3tears-registry 0.19.1

MCP-compatible tool registry for 3tears tool system

3tears Registry

MCP-compatible tool registry for the 3tears tool system. Routes tool calls between agents and tool pods via NATS request/reply.

Part of the 3tears framework.

Components

• ToolCatalog -- in-memory index of registered tool pods, backed by a NATS KV bucket for recovery across restarts.
• RegistrationHandler -- subscribes to {ns}.tools.register and mutates the catalog.
• HeartbeatMonitor -- sweeps pods whose heartbeats fell behind the timeout and evicts their endpoints.
• DiscoveryHandler -- serves {ns}.tools.discover for pod-readiness polling.
• CallProxy -- the hot path. Subscribes to {ns}.tools.call, authorizes via AgentToolAuthorizer, selects an endpoint via the configured RoutingStrategy, and forwards the call to the tool pod via NATS request/reply with identity + correlation carried through the CallContext envelope.
• RegistryRbacStack -- self-contained rbac surface the standalone server constructs against the connected NATS client: NATS-proxy NamespaceCollection + four rbac metadata Collections + AclCache + invalidation subscribers. The _run_server() entry point uses this to wire RbacEvaluatorAuthorizer without any host-application loaders, so a standalone server no longer defaults to deny-all.

Authorization

Tool dispatch authorization lives behind the AgentToolAuthorizer protocol. Implementations receive the calling agent id, the invoking user id (from CallContext.user_id), and the fully qualified tool name, and return a boolean decision.

Production deployments wire RbacEvaluatorAuthorizer (in threetears.registry.rbac_authorizer) which delegates to the unified rbac evaluator from threetears.agent.acl:

• The platform-side ToolNamespaceEmitter listens on {ns}.tools.register and upserts a platform.namespaces row of type tool per tool in every RegistrationManifest. The canonical name shape is tools.<sanitized-mcp-name>.<sanitized-version> (per build_namespace_name); metadata carries the pre-sanitized natural-identity fields mcp_name / mcp_version / pod_id so downstream pattern matching (the access materializer's agent.yaml access.tools patterns) does not need to reverse the sanitization rules.
• The authorizer resolves the tool namespace via an injected NamespaceCollection. The signature is is_authorized(agent_id, user_id, tool_name, tool_version). The implementation builds the canonical lookup key via build_namespace_name(PLURAL_PREFIX_TOOL, tool_name, tool_version) rather than passing the raw mcp_name directly, so the lookup matches the row the emitter wrote.
• evaluate_decision resolves the two-sided grant chain: user side (groups the invoking user is in) intersected with agent side (groups the calling agent is in, short-circuited by namespace ownership). The decision is cached in threetears.agent.acl.AclCache with TTL + fine-grained invalidation; cross-process rbac mutations purge the cache promptly via the acl.{membership,assignment,role}.invalidate subjects the RegistryRbacStack subscribes to on startup.

Defense in depth: when user_id=None (tool dispatch without user identity) the authorizer denies unconditionally. When the namespace Collection's get_by_name returns None (tool registered but namespace row not yet visible) it denies. This catches registration races rather than defaulting to allow.

Platform-built-in tools land with owner_agent_id=NULL, customer_id=NULL. There is no implicit "anyone can call" behaviour for them. Grants are managed via explicit assignments on the platform-seeded ToolCaller role (same pattern as shared-type workspaces).

RbacEvaluatorAuthorizer is the only authorizer the production server wires: no dual-enforcement window, no back-compat aliases. The declarative access.tools expression on agent.yaml stays as operator-facing syntax and is translated to RBAC assignments at bootstrap.

Dev-mode authorizers

AllowAllAuthorizer permits every dispatch unconditionally, enabled by THREETEARS_REGISTRY_ALLOW_ALL_TOOLS=true. Use only in local dev containers when an explicit RBAC bypass is needed.

DenyAllAuthorizer refuses every dispatch. Available as a panic-button kill switch via THREETEARS_REGISTRY_FORCE_DENY_ALL=true. It is also the millisecond-window placeholder the server holds before the rbac stack is wired against the live NATS client during serve().

Standalone entry point

python -m threetears.registry

Reads THREETEARS_NATS_URL (defaults to nats://localhost:4222) and THREETEARS_NATS_SUBJECT_NAMESPACE (the NATS subject namespace).

By default the entry point wires RbacEvaluatorAuthorizer against a self-contained RegistryRbacStack (NATS-proxy NamespaceCollection + four rbac metadata Collections + AclCache + invalidation subscribers). The proxy collections read through the platform broker's system.platform.rbac carve-out, so no direct DB credentials are needed. The registry is self-sufficient in any deployment with a reachable platform broker. Optional knobs:

• THREETEARS_REGISTRY_ALLOW_ALL_TOOLS=true -- bypass the rbac stack entirely (dev only).
• THREETEARS_REGISTRY_FORCE_DENY_ALL=true -- kill switch for misconfigured deployments.
• THREETEARS_REGISTRY_ACL_TTL_SECONDS -- override the AclCache TTL (default 60s).

Dispatch flow:

sequenceDiagram
    participant Agent
    participant Registry
    participant RbacStack
    participant PlatformBroker
    participant ToolPod

    Agent->>Registry: ProxyCallRequest(tool_name, tool_version, context.user_id)
    Registry->>RbacStack: is_authorized(agent_id, user_id, tool_name, tool_version)
    RbacStack->>RbacStack: build_namespace_name(PLURAL_PREFIX_TOOL, tool_name, tool_version)
    RbacStack->>PlatformBroker: NamespaceCollection.get_by_name (system.platform.rbac proxy)
    PlatformBroker-->>RbacStack: tool namespace row
    RbacStack->>RbacStack: evaluate_decision (user ∩ agent grants)
    RbacStack-->>Registry: True / False
    Registry->>ToolPod: forward call (CallContext echoed)
    ToolPod-->>Registry: CallResponse
    Registry-->>Agent: ProxyCallResponse