@objectstack/service-realtime

In-process pub/sub for ObjectStack — the production IRealtimeService implementation, backed by an in-memory adapter.

⚠️ Server-internal only — no client transport. This service delivers events to trusted, in-process subscribers (today: the webhook auto-enqueuer and knowledge sync). There is no WebSocket/SSE endpoint, no REST subscribe route, and no working client transport — IRealtimeService.handleUpgrade is deliberately unimplemented platform-wide, and the @objectstack/client RealtimeAPI is a placeholder. See Security posture before changing that.

What this package actually provides

• InMemoryRealtimeAdapter — a Map-backed pub/sub implementing IRealtimeService (publish / subscribe / unsubscribe), with:
  • channel-based routing and per-subscription filtering by object name and event types (RealtimeSubscriptionOptions.object / eventTypes; options.filter is declared in the contract but not evaluated);
  • a maxSubscriptions safety cap (default 50 000; 0 = unbounded, tests only) so a subscription leak can't grow the map until the pod OOMs;
  • handler errors swallowed per-delivery so one bad subscriber can't break the publish loop.
• RealtimeServicePlugin — registers the adapter as the kernel realtime service, registers the sys_presence system object, and contributes its translations.

v1 deployment contract (launch-readiness P0-5): single-instance only. The adapter is process-local — events published on node A are not delivered to subscribers on node B. An HA adapter (Redis-backed, over service-cluster-redis) is a post-GA fast-follow.

Usage (server-side, trusted code only)

import { ObjectKernel } from '@objectstack/core';
import { RealtimeServicePlugin } from '@objectstack/service-realtime';

const kernel = new ObjectKernel();
kernel.use(new RealtimeServicePlugin());
await kernel.bootstrap();

const realtime = kernel.getService('realtime');

const subId = await realtime.subscribe('records', (event) => {
  console.log(event.type, event.payload);
}, { object: 'account', eventTypes: ['record.created'] });

await realtime.publish({
  type: 'record.created',
  object: 'account',
  payload: { id: 'acc-1', name: 'Acme' },
  timestamp: new Date().toISOString(),
});

await realtime.unsubscribe(subId);

Configuration:

new RealtimeServicePlugin({
  adapter: 'memory',                    // only supported adapter today
  memory: { maxSubscriptions: 50_000 }, // 0 = unbounded (tests only)
});

Security posture (#2992 / ADR-0096 D4)

Delivery is a pure fan-out with no per-recipient authorization seam:

• subscriptions carry no principal — there is nothing to check a row against;
• matchesSubscription filters only by object name + event type;
• the ObjectQL engine publishes record.created / record.updated events with the full record body (the after row) — rows and fields a subscriber's own find would hide under RLS/FLS/tenant scoping.

That is safe only while every subscriber is trusted server-internal code. Before any end-user transport ships (WebSocket handleUpgrade, SSE, a REST subscribe route, or a real client transport), the delivery path MUST gain one of:

1. a per-recipient re-check on delivery — the subscription carries the subscriber's ExecutionContext, and every event is re-authorized (RLS/FLS/tenant) against it before the handler fires; or
2. id-only payloads — the client re-fetches the record under its own authority.

This posture is registered in the authz conformance matrix (packages/qa/dogfood/test/authz-conformance.matrix.ts, row realtime-delivery-authz), and transport tripwire probes in authz-conformance.test.ts fail CI if a transport is wired without upgrading that row with a real enforcement site.

Contract

Implements IRealtimeService from @objectstack/spec/contracts:

interface IRealtimeService {
  publish(event: RealtimeEventPayload): Promise<void>;
  subscribe(channel: string, handler: RealtimeEventHandler, options?: RealtimeSubscriptionOptions): Promise<string>;
  unsubscribe(subscriptionId: string): Promise<void>;
  handleUpgrade?(request: Request): Promise<Response>;   // deliberately unimplemented — see above
  subscribeMetadata?(filter, handler): Promise<string>;  // optional convenience — not implemented here
  subscribeData?(filter, handler): Promise<string>;      // optional convenience — not implemented here
}

License

Apache-2.0. See LICENSING.md.

See Also

• @objectstack/spec — realtime contract
• framework#2992 — the identity-admission tracking issue for this surface
• ADR-0096 — Execution-Surface Identity Admission