return addrs.map((addr) => {
+            let parsed;
+            try {
+                parsed = multiaddr(addr);
+            }
+            catch (error) {
+                log('normalizeSelfAddrs: leaving unparsable multiaddr %s as-is: %o', addr, error);
+                return addr;
+            }
+            return withTrailingPeerId(parsed, selfPeerId)?.toString() ?? addr;
+        });
+    }
     /**
      * Enumerate the cadre's `CadrePeer` membership — the ADDRESSABLE surface (see
      * {@link isMember}). Rows whose stamp is retired in `CadreControl.Revocation`
@@ -4090,13 +5139,18 @@ export class CadreNode {
      * legit member goes un-authorized on readers that only pin the new key. Full
      * rotation handling (re-vouch on rotate) is the
      * `flip-strand-membership-rotation-known-gap` work, not this predicate's.
+     *
+     * @param retry - Whether the underlying membership read may retry a transient cluster
+     *   failure. Only {@link refreshAuthorizedControlPeers} passes `false`, because it runs
+     *   as the control database's membership listener with that database's write lock held;
+     *   see its comment.
      */
-    async listAuthorizedMembers() {
+    async listAuthorizedMembers(retry = true) {
         if (!this.controlDatabase) {
             throw new Error('CadreNode must be started before listing members');
         }
         const selfPeerId = this.peerId?.toString();
-        const rows = await this.controlDatabase.queryCadrePeers();
+        const rows = await this.controlDatabase.queryCadrePeers(retry);
         const authorized = rows
             .filter(row => row.peerId !== selfPeerId && this.hasAnchoredVoucher(row))
             .map(({ peerId, multiaddr }) => ({ peerId, multiaddr }));
@@ -4260,6 +5314,25 @@ export class CadreNode {
             await this.membershipGateDrain;
         }
     }
+    /**
+     * Re-materialize a CLOSED strand's revoked-peer deny set now, and hang up any
+     * connected peer it newly covers — the strand-side counterpart to
+     * {@link refreshMembershipGate}.
+     *
+     * Unlike that one, NOTHING calls this automatically: strand membership is
+     * written through the strand's own `Database` handle
+     * (`strand-membership-writer.ts`), which raises no notification this runtime
+     * can hook, and a revocation that arrives by REPLICATION raises none either.
+     * The gate therefore polls (default 30 s). An app that has just called
+     * `revokeMember` or `leaveStrand` should follow the write with this call so
+     * the cut is immediate rather than up to one poll interval late.
+     *
+     * Quiet no-op for a strand that is not running, is quiesced, is open, or has
+     * the gate disabled. Never rejects; resolves once the sweep has finished.
+     */
+    async refreshRevocationEnforcement(strandId) {
+        await this.strandManager.refreshRevocationEnforcement(strandId);
+    }
     /**
      * The single in-flight refresh loop behind {@link refreshMembershipGate}: read
      * until the stale flag stays clear, then release the slot.
@@ -4571,7 +5644,11 @@ export class CadreNode {
         this.strandSolicitationService = new StrandSolicitationService({
             ...options,
             partyId: this.config.controlNetwork.partyId,
-            cadrePeerAddrs: this.getMultiaddrs()
+            cadrePeerAddrs: this.getMultiaddrs(),
+            // Overrides any caller-supplied hook, exactly like partyId/cadrePeerAddrs: only
+            // this node can say which strand-network addresses it is actually listening on,
+            // and a wrong answer here seeds a joiner's mesh with addresses that reach nobody.
+            resolveStrandAddrs: (strandId) => this.getStrandMultiaddrs(strandId)
         });
         // Register as responder on the control node
         this.strandSolicitationService.registerResponder(this.controlNode);
@@ -4616,7 +5693,41 @@ export class CadreNode {
         if (!this.strandSolicitationService) {
             this.initializeStrandSolicitation();
         }
-        return await this.strandSolicitationService.formStrand(invitation, disclosure, this.controlNode);
+        const result = await this.strandSolicitationService.formStrand(invitation, disclosure, this.controlNode);
+        this.recordCrossPartyStrandAddrs(result.strandId, result.strandAddrs);
+        return result;
+    }
+    /**
+     * Remember the responder's strand-network addresses for a strand this node just
+     * formed, so the strand's discovery seed has something to work with when the app
+     * launches it (see {@link crossPartyStrandAddrs}).
+     *
+     * Scoped strictly to `strandId`: these addresses reach ONE strand node of ONE other
+     * party and must never seed another strand's mesh or the control peerStore. An empty
+     * list is recorded as no entry at all rather than an empty one, so a later formation
+     * against the same strand that DOES disclose addresses is not shadowed.
+     */
+    recordCrossPartyStrandAddrs(strandId, strandAddrs) {
+        if (strandAddrs.length === 0) {
+            log('formStrand: responder disclosed no strand addrs for %s — cross-party seed stays empty', strandId);
+            return;
+        }
+        // Capped at the same `MAX_STRAND_ADDRS` one arriving list is, because this
+        // ACCUMULATES: re-forming against the same strand (the documented recovery for a
+        // responder whose relay reservation rotated) unions a fresh list onto the old one,
+        // and nothing here can tell a dead entry from a live one. Without the cap, the seed
+        // — and the peerStore rows every refresh pass re-merges from it — would grow by up
+        // to 16 entries per redemption for the node's lifetime. Oldest entries fall off the
+        // end, which is the right end to lose: `unionAddrs` keeps the freshest list first.
+        const merged = unionAddrs(strandAddrs, this.crossPartyStrandAddrs.get(strandId) ?? [])
+            .slice(0, MAX_STRAND_ADDRS);
+        this.crossPartyStrandAddrs.set(strandId, merged);
+        // A strand already running when this lands (a re-formation) would otherwise wait out
+        // the rest of its ~10-minute refresh throttle before the new addresses reached its
+        // address book. Clearing the stamp makes the next 15 s reconcile tick merge them,
+        // which matters precisely because re-forming is the recovery path for a dead entry.
+        this.strandPeerAddrRefreshAt.delete(strandId);
+        log('formStrand: recorded %d cross-party strand addr(s) for %s', merged.length, strandId);
     }
     /**
      * Encode an open invitation for out-of-band delivery (QR, link, etc.).