OpenNest/docs/nest-storage.md

Nest storage: File mode vs. Database mode

The desktop app can save nests two ways:

• File mode (default, unchanged behavior): Save/Save As write a .nest ZIP archive to disk via the normal file dialog. See nest-file-format.md.
• Database mode: Open browses server records 100 at a time. The Find box searches name, customer, material, grade, made by, comments and status on the server after a short typing pause (Enter in the box searches at once); clicking a column header sorts every match on the server (click again to reverse); the arrow buttons move between pages and the title and find bar show the range and total. Dates and numbers are not searched as text; sort their column instead. The selected sort column and direction are remembered for the current Windows user when the browser closes, including across app restarts. Until a selection is saved, nests appear newest-saved first. Below the list, the Details tabs show the highlighted nest's plates (duplicates, size, parts, drawings, utilization), drawings (required, nested, remaining, area), and Versions (bounded current and earlier snapshots). Plates and drawings come from the archive downloaded shortly after the highlight stops moving; Versions loads on selection and follows the selected nest without opening another window. Beside the tabs, a preview draws one plate of the highlighted nest; the arrow buttons below it step through the plates, and selecting a row on the Plates tab shows that plate. Enter on the nest list or a double-click opens the highlighted nest; Esc closes. Save creates a record on first save and updates that same record afterward. Save As creates a new record (a copy). A failed save keeps the previous record association; switching server URLs creates a record on the new server rather than updating an id from the previous one. On the Versions tab, Open read-only... previews one snapshot without binding an editable document, and Download selected version... saves its exact archived bytes. Select a nest and click Nest Information... above the list (or use the row's right-click menu) to edit the same information as Nest > Nest Info, including the name, without opening the nest in the main editor. OK saves immediately to the same database ID as a new version, then refreshes the list, preview and history; Cancel makes no change. The dialog starts with the latest saved metadata. Plate defaults follow the same rules as the open editor: populated sheets are not resized or re-nested. This action requires a version-aware server and refuses to overwrite a newer save from another PC. After a conflict or network error, refresh and reopen the information dialog before trying again; a lost reply can mean the save already reached the server. An already-open editor is not modified; reload it before saving further changes to that same nest. A separate confirmed Restore selected version... creates a new current revision of the same ID and keeps all intervening versions. Delete... hides the record from ordinary browsing but retains every archive; Deleted nests... opens an explicit recovery view. Neither action purges data. An old desktop without a revision precondition cannot update or delete on an upgraded server. A separate File > Export .nest... command is always available (in both modes) for producing a local file to share or back up. Export does not change the document's file save path or database record association.

Dragging one or more .nest files onto the main window (or onto an open plate) opens them from disk directly, in either mode — this is the only way to open a local file while in Database mode, since Open there browses server records instead of showing a file dialog. A document opened this way is not bound to a server record, so a subsequent Save in Database mode creates a new record on first save, same as any other unbound document.

The mode and server address are stored per-PC at %APPDATA%\OpenNest\storage.json (OpenNest.Data.NestStorageSettings), defaulting to File mode so existing installs are unaffected until an operator opts in via File > Storage Mode....

Wire contract

OpenNest.Data.NestRecord is the metadata DTO shared by the client (RemoteNestRepository) and the server (OpenNest.Server). JSON is camelCase with enums serialized as strings (JsonSerializerDefaults.Web + JsonStringEnumConverter(JsonNamingPolicy.CamelCase)), matching the rest of OpenNest.Data's local JSON stores. Uploaded metadata (POST and both PUTs) must carry string text fields (null is 400) and a defined status: a name, or for existing callers its integer value (0 quote, 1 toBeCut, 2 hasBeenCut, 3 draft); an undefined value is 400 and stores nothing. A server older than draft refuses it, so upgrade the server before desktops that can set it. An uploaded file (POST and PUT /file) must be a .nest archive with a readable nest.json, or the request is 400 and stores nothing. The server reads only that entry, never programs or geometry, and takes the archive-derived fields below from it.

Field	Type	Notes
id	guid	Client-generated on first save; kept on updates.
name	string
customer	string
dateCreated / dateModified	datetime	Set by the client from the nest's own metadata.
material	string	Material name (type), e.g. Stainless. Read from the uploaded archive (nest material, else plate defaults' on an explicit null); a metadata-only PUT may change it, and the desktop applies the record's value when opening the nest.
materialGrade	string	Optional; default blank. Older servers drop it. A blank grade on a record saved before schema v8 is treated as unrecorded: opening keeps the archive's grade while the material name matches.
thickness	number	Read from the uploaded archive (nest thickness, else plate defaults' when not positive); editable like material.
units	"inches" | "millimeters"	The nest's units, which thickness is in. Server-computed from the uploaded archive (absent or unknown values are inches, as NestReader reads them); ignored on upload and kept by a metadata-only PUT. Schema v12 read every stored archive, current and historical, to fill it. Older servers omit it, which readers take as inches.
status	"draft" | "quote" | "toBeCut" | "hasBeenCut"	Default quote.
plateCount / partCount	integer	Server-computed from the uploaded archive (non-cutoff parts only; a trailing plate with no parts or cut-offs is not counted); ignored on upload and kept by a metadata-only PUT.
comments	string
madeBy	string
fileSize	integer	Server-computed; ignored on upload.
savedAt	datetime	Server-computed; ignored on upload.
revision	integer	Current immutable revision; zero on a legacy server without history.
deleted	boolean	Hidden from ordinary reads when true; retained in recovery/backup.
restoredFromRevision	nullable integer	Historical source promoted by Restore; not the preceding revision.

Endpoints

Method	Path	Body	Response
GET	/healthz	—	200 { "status": "ok" } after a live database query; 503 { "status": "unavailable" } on storage failure (no internal details)
GET	/api/nests	—	NestRecord[], newest savedAt first. Full, unbounded enumeration for backup manifests, restore checks and the container smoke; browsing uses /api/nests/query
GET	/api/nests/query?search=&status=&material=&materialGrade=&thickness=&sort=&order=&offset=&limit=	—	{ "items": NestRecord[], "total", "offset", "limit" }: one bounded page filtered in SQL (see below), or 400 for an invalid parameter
GET	/api/nests/{id}	—	NestRecord or 404
GET	/api/nests/{id}/file	—	.nest archive bytes (application/zip) or 404
GET	/api/nests/{id}/sheets	—	{ "nestId", "revision", "sheets": [{ "width", "length", "quantity" }], "parts": [{ "name", "required", "nested" }], "plates": [{ "index", "width", "length", "quantity", "stockItemCodes", "expectedRemnant" }] } read from the current archive (see below), 404, or 500 problem when the stored archive is unreadable
POST	/api/nests	multipart: metadata (JSON NestRecord) + file (.nest bytes)	NestRecord with server-assigned id when the client sends an empty guid; 409 with the current record (active or deleted) when the id already exists, storing nothing
PUT	/api/nests/{id}/file	multipart: metadata + file	Updated NestRecord, or 404 if id is unknown
PUT	/api/nests/{id}/metadata	JSON NestRecord	Updated NestRecord (archive untouched), or 404
DELETE	/api/nests/{id}	—	Updated hidden NestRecord, or 404
GET	/api/nests/{id}/revisions?offset=0&limit=100	—	Metadata page, newest first; limit 1–200
GET	/api/nests/{id}/revisions/{revision}/file	—	Exact immutable archive bytes
POST	/api/nests/{id}/revisions/{revision}/restore	—	New current revision of the same ID, with source metadata/bytes
GET	/api/nests/deleted/query	—	Bounded deleted-record page; same query parameters as ordinary browsing
GET	/api/nests/deleted/{id} / /{id}/file / /{id}/revisions / /{id}/revisions/{revision}/file	—	Recovery equivalents of current/history reads
POST	/api/nests/deleted/{id}/recover	—	New nondeleted revision of the same ID
POST	/api/nest-names/next?year=	—	{ "year", "number", "name" }: the year's next generated nest number (see below); 400 outside 2000–2099

All existing-record mutations require If-Match: "<current revision>". Missing precondition returns 428 (upgrade/reload), malformed precondition 400, stale precondition 409 with current metadata; none mutate data. Ordinary reads of hidden records return 404. Changed file/metadata saves and visibility changes append snapshots atomically; an identical save at the current revision is a no-op. Restore appends a new snapshot, never rewrites its source or intervening history.

Sheets and part counts

/sheets lists what a nest needs cut, for inventory holds (MaterialLedger). It skips the trailing empty new-plate slot, as plateCount does. Sheets group by size with width the shorter side, sizes as stored (unrounded, in the nest's units: inches or millimeters, inches when the archive has none or an unknown value, as NestReader reads it), quantity the sum of those plates' quantities, ordered by width then length. Callers that work in one unit, such as MaterialLedger's inches, must convert using units. parts has one entry per drawing, ordered by name: required is the drawing's required quantity, nested its parts on each plate times that plate's quantity; parts whose drawing is missing are skipped.

plates lists the same plates one by one, in nest order: index (0-based position), width (the shorter side) and length as stored, quantity, and stockItemCodes, the inventory item each sheet of that plate is cut from (entry i is sheet i; sheets past the end are uncoded and a bundle repeats its code; empty when none is coded). Codes come from the plate's optional stockItemCodes in nest.json (see the nest file format), read as NestReader reads them. MaterialLedger can hold exactly those items and match uncoded sheets by size.

Each plate also reports expectedRemnant, { "width", "length", "source" } (width the shorter side, in the nest's units, source cutoff or offcut), the rectangular drop each of its sheets is expected to leave, or null when none. The server has no geometry: it reports the plate's derived expectedRemnant that the desktop wrote at save (see expected remnants). A file without it, or with a malformed or non-positive value or an unknown source, reports null.

MaterialLedger holds (desktop)

MaterialLedger creates one hold per physical sheet of a server nest, from /sheets, and stores the nest's ID. The desktop shows those holds read-only; it never creates, approves or closes them, and nothing waits on the ledger.

Where. A status bar label after the material label, only for a nest saved to the server in Database mode (Document.RemoteId, not a first save) while Tools > Options > MaterialLedger has a URL (setup). File-mode nests, unsaved nests and PCs without a ledger show nothing. The tooltip lists each hold: item code, size in the nest's units, location code and status.

When. The holds are read when a server nest opens, after each Save, after the storage mode or Options change, and when you click the label. The status bar never polls. Each read uses MaterialLedgerClient.GetHoldsAsync (GET /api/stock/holds?openNestNestId=, X-Api-Key, 5 s), whose result is NotConfigured, Unreachable(reason), Unauthorized or Ok(holds). A newer read replaces an older one still running.

Summary. LedgerHoldSummary (OpenNest.Data/MaterialLedger/) compares the open holds with the sheets of the last open or save: the sum of plate quantities, skipping the trailing empty plate as /sheets does. Proposed, Approved and AwaitingCloseout holds are open, the statuses ML counts against free stock. Released means the hold was let go, not sent to cutting, so it is listed but not counted, as are closed, cancelled, exception and unknown statuses; unknown status strings are kept as sent.

Holds	Label
One open hold per sheet	Ledger: 4 of 4 sheets held
More open holds than sheets	Ledger: 4 of 4 sheets held, 1 extra
Some sheets without one	Ledger: 2 of 4 held, 2 short
None open	Ledger: no holds, or Ledger: no open holds (3 closed)
No answer or key rejected	Ledger: unavailable (the tooltip gives the reason)

The label prefix is Ledger: rather than Material: so it is not confused with the nest's material label beside it.

Has Been Cut. When Nest Info changes the status to Has Been Cut, the desktop rereads the holds. If any are still open, it shows a non-modal note, "Close out N holds in MaterialLedger", with a link to {ledgerUrl}/Nests/Details/{id}. Closeout happens there. The note never blocks the dialog, save or post, and posting is not gated on holds.

Generated nest names

File > New names a nest N<yy>-<seq> (OpenNest.Data.NestNames): the two-digit year and the year's sequence number in a base-29 alphabet without look-alike characters (no S, which reads as 5), padded to three digits (24,389 a year before a fourth appears). The sequence runs for the whole year. In Database mode the desktop asks POST /api/nest-names/next for the number, so every PC shares one counter per year (nest_sequences, schema version 6). The server also keeps the number above every stored generated name for that year, active or deleted, so names created offline or before the server counted are not reissued; renamed nests and other years' names do not move it.

When the server is unreachable within 3 seconds, has no such endpoint, or the app is in File mode, the PC's own counter (NestNumber user setting) names the nest. It resets when the year changes and is raised past each number the server hands out. Two PCs naming nests offline at the same time can still pick the same name; a nest's identity on the server is its id, never its name.

A nest's name may already be on posted CNC programs or labels, so it is never renamed silently. When Save (not Save As, and not the reconciliation of a pending upload) creates a nest's first record on the current server, it first searches active nests for one with exactly the same name (case-sensitive; deleted nests do not count, NestNameConflicts). Only on a match does it allocate the year's next name and show it in an editable dialog: OK uploads under the chosen name, Cancel saves nothing. If the check or the allocation fails or takes longer than 3 seconds, the nest uploads under its current name.

In Database mode the name can be edited in Nest > Nest Info (it uploads with the next Save) and in the saved-nest browser's Nest Information... (saved immediately). In File mode it stays read-only, since the file name is the nest name. If another active nest already has the exact new name, a warning asks before using it; No reopens the dialog with the edits kept. A name accepted this way is not asked about again by the nest's first Save. A rename that the server cannot check within 3 seconds goes ahead without a warning.

There is no authentication; this is a LAN-only service. Do not expose it outside the shop network without adding one.

Browsing query

GET /api/nests/query filters, orders and pages in SQLite, so a client receives only the requested page of metadata (never archive bytes):

• search (optional): trimmed, at most 200 characters, no NUL characters; blank means no filter. Case-insensitive substring of the whole text in name, customer, material, materialGrade, madeBy, comments or the status (ToBeCut or the display name To Be Cut). %, _ and \ are literal. Dates and numbers are not matched as text. Case folding is ASCII-only (SQLite LIKE).
• Exact filters (optional, all must match; used to find draft nests a release can merge into): status (draft, quote, toBeCut or hasBeenCut), material and materialGrade (compared by SharedListNames.Key, so case and spacing are ignored; a present but blank materialGrade asks for nests with no grade) and thickness (a number, zero or greater, matched at four decimals in each nest's own units). The client sends them only when set, so plain browsing still works against servers without them.
• offset (default 0, at least 0) and limit (default 100, 1 to 500).
• sort (default savedAt): one of savedAt, name, customer, status, material, dateCreated, dateModified, thickness, plateCount, partCount, madeBy, comments, fileSize, materialGrade (names, case-insensitive; no numbers). Text columns sort case-insensitively (ASCII); dates sort as their stored ISO text. order is asc or desc (default desc).
• Ties are broken by id in the same direction, so pages partition the matches deterministically. total counts every match and is read with the page in one database hold. A save between two page requests can move a row across a page boundary.
• Unknown, repeated, non-integer or out-of-range parameters return 400 instead of being ignored or clamped. RemoteNestRepository.QueryAsync checks the same bounds before sending, and reports an HTTP 404 from an older server as a server version that must be updated.

Drawing library endpoints

The server also keeps a shared library of drawings (schema v5). The desktop adds library drawings to a nest and saves nest drawings to the library (below). A drawing's geometry travels as an opaque drawing package: a .nest archive holding exactly one drawing and no plates, written and read on the client by OpenNest.IO.DrawingPackage. The server never parses it.

OpenNest.Data.DrawingLibraryRecord fields: id (client-allocated before the first upload), revision, name, customer, materialName, materialGrade, thickness (stored rounded to 4 decimals), units (inches | millimeters), cutType (laser | waterjet | plasma), notes, settings, archived, savedBy, and the server-computed packageSha256 (lower-case hex), packageSize and savedAt.

settings holds the drawing's nesting settings, applied when it is added to a nest: cutFirst (sequence its parts first, for example test squares), priority, stepAngle, startAngle, endAngle (radians), allow180Equivalent and colorArgb (32-bit ARGB; alpha 0 means no stored color, so the nest assigns one). They are record fields, not package content (see drawing packages), so changing them adds a revision without new geometry. Default quantity is not stored: quantity belongs to each nest.

Method	Path	Body	Response
POST	/api/drawings	multipart: metadata (JSON record with a nonempty id) + package	Revision 1; 409 with the current record when the id exists
GET	/api/drawings/query?search=&customer=&materialName=&materialGrade=&thickness=&cutType=&cutFirst=&includeArchived=&sort=&order=&offset=&limit=	—	{ items, total, offset, limit }
GET	/api/drawings/{id} / /{id}/file	—	Current record / package bytes (archived drawings included), or 404
GET	/api/drawings/{id}/revisions?offset=0&limit=100	—	Revision page, newest first; limit 1–200
GET	/api/drawings/{id}/revisions/{revision}/file	—	Exact immutable package bytes
PUT	/api/drawings/{id}/file	multipart: metadata + package	New revision
PUT	/api/drawings/{id}/metadata	JSON record (all details and settings; an omitted settings means defaults)	New revision with the same package
POST	/api/drawings/{id}/archive / /restore	—	New revision with archived changed

• Existing-drawing writes require If-Match exactly as for nests: 428 missing, 400 malformed, 409 stale with the current record. Writing to an archived drawing, archiving an archived one or restoring an active one is also 409. None of these change data. There is no delete; archive hides a drawing from the query unless includeArchived=true.
• Every change appends an immutable revision in the same transaction that updates the current row, including metadata-only edits and archive/restore. An identical save (details, settings and package hash) at the current revision is a no-op.
• Packages are content-addressed: each distinct package is stored once, keyed by its SHA-256, and revisions point at it. Only a new package adds a blob; details, settings, archive and restore revisions add none.
• Validation (400, no state change): cutType and units must be single enum names (no numbers or combinations); thickness finite and at least 0; name nonblank; name, customer, material, grade and savedBy at most 200 characters, notes at most 4000; no NUL characters; settings not null, angles finite and stepAngle at least 0; package nonempty, at most 16 MiB and starting with a ZIP signature. Metadata id on a PUT must be empty or match the route.
• Query: search is a literal, case-insensitive (ASCII) substring of name, customer or notes (%, _, \ literal). customer, materialName and materialGrade match exactly after SharedListNames.Key normalization (trimmed, collapsed spaces, case-insensitive); blank means any. thickness matches exactly after rounding to 4 decimals. sort is one of savedAt (default), name, customer, materialName, materialGrade, thickness, cutType, revision; ties break by id. cutFirst=true|false keeps only drawings with that setting. Paging, order and the refusal of unknown, repeated or out-of-range parameters follow the nest query.
• An older server answers 404 on these routes; the client reports that the server must be updated and never falls back to another store.

Schema v5 keeps three drawing tables in the same file: drawing_packages (sha256, size, package), drawing_revisions (every immutable revision's details, settings, archived flag and package hash) and drawings (each drawing's current revision, indexed for browsing). Upgrading from v4 runs in one transaction: each distinct v4 blob is stored once by its hash, every revision and current row is copied as it was with default nesting settings (v4 had none), and the v4 drawing tables are dropped. A pre-v4 database gets the v5 tables directly. The nest tables are untouched. A server older than v5 refuses to open a v5 database, so rolling back after the upgrade needs the pre-upgrade backup (see Backup, restore, and upgrade). The stopped-volume tar backup includes the drawing tables, but nest_manifest.py and restore_check do not verify drawings yet.

Add from Drawing Library (desktop)

Nest > Add from Drawing Library... and the Library button above the drawing list open a paged browser of active library drawings (Database mode only; in File mode both are disabled with "Database mode only"). It starts filtered to the nest's material, grade and thickness; Show all materials lifts that filter. Selecting a drawing fills the details pane beside the list: its details, notes and a preview of its geometry. The preview downloads the listed revision's package shortly after the selection settles (arrowing through the list does not download each row), caches it per revision while the dialog is open, and is best-effort: a failed download shows "Preview unavailable" and never blocks adding. Add to Nest (or double-click / Enter) downloads that exact revision, checks its SHA-256 against the record and plans the insert (OpenNest.Data.LibraryDrawingInsert) before changing anything:

• Material, grade or thickness differing from the nest: a warning names each difference and the operator confirms. The drawing is added, but its cut pins will not apply; the nest's cutting settings do.
• Different units: refused (no conversion).
• The same revision from the same server already in the nest: only the quantity is raised. A different revision of that drawing: refused; change revisions through Update Drawings.
• Another drawing with the same name: refused, naming both.

The added drawing is an independent copy carrying a library link (server key, id, revision and a snapshot of the library details) that is saved with the nest (see the nest file format). Editing it in the nest never changes the library. The copy takes its name, customer, material and nesting settings from the library record, not from the package.

The In This Nest tab (its title counts them) lists the nest's drawings, library or not, cutoffs excluded: name, library revision ("Not from the library" or "(other server)" when it is linked elsewhere), and the Required, Nested and Remaining quantities, with totals below. It refreshes after every add. Required is edited in place (0 to 99,999; one click starts editing, a bad number keeps the editor open with an error) and applies to the nest at once, like an add; the main window's drawing list refreshes when the dialog closes.

The browser's Cut first column shows the setting.

File > Drawing Library... (Database mode only, like Drawing Sets) opens the drawing sets window on its Library tab (below), the same browser without a nest: it lists every active drawing and has no Add to Nest or In This Nest tab. There a double-click, Enter or Add to Release adds the selected drawing on its own, at the entered Quantity, to the window's release panel (below); Edit Drawing... (the button or the right-click menu) edits it. Its right-click menu also has the set and release items below.

Edit Drawing (desktop)

Edit Drawing... (OpenNest.Data.DrawingLibraryEditSession) edits one active library drawing. Its Details are the name, customer, material, grade, thickness and cut type; Units are shown read-only, since changing them would change what the geometry means. Its Nesting settings are Cut first, priority, rotation step/start/end (degrees), 180° equivalent and color, then the notes. Text is trimmed and thickness rounded as the server stores it; Save stays disabled until something changed and every value passes the library rules.

Customer, material, grade and thickness are drop-downs that still accept any typed value (OpenNest.Data.DrawingLibraryChoices). They list what the newest 5,000 active library drawings use, plus the machine configurations' and post processors' materials and grades; grades follow the typed material, and the thicknesses that material (and grade) already uses in the drawing's units are listed ahead of the standard gauges and fractions. A library that cannot be read leaves the catalog's lists.

The color is Custom (the swatch opens the color picker) or Automatic (stored as 0), where each nest's color scheme picks the part color, so it changes with the scheme. Reset returns to the revision's stored color.

The rotation dial beside the angle boxes shades the range counterclockwise from start (hollow handle) to end (solid handle), 0° at the right, and ticks each angle the nesting engines try (RotationPolicy.FromLegacy); allowed 180° equivalents are hatched. A zero step is the engines' automatic 0°/90°/180°/270°, so the range is drawn faded. Dragging a handle moves it in whole degrees (Shift: 15°) within 0° ≤ start ≤ end ≤ 360°; the end can be dragged past 0° to a full turn. With focus, the arrow keys move a handle and Space switches handles.

When the new details would give the drawing another identity (D4: normalized customer, name, material and grade, exact thickness, units and cut type), Save first looks up active library drawings that already have them and, if any do, names them and asks before saving; a failed lookup also asks. Editing only notes or settings never asks.

Save goes through PUT /api/drawings/{id}/metadata, guarded by the revision the dialog opened with: a new revision with the same package. A material or thickness change is an edit of the same drawing, not a new one. A 409 (someone else saved first) is shown, nothing is saved and the dialog stays open; close it and edit again. Nests that already hold the drawing keep their copy and revision. Sets list drawings by id, so they release the new revision next time.

Edit Drawing opens from:

• the Drawing Library dialog (the Edit Drawing... button or the drawing's right-click menu), which reloads the page after a save;
• the set editor's member grid: double-click a member (outside its quantity), right-click it, or Edit Drawing... beside the grid. It first reads the member's current record, so a set read earlier does not cause a conflict; the row then shows what was saved. The set itself is unchanged and needs no save;
• the release panel: a group refused for its drawings (no material or thickness, or two drawings with one name) has Fix Drawings..., which opens Edit Drawing on each drawing it is refused for in turn (Cancel stops), as does a double-click on the group; with a releasable group selected, it takes the first refused one. Its right-click menu lists Edit Drawing for each of the group's drawings. Each edit reads the current record first, and the plan is rebuilt with what was saved, so a fixed drawing joins its material group.

Save to Drawing Library (desktop)

Right-click a drawing in the drawing list > Save to Drawing Library... (Database mode only; disabled with "Database mode only" in File mode). The dialog (OpenNest.Data.DrawingLibrarySaveSession) prefills name and customer from the drawing (the nest's customer when the drawing has none), material, grade, thickness and units from the nest (the drawing's material when the nest has none), and the cut type and notes of the linked revision when the drawing came from this server's library, otherwise the cut type last saved on this PC. Units follow the nest and cannot be changed. The drawing's own nesting settings (Cut first, priority, rotation, color) are saved in the record and summarized read-only in the dialog; change them later with Edit Drawing.

Whenever the details change, the dialog looks up active library drawings with the same normalized customer, name, material and grade and the exact thickness, units and cut type, and offers Save as:

• No match: a separate (new) library drawing.
• One match, or the drawing's own linked library drawing among several: the next revision of it, guarded by If-Match on the revision listed.
• Several matches: no default; the operator chooses one or a separate drawing.
• A linked drawing whose details no longer match is offered but never the default, so changing thickness cannot silently rewrite it.

Save stays disabled until the lookup for the current details has finished. A 409 (someone else saved first) is shown and the choices are refreshed. A save that fails without a definite answer stays pending: the next Save first looks for the revision it would have produced and adopts it when the package hash and details match, so it is never stored twice and a retried new drawing keeps its client-allocated id. Saving identical content at the current revision is a no-op. On success only the nest drawing's library link changes, to the saved revision; save the nest to keep it.

Drawing sets (desktop)

File > Drawing Sets... (Database mode only) opens the drawing sets window; it needs no open nest, since releasing a set makes new nests or merges into draft ones and opens each in its own tab. It is a window of its own beside the main window (in the taskbar, with its own minimize button), not a tab inside it, since the main window's menus and toolbar are for editing nests. There is one at a time: the menu items bring it forward on the tab asked for. It opens maximized the first time, then where and as it was last closed, and closes with the main window. The window has three tabs, Library (File > Drawing Library... opens on it), Sets and Releases (below); File > Releases... is a shortcut that opens the same window on the Releases tab. Beside the Library and Sets tabs is the release panel (below), which builds one release from both. Each tab reads its list when first shown, and Releases re-reads its page each time it is shown again. Sets lists sets a page at a time (OpenNest.Data.DrawingSetBrowseSession): search by name, customer or notes, sort by name, customer, revision or saved time, and Show archived. Selecting a set shows its notes. A double-click or Enter adds the set to the release at one kit (again adds another kit). Below the list are New Set..., Edit..., More ▾ and Add to Release in bold, which adds every selected set (Ctrl- or Shift-click selects several). More ▾, also the list's right-click menu (the menu key or Shift+F10 opens it from the keyboard), holds Add to Release and Edit Set..., then Archive or Restore, History... and Releases... for the selected set, then Import BOM... (below), which needs no selection.

• New Set... and Edit... open the set editor (OpenNest.Data.DrawingSetEditSession): name, customer, notes and the member grid: drawing, material (name, grade, thickness and units in one column, such as "Steel A36 0.25 in"), quantity per set and a note. A cut type column appears only when the set mixes cut types. The editor's left pane browses the library in place, with no second dialog: every active drawing (never filtered to a nest), searched, sorted and paged like the Drawing Library dialog. Select one or several and choose Add to Set, double-click or press Enter to add them at the entered Qty per set. Drawings already in the set are greyed; one picked again is skipped and named, so there is one member per drawing. Quantities are edited in the grid (1 to 100,000) and Remove drops a member. Members stay in the order they were added (and stored in that order); nothing a release makes depends on it, since materials are grouped and sorted and nests list drawings by name, so the editor has no Move Up/Down. Drag the divider to widen the library pane. The note column flags drawings archived in the library (skipped on release unless included) and drawings with no material or thickness (cannot be released until set; double-click to open Edit Drawing).
• Save adds a revision guarded by the revision the set was read at; a 409 is shown and the operator cancels and reloads. A new set's id is allocated before its first save, and a save that fails without a definite answer stays pending: the next Save reads that id and adopts the stored set (saving any later edit as its next revision) instead of creating it twice. Closing with unsaved edits asks first. Editing a saved set, the editor's History... lists the set's revisions (below).
• Archive (after confirming) and Restore add a revision; nothing is deleted. History... (in the set editor, and in the Sets tab's More menu for the selected set) lists revisions newest first with the members of the selected one, shown with their drawings' current library details.

Import BOM to a set (desktop)

Import BOM... (the Sets tab's More ▾ menu; File > Import BOM... in Database mode opens the drawing sets window straight into it) turns a BOM into a new drawing set. It sits in More rather than beside New Set because it is another way to start a set, used once per job, and the Sets tab keeps New Set, Edit and Add to Release as its only buttons; File > Import BOM stays the familiar way in.

1. Choose the BOM (.xlsx, read by BomReader) and the folder of its drawings, the Set name (prefilled from the BOM file name without a trailing " BOM") and an optional Customer, then Read BOM. Rows resolve to drawing files as in File-mode BOM import (BomImportRows). Rows that name the same file with the same material (ignoring case) and thickness are one drawing needing their total quantity, which becomes its quantity per set (BomSetDrawings). Rows with no file name, no drawing file or a quantity below 1, and files that fail to import, are listed greyed and left out. Rows with no material or thickness are kept: the drawing is stored with a blank material and thickness 0, and the set editor's note column leads to Edit Drawing to fix it before Make Nests.
2. Each drawing is matched to the library (OpenNest.Data.DrawingSetImport) by its identity (D4: normalized customer, name, material and grade, exact thickness, units and cut type; the name is the file name without extension, the grade blank, the units the new-nest default and the cut type the one last saved to the library on this PC) and its geometry:
   • an active drawing with the same identity and geometry is used as it is;
   • one active drawing with the same identity and other geometry gets a new revision with the new package, keeping its details, notes and settings;
   • no active match: a new library drawing;
   • several matches, none with this geometry, or a second BOM drawing with the same identity as an earlier one: left out with a reason (add the right drawing in the set editor). Geometry is compared by package hash, then by DrawingPackage.GeometryKey on the matching drawing's current package (see drawing packages), since a file read from another folder records another source path (and drawings stored before entity ids were stable carry random ones). Reading only queries and downloads. Changing the BOM, folder or customer afterwards asks for Read BOM again.
3. Create Set...: when the import would upload drawings or add revisions, a confirmation lists each one first; Cancel stores nothing. On OK they are stored in order (each revision guarded by the revision it was matched against), and then the set editor opens with a new, unsaved set holding every imported drawing at its BOM quantity, named and with the customer as entered and notes naming the BOM file. The set is stored only by the editor's Save; cancelling the editor leaves the confirmed library drawings and no set. A failed write stops the import, names what was already stored and leaves the set unchanged; Read BOM again then reuses those drawings, so importing twice never stores a drawing twice.

Releasing the set (Make Nests in the release panel) then makes the nests, replacing File-mode BOM import's Create Nests for Database mode. In File mode, File > Import BOM... still makes nests directly, unchanged.

In the Drawing Library dialog, right-click a drawing for Used in Sets... (the sets whose current revision contains it) or Add to Set...: choose an active set or New Set, and the set editor opens with the drawing added at the entered quantity for review and Save. Releases... opens the drawing sets window on its Releases tab, filtered to the releases that had the drawing on its own (see below), with Undo Release. In the drawing sets window, Add to Release adds the drawing to the release panel. When the dialog was opened from a nest, Make Nests... reads the drawing's current record and opens the release panel in a dialog of its own with the drawing on its own at the entered quantity; Add Drawings... there adds more library drawings (sets are released from the drawing sets window).

The nest's drawing list has Add Library Drawings to Set... (right-click any drawing; it acts on the whole nest, OpenNest.Data.NestSetMerge). It takes each drawing copied from this server's library once, in list order, with its required quantity (copies of one library drawing are summed). Drawings never saved to the library, linked to another server or with no required quantity are skipped and named; cutoffs are left out. If none remain it says so before anything else. Otherwise choose an active set or New Set (named after the nest, with its customer): the set's current library records are read, drawings the set already lists keep the set's quantity (a released nest carries its multiplier, so copying its quantities back would multiply them again), and members are added at the library's latest revision. Anything kept, skipped, archived in the library or newer there than in the nest is listed first, then the set editor opens for review and Save; nothing is stored before then.

Make Nests: the release panel (desktop)

The release panel (OpenNest.Controls.ReleasePanel) sits beside the Library and Sets tabs and holds one release in progress for both. Adding is a double-click (or Enter) in either list: a set is read with its members' current drawings and listed at one kit; a library drawing is read afresh and listed on its own at the Library tab's Quantity. Adding a set or drawing already listed adds to its quantity instead, so double-clicking a set twice makes it ×2 kits. An archived set or drawing is refused. Each line shows its name, its quantity (edited in place: 1 to 1000 kits of a set, multiplying its quantities, or 1 to 100,000 pieces of a drawing) and kits or pcs; ✕ (or Delete) removes it. A drawing that a set also lists becomes one item with both quantities. Above the lines, the heading reads as a sentence of what is listed, such as "Release set 'Frame kit' ×2", or the first few lines when there are several. Below them are the release's Customer (the one every line names, or left blank when they differ) and Notes. Closing the window keeps a release not yet made for the next time it opens in this run of OpenNest; it is not saved to disk.

Nests it will make previews, live as lines change, one row per material (name, grade, thickness, units and cut type) across all the sets and drawings (OpenNest.Data.SetReleasePlan): a tick, the material, its parts, its Nest and What happens. Untick a group to leave it out; the choice survives changing the lines. Refused groups (two drawings with one name, or drawings without material or thickness) cannot be ticked and say why at once. Fix Drawings... opens Edit Drawing on the selected refused group's drawings, or the first refused group's when another row is selected, and rebuilds the plan with what was saved. Archived members are left out and named below the grid, where Include archived drawings appears to put them back in.

A group merges into a Draft nest by default, which is what Draft status is for: the plan looks up the Draft nests of the group's material, grade and thickness (SetReleasePlan.FindDraftsAsync) and

• with exactly one, merges into it: the row says "→ merges into N26-0007";
• with several, merges into the most recently saved; the Nest list in the row offers the others (newest first) and New Draft nest, and the row says how many match;
• with none, makes a new Draft nest ("→ new Draft nest");
• when the draft it would merge into is open in a tab of this desktop, the row says "N26-0007 is open — save and close it to merge into it" and Make Nests waits: the tab could hold edits the merge would leave behind, and a parallel nest is never made silently. Close the tab (the panel checks again when the window is activated), choose New Draft nest for the group, or untick it.

Make Nests also waits until every chosen group's drafts have been looked up. A merge adds the demand to that draft's drawings and renests the whole draft: every sheet (placements, cutoffs, cut plans) is discarded and rebuilt, keeping drawing-level setup such as cut pins; Undo Release restores it. With Nest after release unticked, the row says the merged draft is left without sheets until it is nested.

Nest after release (beside the button, ticked by default; the panel remembers the operator's last choice) runs Auto Nest on every released group, new or merged, before anything is saved (OpenNest.Engine.Jobs.NestRenest): every drawing's required quantity, the selected engine, sheets from the nest's plate defaults and plate-size options, as the Auto Nest dialog would offer them. A layout is kept only when it is valid; otherwise the nest is saved without sheets and its status says "Auto Nest could not keep a layout: open it and run Auto Nest". The row lists each group's sheets and utilization, and any copies left unplaced, which stay as remaining quantity. Unticked, new nests are saved without sheets and merged drafts are left cleared for Auto Nest.

Ticked, the nesting runs where the operator can watch it. When Make Nests starts, the drawing sets window minimizes and the main window comes forward. Each group's nest opens in its own main-window tab as soon as it is built, before it is saved, and Auto Nest runs on it there with the usual progress window and live plan strip (AutoNestCommand.SolveAsync), one nest at a time in plan order, switching to each tab in turn. The release keeps the layout as headless NestRenest would (only a valid one, with no Keep or validation review). Stop in the progress window (or switching tabs, as for Auto Nest) stops the whole release, as the panel's Stop does: nothing is saved. Until Make Nests finishes the main window's Nest and Plate menus are locked and Save is refused in those tabs, since the release saves them. After saving, each tab is bound to its server record (no second tab opens). A tab whose nest was not saved (a later group refused or failed, or the release stopped before upload) is closed, since it is not part of any release. The main window stays in front with the saved nests, and the drawing sets window keeps the outcomes; its taskbar button flashes when a group failed or was refused or the release was not recorded. A renest that throws still leaves the nest without sheets and a note, and the release goes on.

Make Nests (n), in bold, with n the groups ticked, is the only step that writes; Clear empties the panel. It runs OpenNest.Data.SetReleaseSession: every ticked group's new nest is made as File > New would (the server's next nest name, the saved plate defaults and clamps), in the group's units, with the saved plate size and spacings converted (25.4 mm per inch) when those differ; the nest takes the group's material, grade and thickness, the release's customer when there is one, and the Draft status. A merged draft is saved only while nobody else has saved it since it was listed. Each created or merged nest opens in its own tab of the main window (or keeps the tab it was nested in), bound to its server record, the main window comes forward, and the release (with its notes) is recorded. A release with drawings on their own first checks that the server can record them (see below) and, on an older server, saves nothing and says so. Each row then shows its group's outcome: Created or Merged into with the nest name, Refused or Failed with the reason, or Not started. Stop (Clear while running) during preparing or nesting saves nothing; once saving starts it stops between saves, never during one, and the window does not close while it runs. When every nest was saved but recording failed, the button becomes Try Again and posts the same release again without making the nests again; until then nothing more can be added. After a release, the next double-click starts the next one.

The Releases tab lists every release on the server, newest first, 100 at a time (< Newer / Older >): when, by whom, a Released column naming what each one had ("Frame A ×2, Frame B; Bracket ×4": sets with their quantity past one, then drawings on their own with their quantities), the number of nests, progress such as "2 of 3 cut" (deleted nests are not counted) or "Undone", and the notes. The selected release's nests show their Material, the Action ("Created", "Merged (revision 3 → 4)", and what undo did) and current status, or Deleted. Undo Release... deletes the nests the release created (they can be recovered) and restores the drafts it merged into. When some nests were changed after the release, it lists them and offers to undo the others, leaving those as they are. New Release switches to the Sets tab, where the release panel builds the next release; the list re-reads from the newest when the tab is shown again.

A filter narrows the tab to one set or one drawing, shown above the list ("Releases of set 'Frame A'") until Clear Filter lists every release again:

• Releases... in the Sets tab's More menu filters to the releases that include the selected set, with the set's Revision and the Quantity of this set (and how many other sets and drawings the release had) in place of Released.
• Releases... in the Drawing Library's right-click menu opens the window filtered to the releases that had that drawing on its own, with its Quantity (and how many sets and other drawings the release had).

Nest > Edit (Nest Info) shows, beside its buttons, the newest release that made or merged into a server nest ("Released from set 'Frame A' revision 3 ×2 on 10/20/2026 by ...", "Released from drawing 'Bracket' ×4", or "Merged from sets ..."), with a count of earlier ones. It is read in the background and left blank when the nest came from none or the server cannot be reached.

Drawing set endpoints

A drawing set (schema v7) is a named, versioned list of library drawings with a quantity each: an assembly, a job or a recurring order. Members name drawings by id and always mean each drawing's current revision; there is no per-member revision pin. Sets travel as JSON (application/json, at most 1 MiB). The desktop browses, edits and releases them in File > Drawing Sets (Drawing sets (desktop)).

OpenNest.Data.DrawingSetRecord fields: id (client-allocated before the first save), revision, name, customer, notes, archived, savedBy, the server-computed savedAt and memberCount, and members, in order, each { drawingId, quantity, drawing }. drawing is the member drawing's current library record (archived or not), joined by the server on every read so a client can group members by material without one request per drawing; it is ignored on save, so a record read from the server may be sent back as it is.

Method	Path	Body	Response
POST	/api/sets	JSON set with a nonempty id and members	Revision 1; 409 with the current record when the id exists
GET	/api/sets/query?search=&customer=&includeArchived=&sort=&order=&offset=&limit=	—	{ items, total, offset, limit }; items have memberCount and no members
GET	/api/sets/{id}	—	Current record with joined members (archived sets included), or 404
GET	/api/sets/{id}/revisions?offset=0&limit=100	—	Revision page without members, newest first; limit 1–200
GET	/api/sets/{id}/revisions/{revision}	—	That revision's details and members, each joined to the drawing's current record
PUT	/api/sets/{id}	JSON set (id empty or matching the route)	New revision
POST	/api/sets/{id}/archive / /restore	—	New revision with archived changed and the same members
GET	/api/drawings/{id}/sets?offset=0&limit=100	—	Sets, archived included, whose current revision contains the drawing, by name; 404 for an unknown drawing

• Existing-set writes follow the drawing contract: If-Match 428 missing, 400 malformed, 409 stale with the current record; writing to an archived set, archiving an archived one or restoring an active one is also 409. There is no delete.
• Every change appends an immutable revision, with its own copy of the members, in the transaction that updates the current row. An identical save (name, customer, notes and members in order) at the current revision is a no-op; reordering members is a change.
• Validation (400, no state change): name nonblank; name, customer and savedBy at most 200 characters, notes at most 4000, no NUL characters; members present and not null, at most 500, each with a nonempty drawingId that is in the library (archived drawings allowed), an integer quantity from 1 to 100000, and no drawing listed twice (one member carries the whole quantity). An empty set is allowed.
• Query: search matches name, customer or notes and customer matches by SharedListNames.Key, exactly as for drawings. sort is one of savedAt (default), name, customer, revision; ties break by id. Paging, order and the refusal of unknown, repeated or out-of-range parameters follow the drawing query.

Set releases

A set is never added to a nest, because a nest is one material. It is released: the client makes one nest per material group with every quantity multiplied, uploads each nest, and only then posts a release record naming the set revisions and the nests. A failure part-way leaves ordinary nests and no release, and nothing is rolled back silently.

Since schema v9 a release covers one or more sets (release_sets), and a nest may be one the release created or an existing draft it merged into (release_nests, with the nest revision before and after). The drawing quantities each set added to each nest are kept in release_nest_items, so a set can still be traced once sets share a nest. The v8 → v9 migration turns each v7 release into one set line (its multiplier is the quantity) and created nests at their first revision, with no items. Since schema v11 a release may also name library drawings on their own (release_drawings), with or without sets; their items in release_nest_items have no set.

OpenNest.Data.SetReleaseRecord fields: id (client-allocated, so an ambiguous post can be retried), sets (each { setId, setRevision, quantity, setName }; setName is the set's name at that revision, joined on read), drawings (each { drawingId, quantity, drawingName }, the drawings released on their own; drawingName is the drawing's current library name, joined on read), notes, releasedBy, the server-computed releasedAt, undoneAt and undoneBy, and nests, in order, each { nestId, kind, revisionBefore, revisionAfter, materialName, materialGrade, thickness, units, cutType, items, undo, undoRevision, nest }. kind is created (no revisionBefore) or merged; revisionAfter is the nest revision the release wrote. items are { setId, drawingId, drawingRevision, quantity }. undo and undoRevision are server-computed. An item's setId is null for a drawing released on its own; every other item names one of the release's sets. nest is the nest's current metadata (deleted or not), joined on every read so status and deletion are always current. Joined and server-computed values are ignored on post.

Method	Path	Body	Response
POST	/api/releases	JSON release with a nonempty id	The stored release; 400 for an unknown set or revision; 409 with the release that already holds the id or one of the created nests
GET	/api/releases/query?setId=&nestId=&drawingId=&offset=0&limit=100	—	Release page, newest first, optionally only releases including the set, the nest or the drawing on its own; limit 1–200
GET	/api/releases/{id}	—	The release, or 404
POST	/api/releases/{id}/undo	{ "undoneBy": "...", "skipNests": [...] }	The undone release; 404 for an unknown release; 409 with { reason, release, changedNests }

• Releases are append-only: there is no edit or delete. Undo marks the release undone and records what it did to each nest.
• Set revisions and drawings on their own must exist but need not be current, and sets and drawings may be archived: the nests already exist by the time the release is posted, so it is never refused for a state the operator cannot fix. A merged nest need not still be at revisionAfter when the release is posted.
• A created nest belongs to that release only; a merged nest may be in several.
• Undo runs in one transaction. Each created nest is soft-deleted and each merged nest restored to revisionBefore, except the nests in skipNests (recorded as skipped). Every other nest must still hold revisionAfter: be at it, or have been restored to it as its latest save. Otherwise nothing changes and the 409 lists the changed nests (reason nestsChanged), so the caller can skip them and try again. A second undo is refused with alreadyUndone. Because each undo writes a new nest revision, releases that share a nest are undone newest first.
• Validation (400, no state change): at most 50 sets, no set twice, each quantity 1–1000; drawings (may be left out, as older clients do) at most 500, no drawing twice, each quantity 1–100,000; at least one set or drawing; notes at most 4000 and releasedBy at most 200 characters; nests present, 1–500 entries, no nest twice, each an existing, not deleted nest whose named revisions exist, with material name and grade at most 200 characters, thickness finite and at least 0 (stored rounded to 4 decimals), and kind, units and cutType single enum names; each item names one of the release's sets, or has no set and names one of its drawings on their own, at most once per set (or no set) and drawing, with a positive revision and quantity.
• Compatibility. A v11 server accepts releases from older clients (no drawings). A server older than v11 knows no drawingId parameter and answers 400 for it, so clients probe GET /api/releases/query?drawingId=<any id>&limit=1 before building a release with drawings on their own; a 400 or 404 there means the server is too old, and nothing is saved.

Client and release session

OpenNest.Data.RemoteDrawingSetStore is the client for every route above. It checks DrawingSetRules/SetReleaseRules before sending, raises ServerTooOldException on a server without sets (or, for releases, without /api/releases, and for drawings on their own, without the drawingId query: EnsureDrawingReleasesSupportedAsync), DrawingSetSaveConflictException or SetReleasePostConflictException (carrying the current record) on 409, SetReleaseUndoConflictException (carrying the refusal) when an undo is refused, and refuses replies whose id, revision, members, sets or nests differ from what was sent.

SetReleasePlan.Build(lines, drawings, includeArchived) splits sets read from the server, each with a quantity (SetReleasePlanLine), and library drawings on their own, each with a quantity (SetReleaseDrawingLine), into groups without any I/O; either list may be empty, not both (Build(lines, includeArchived) and Build(set, multiplier, includeArchived) are the sets-only forms). A drawing listed by several sets, or by a set and on its own, becomes one item with the quantities summed and each share kept (Sources; a share with no set is the drawing on its own), using the newest revision it was read with. A drawing listed twice on its own is refused (give it a larger quantity). A group is the items whose drawings share material name and grade (by SharedListNames.Key), thickness (rounded to 4 decimals), units and cut type. The plan's customer is the one every set and drawing on its own names, or blank. A set listed twice is refused (give it a larger quantity instead). Archived drawings are skipped unless included. A group is refused when two of its drawings share a name (compared ordinally, as a nest keys drawings), and every drawing without a material or a positive thickness goes to one refused "unassigned" group, listed last.

SetReleasePlan.FindDraftsAsync(nests, group) lists the Draft nests a group could merge into, using the nest query's status, material, grade and thickness filters. Units and cut type are not in nest metadata, so they are checked on the downloaded nest. The desktop merges into the most recently saved of them by default and never into one open in a tab (release panel).

SetReleaseSession.RunAsync releases the chosen releasable groups in plan order. A group named in its mergeInto map merges into that draft instead of making a new nest. When the plan has drawings on their own it first asks the server whether it can record them (IDrawingSetStore.EnsureDrawingReleasesSupportedAsync): an older server refuses the first group with the reason, a failed check fails it, and nothing is built or saved.

1. Build every group first. For a new nest the caller's factory makes an empty nest in the group's units; the session sets material, grade, thickness, the plan's customer (when there is one) and Draft. For a merge the session downloads the draft at the revision it was chosen at (reading it with the caller's nest reader) and refuses it unless it is still a Draft of the group's material, grade, thickness and units with no drawing for another cut type; then it removes every plate, since a merge renests the whole demand. Either way it downloads each item's exact revision and inserts it through LibraryDrawingInsert (a drawing the draft already holds at that revision gains quantity; another revision is refused, pointing at Update Drawings). When the caller supplies a renest step ("Nest after release"), every group is then nested from scratch; a step that throws leaves the nest without plates and a note, and the release goes on. A refusal or a download failure stops here, so nothing is uploaded. The factory may already have allocated nest numbers.
2. Upload in order under client-allocated ids, never cancelling an upload in flight; cancellation is checked between uploads. A failed upload is checked by its id, so one stored before its reply was lost still counts as created. A merged draft is saved with the revision it was chosen at as If-Match; a failed save counts only when the server holds exactly the bytes sent, and otherwise says whether someone saved the draft meanwhile. The first real failure stops the rest.
3. Post the release only when every chosen group was created or merged, under a client-allocated id. It names every set with its quantity, every drawing on its own with its quantity, each nest as created or merged with the revisions before and after, and the drawing revisions and quantities each set (or no set, for a drawing on its own) put in each nest. When the post fails, the nests stay and RetryReleaseAsync posts the same id again; a 409 naming that id is adopted as the stored release.

The result lists each group's outcome (Created, Refused, Failed, NotStarted), the created or merged nests' records and in-memory Nest objects (so the desktop can open them without downloading), the draft each merged into, what nesting after release did, and the release or why it was not recorded.

RemoteDrawingSetStore.UndoReleaseAsync undoes a release (see above); SetReleaseText.UndoRefusal words a refusal for the operator, naming each changed nest.

Schema v7 adds drawing_set_revisions (every revision's details and archived flag), drawing_set_members (each revision's members by position, unique per drawing), drawing_sets (each set's current revision), set_releases and set_release_nests. Upgrading from v6 only creates these tables; every other table is untouched. A server older than v7 refuses to open a v7 database, so rolling back needs the pre-upgrade backup. The stopped-volume tar backup includes the set and release tables; nest_manifest.py and restore_check do not verify them yet.

Schema v8 adds a materialGrade text column (default blank) to nests and nest_revisions; existing records keep a blank grade until they are next saved. A server older than v8 refuses to open a v8 database, so rolling back needs the pre-upgrade backup.

Material list endpoints

The server keeps the company material list: each material with its grades. Both are keyed by SharedListNames.Key, so names that differ only in case or spacing are the same entry, and an entry keeps the spelling it was first added with (trimmed, internal spaces collapsed). Nests, drawings and releases keep their own free-text material and grade. The list only suggests names and records the company spelling; it does not check or rewrite stored records. A grade belongs to one material, and the same grade name may be listed under several materials. Wire types are OpenNest.Data.MaterialListEntry and MaterialListAddition.

Method	Path	Body	Response
GET	/api/materials	—	[{ "name", "grades": [...] }], materials and grades in case-insensitive name order
POST	/api/materials	{ "name": "...", "grade": "..." } (grade optional)	The material as listed: 201 when the material or grade was added, 200 when both were already listed

Validation (400, no state change, MaterialListRules): a JSON object with no other properties; name not blank; name and grade at most 200 characters with no NUL characters.

Schema v10 adds empty materials and material_grades tables. Existing records are not read into the list; fill it through POST /api/materials. No other table changes. A server older than v10 refuses to open a v10 database, so rolling back needs the pre-upgrade backup.

Schema v11 adds release_drawings (each release's drawings on their own, by position, unique per drawing) and rebuilds release_nest_items with a nullable setId, copying every row (SQLite cannot drop NOT NULL from a column). No other table changes. A server older than v11 refuses to open a v11 database, so rolling back needs the pre-upgrade backup.

Shared settings endpoints

/api/settings holds the machines, post settings, clamp settings and nest defaults every workstation shares in Database mode; see shared settings for the endpoints and how the desktop uses them. Schema v13 adds the empty shared_settings and shared_setting_revisions tables; no other table changes. A server older than v13 refuses to open a v13 database, so rolling back needs the pre-upgrade backup.

Storage

OpenNest.Server.NestDatabase uses SQLite (Microsoft.Data.Sqlite) with journal_mode=WAL. Each row holds the metadata columns plus the .nest archive as a BLOB. The database file path comes from --database=<path> or --database <path>, then OPENNEST_DB, defaulting to ./data/nests.db; a --database without a path, or given twice, fails startup. The server opens the database at startup, so an unusable path fails startup rather than the first request.

Run one service instance with its database on a local filesystem. Multiple PCs may use that instance, but do not share the SQLite file between replicas or place it on SMB/NFS storage. A private reentrant lock serializes complete database operations (including readers, write readbacks, health checks, and disposal); HTTP upload/body reading happens outside that lock. /healthz executes SELECT 1 on the live connection; it is a connection check, not a backup, integrity scan, or guarantee of future disk capacity.

Revision preconditions refuse stale edits; the database monitor is not a document edit lock. After a conflict, explicitly reload the newer revision or Save As a separate nest. After an ambiguous update failure, reload the current version before another save. For an ambiguous first upload (including Save As or a server switch), OpenNest keeps the client-generated pending ID and blocks another upload. The next Save checks that exact ID on the original server without writing: if it exists with the exact attempted archive and metadata, the document binds to its revision; if it is absent, another explicit Save (or Save As for a pending copy) may retry with the same ID. If it differs, reopen the server record to review it; do not discard the pending identity or blindly create another record. Older servers remain read-only for existing nests until upgraded.

Server integration tests

dotnet test OpenNest.Server.Tests/OpenNest.Server.Tests.csproj

Cross-platform; runs in both CI workflows. Each test hosts the production routes in memory (WebApplicationFactory) against its own temporary SQLite file and drives them through the real RemoteNestRepository and NestSaveSession: create, list, download, same-record update, copy, metadata-only update (archive and fileSize unchanged), and delete. Missing/invalid upload parts must return 400 and unknown ids 404, both leaving every stored record and archive hash unchanged. Tests never open data/nests.db or OPENNEST_DB; the temporary directory is removed when the host is disposed. Concurrent HTTP clients and database-level readers/writers must retain exact record membership, metadata, and archive bytes; a monitor-ownership test checks every operation without relying on stress timing. Health tests check the unchanged success response and a detail-free 503 after the database is disposed. The container smoke remains the image-level check.

Running

Locally:

dotnet run --project OpenNest.Server/OpenNest.Server.csproj

Listens on ASPNETCORE_URLS (default Kestrel ports) unless overridden.

Docker image

Docker must be built from the repository root: the server references OpenNest.Data, which references OpenNest.Core. The Dockerfile copies all three project files before restore and their source/resources before publish, including Data's embedded Defaults/CL-980.json. The allowlist .dockerignore excludes other projects, host bin/obj, local databases, environment files, and launch settings. The server image uses the .NET 8 SDK to build and the .NET 8 ASP.NET runtime to run; IO/Engine are used only by the host-side smoke tool, not the image.

docker build --pull -f OpenNest.Server/Dockerfile -t opennest-server:local .
# A release build stamps its version and exact source commit:
docker build --pull -f OpenNest.Server/Dockerfile --build-arg VERSION=X.Y.Z \
  --build-arg SOURCE_REVISION="$(git rev-parse HEAD)" -t opennest-server:X.Y.Z .

Without build arguments the image is labeled version 0.0.0-dev, revision unknown: a development build, never a release. The OCI labels are org.opencontainers.image.source, version, revision and base.name. SDK_IMAGE/RUNTIME_IMAGE build arguments accept digest-pinned base images; for a release, record the base digests the build log resolved.

Runtime contract:

• Container port 8090 (ASPNETCORE_URLS=http://+:8090). Change the host port mapping, not the container port: the healthcheck probes 8090.
• Runs as the .NET base image's non-root app user (UID/GID 1654). Application files are root-owned and read-only to it; within /app only /app/data is writable, and a fresh named volume inherits that directory's ownership. The database stays OPENNEST_DB=/app/data/nests.db. The server also needs the container's writable /tmp: multipart uploads over 64 KiB are buffered there.
• HEALTHCHECK runs curl --fail http://127.0.0.1:8090/healthz (interval 30 s, timeout 5 s, start period 10 s, retries 3, and a 2 s start interval during the start period on Docker 25+). curl is in the image only for it.
• A read-only or unwritable data location fails startup: the process exits rather than serving requests it cannot store.
• Uploads: Kestrel's default 30,000,000-byte request limit covers the whole multipart request, so an archive must be slightly smaller (the smoke stores a 29,000,000-byte one). A larger request gets 413 and nothing is stored. The desktop client streams without Expect: 100-continue, so it typically reports a closed connection instead of the 413 status. The save still fails.

Data written by a root-run image or a root-owned bind mount is not writable by UID 1654, so startup fails. With the operator's approval, change ownership of that data location only, once, for example docker run --rm --user 0 --entrypoint chown -v <volume>:/app/data <image> -R 1654:1654 /app/data (or chown -R 1654:1654 on the bind-mounted directory itself, never its parents). The image has no root entrypoint that changes ownership.

Deploying with Compose

compose.server.yaml runs a published image (no local build) with no-new-privileges, all capabilities dropped, and a named data volume. Copy it and OpenNest.Server/server.env.example to a deployment directory, save the env file under a local name such as server.env, and set:

• OPENNEST_SERVER_IMAGE: ghcr.io/ajisaacs/opennest-server:X.Y.Z or, preferably, ghcr.io/ajisaacs/opennest-server@sha256:<verified-manifest-digest> from the successful clean pulled-image verification job. Do not substitute Docker's store-dependent image Id or the config blob digest for this verified registry manifest digest; see server image releases.
• OPENNEST_BIND_ADDRESS: 127.0.0.1 for testing on the host; this host's trusted LAN address for shop PCs. Do not use 0.0.0.0. The bind address is only one layer: verify that the network/firewall admits only trusted clients.
• OPENNEST_HOST_PORT (default 8090) and OPENNEST_DATA_VOLUME (default opennest-data).

Publication requires an existing verified private package; first-package initialization needs separate owner authorization outside the release workflow. An authorized deployment operator must obtain a read:packages token out of band and log in on the deployment host using docker login ghcr.io -u <github-user> --password-stdin, piping the token from a secret manager or a protected prompt (never a token literal in shell history). Keep Docker's credentials protected on that host; do not put credentials in server.env, Compose, the image, or source control. Login/pull success does not authorize making the package public. Until an approved image has passed the published-digest smoke, the reference below is only a template, not an available verified image.

compose="docker compose --env-file server.env -f compose.server.yaml"
$compose pull || { printf 'STOP: image pull failed\n' >&2; exit 1; }
$compose up -d
$compose ps                                       # STATUS shows (healthy)
curl --fail http://<bind-address>:<port>/healthz  # {"status":"ok"}

In the desktop app choose File > Storage Mode..., Database, and enter the base URL http://<bind-address>:<port>, without /healthz or /api/nests. To set or change just the saved server address without changing File/Database mode, use Tools > Options > Nest server URL > Set / Change Server. This saves the URL immediately, independently of the Options Save button; it does not migrate nests or enable Database mode. Canceling Options afterward does not undo that address.

Redeploying a development build

Until a verified image is published, scripts/Deploy-Server.ps1 redeploys a development build of this checkout to a host's Compose stack over SSH, using the local Docker engine (no build on the host, no registry):

powershell -ExecutionPolicy Bypass -File scripts/Deploy-Server.ps1 `
    -DeployHost <host> -StackDir ~/docker/opennest `
    -LocalComposeFile <config-repo>\opennest\compose.yml

It builds opennest-server:<yyyyMMdd>-<short sha> (-dirty and a warning when OpenNest.Server, OpenNest.Data or OpenNest.Core have uncommitted changes; VERSION stays 0.0.0-dev, SOURCE_REVISION is the full commit), copies it with docker save/scp/docker load, stops the container, tars the data volume to <BackupRoot>/opennest-<tag>/backup/ with the previous compose.yml, rewrites the stack's image: opennest-server:<tag> line, starts the stack and waits for healthy. The stack's compose.yml must name the image literally on that line, not through a variable as compose.server.yaml does. -LocalComposeFile updates a config repository's copy, uncommitted. Host, user and paths are parameters so no private address is in source; -SkipBackup and -NoPull are available but the backup is the only way back across a schema upgrade.

Build from a pushed commit (a clean worktree is simplest) so the running image can be traced. When the build raises the schema version, first run the new image in a throwaway loopback container on a snapshot of the live database and check user_version, integrity and record counts. To roll back, stop the stack, restore the tarball into the volume and set the printed previous tag: an older server refuses a newer schema.

Backup, restore, and upgrade

SQLite runs in WAL mode, so copying nests.db from a running service is not a backup. Back up during a maintenance period with ALL client writes disabled, including metadata edits, delete, recover and restore, until capture finishes. The HTTP manifest is not a transaction across requests; writes during capture can invalidate it. Keep the entire stopped data directory, including any WAL/SHM files, original image digest and deployment configuration. Copy scripts/Server.Tests/nest_manifest.py from this source version to the deployment directory as nest_manifest.py (Python 3 standard library only). It enumerates bounded active AND deleted pages plus ALL revision pages, then streams every current/historical archive through SHA-256. Canonical JSON includes complete metadata, IDs, current pointers, visibility, timestamps, byte sizes and restore source relationships. Missing pages, legacy endpoints, failed downloads, inconsistent totals and invalid revision chains fail closed, not as empty history. Protect manifests like the database: they contain names and comments. Each step below is a Bash function that checks every command and stops at the first failure, however it is called; define them in the shell where compose is set:

url=http://<bind-address>:<port>

# Canonical complete manifest; stdout is emitted only after all reads succeed.
nest_manifest() (
  python3 ./nest_manifest.py "$1" || exit 1
)

# Records the expected manifest and metadata, then archives the stopped data directory.
# The service is restarted even if the archive fails.
backup_nests() (  # usage: backup_nests opennest-data-YYYY-MM-DD
  set -o pipefail
  fail() { echo "STOP: $*" >&2; exit 1; }
  for suffix in tar manifest metadata.json; do
    [[ ! -e "$1.$suffix" ]] || fail "$1.$suffix already exists"
  done
  nest_manifest "$url" > "$1.manifest" || fail "could not record the manifest"
  curl -fsS "$url/api/nests" > "$1.metadata.json" || fail "could not record the metadata"
  $compose stop || fail "could not stop the service"
  $compose run --rm --no-deps -T --entrypoint tar opennest-server -C /app/data -cf - . > "$1.tar"
  status=$?
  $compose start || fail "could not restart the service"
  curl -fs --retry 30 --retry-all-errors --retry-delay 1 "$url/healthz" > /dev/null \
    || fail "the restarted service is not healthy"
  [[ $status == 0 ]] || fail "the archive failed; $1.tar is incomplete"
  echo "Backed up all records and revisions to $1.tar"
)

backup_nests opennest-data-YYYY-MM-DD

Restore only into a volume created for that restore, never into an existing one (least of all the active volume). restore_check refuses an existing volume, extracts the backup into a new one, starts a temporary loopback-only container on it, and requires complete active/deleted revision metadata and archive hashes to match. It removes only the container it started; the new volume is kept either way:

restore_check() (  # usage: restore_check opennest-data-YYYY-MM-DD <image> [new-volume]
  set -o pipefail
  fail() { echo "STOP: $*" >&2; exit 1; }
  [[ -r "$1.tar" && -r "$1.manifest" && -r "$1.metadata.json" ]] || fail "backup is incomplete"
  restore=${3:-opennest-data-restore-$(date +%Y%m%d-%H%M%S)}
  existing=$(docker volume ls --format '{{.Name}}') || fail "could not inspect Docker volumes"
  while IFS= read -r volume; do
    [[ "$volume" != "$restore" ]] || fail "volume $restore already exists"
  done <<< "$existing"
  owner=$(python3 -c 'import secrets; print(secrets.token_hex(16))') || fail "could not create ownership token"
  docker volume create --label "com.opennest.restore.owner=$owner" "$restore" > /dev/null \
    || fail "could not create volume $restore"
  [[ $(docker volume inspect --format '{{index .Labels "com.opennest.restore.owner"}}' "$restore") == "$owner" ]] \
    || fail "restore volume ownership differs"
  echo "Restoring into new volume $restore"
  docker run --rm -i --network none --entrypoint tar -v "$restore:/app/data" "$2" \
    -C /app/data -xf - < "$1.tar" || fail "extraction into $restore failed"
  check=$(docker create --cap-drop ALL --security-opt no-new-privileges:true \
    -p 127.0.0.1::8090 -v "$restore:/app/data" "$2") \
    || fail "could not create the check container"
  trap 'docker rm -f "$check" > /dev/null' EXIT
  docker start "$check" > /dev/null || fail "the check container did not start"
  port=$(docker port "$check" 8090/tcp | cut -d: -f2) && [[ -n $port ]] || fail "no check port"
  curl -fs --retry 30 --retry-all-errors --retry-delay 1 "http://127.0.0.1:$port/healthz" > /dev/null \
    || fail "the restored service is not healthy"
  curl -fsS "http://127.0.0.1:$port/api/nests" | cmp - "$1.metadata.json" || fail "metadata differs"
  nest_manifest "http://127.0.0.1:$port" | diff - "$1.manifest" || fail "archives differ"
  echo "Verified $restore. Keep it isolated until the operator explicitly approves switching volumes."
)

restore_check opennest-data-YYYY-MM-DD <image>

Switch only after restore_check prints Verified. If it stops, inspect or remove the new volume it named; the active volume is untouched.

To upgrade, take a stopped-service backup and keep a copy of the current server.env. Prefer a digest in OPENNEST_SERVER_IMAGE so that file records exactly what ran; for a tag, record docker image inspect --format '{{join .RepoDigests " "}}' <image> first. Change only OPENNEST_SERVER_IMAGE after migration/restore rehearsal on a disposable copy, then run $compose up -d only with separate deployment authorization. Never run an old image against a migrated database, even if its current-table GETs still work: old writers can overwrite snapshots or physically delete rows without updating history. Rollback requires a NEW volume restored from the verified PRE-migration backup and the exact old image/configuration. Test its old current metadata/byte manifest on that isolated copy before switching; the revision-aware manifest deliberately refuses old endpoints. Archive the migrated volume unchanged for recovery; reverting loses post-backup changes from the old server's view, so reconcile them deliberately, never replay them automatically. A pre-version server backup needs its own current-record metadata/byte oracle before migration; verify those records become byte-identical revision 1 on the disposable upgraded copy. Never run docker compose down -v: it deletes the data volume.

Capacity and retention

Every revision currently stores a full archive BLOB, including metadata-only and visibility revisions. Budget approximately the sum of ALL revision archive sizes plus current-table archives, SQLite indexes/pages, WAL and backups; do not estimate capacity from active current records alone. Measure volume/database and WAL growth during the disposable rehearsal, reserve space for migration and a separate verified restore copy, and monitor free space before rollout. There is no automatic retention or purge; no revision deletion is authorized. Deduplication requires a separately reviewed migration after measuring actual growth. An old backup is not a substitute for retaining the migrated volume during rollback.

Isolated container smoke

Prerequisites: a local Linux Docker daemon on the default Unix-socket context, Bash, Python 3, curl, GNU timeout, mktemp, tar, cmp, and a .NET SDK able to build net8.0 projects (.NET 8 or newer). Restore needs NuGet access or cached packages. Run from the repository root after building the image:

scripts/Test-ServerContainer.sh --image opennest-server:local
# Optional durable logs outside the default ignored .hermes/progress directory:
scripts/Test-ServerContainer.sh --image opennest-server:local --results /path/to/results

Manifest refusal tests run without Docker. The optional image variables also exercise the Bash backup/restore blocks extracted verbatim from this page in a unique disposable Compose project, including existing-file/volume refusal and tampered-history rejection. The old image test restores ONLY a synthetic pre-migration backup to another fresh volume and compares every old record's metadata/bytes; it never mounts a migrated database into the old image.

python3 -m unittest discover -s scripts/Server.Tests -p test_revision_backup.py -v
OPENNEST_TEST_IMAGE=opennest-server:local \
OPENNEST_TEST_OLD_IMAGE=<local-pre-version-image> \
  python3 -m unittest discover -s scripts/Server.Tests -p test_revision_backup.py -v

Local smoke evidence does not imply registry publication or production deployment.

The wrapper accepts an image, not a URL or an existing volume/container. It uses only the local default Docker context, creates uniquely labeled disposable resources, and publishes to 127.0.0.1 on a Docker-allocated port. Every container runs with the Compose example's --cap-drop ALL and no-new-privileges. It builds the smoke tool once into a private temporary directory, honoring TMPDIR; readiness, HTTP requests, and child commands have watchdogs.

Before starting a container it checks the image's numeric non-root USER, the documented HEALTHCHECK command and timings (including the start interval), and the OCI source/version/revision labels. A service is ready only when Docker reports the image's own healthcheck healthy and the host receives {"status":"ok"}. Each service then checks that the server process (PID 1) runs as the image user with no effective capabilities, owns nests.db, and can write /app/data but not /app or the server DLL.

The test-only scripts/Server.Tests/Server.Tests.csproj console exercises the existing .NET storage client; it is not included in the server image.

Before seeding, the wrapper restores two synthetic legacy-schema rows into its fresh volume, verifies byte-identical revision-1 migration against a precomputed complete metadata/hash oracle, then checks repeated startup preserves history. The synthetic fixture is generated in code: one plate and one rectangular part, with no customer files. seed uses the actual RemoteNestRepository and NestSaveSession to create, update the same ID, and save a copy with a new ID. It also creates metadata-only, historical-restore, delete/recover/delete revisions, leaving a six-revision hidden record with a restore-source relationship. It checks read-back metadata, session binding, exact list membership, raw camelCase/string-enum JSON, identical downloaded bytes, and NestReader geometry and counts. reject snapshots every record's metadata and archive hash, then checks 400 responses for missing/invalid/null metadata and missing/empty files on both upload and file-update routes; unknown metadata/file IDs must return 404. Every rejected operation must leave the snapshot unchanged. limits stores, downloads byte-for-byte, and soft-deletes a 29,000,000-byte synthetic archive (buffered to disk by the non-root runtime), then requires 413 for a request over 30,000,000 bytes sent with Expect: 100-continue, and a reported failure from the real client's oversized upload and file update. The snapshot must be unchanged after each.

The persistence stage stops and removes the first container while retaining its fresh named volume, starts a replacement on another allocated loopback port, and runs verify against saved IDs, all metadata (including server-assigned savedAt), archive hashes, and exact list membership. It then follows the documented stopped-service backup: tar of the whole data directory through the image, restored into a second owned volume whose service must pass the same verify. The Python manifest is captured after all mutations and compared exactly after restart and volume restore, with page size 1 to exercise every pagination boundary. It covers active and deleted current records and ALL revisions, not just the ordinary /api/nests enumeration; the large soft-deleted archive remains included. The original volume mounted read-only, and a root-owned tmpfs, must each make the server exit nonzero at startup with a SQLite error and never report healthy.

A missing/invalid state file or failed assertion exits nonzero. Direct tool use is test-only: it accepts plain loopback URLs, and seed refuses a nonempty server unless --test-allow-nonempty is explicitly supplied for an owned disposable target. Prefer the wrapper; loopback alone is not proof that an existing server is disposable.

Each invocation writes a fresh run.* results directory containing build, smoke, container, image, runtime, ownership, and cleanup logs. On failure those logs remain for diagnosis. The exit trap removes only invocation-owned containers and named volumes; transient state, the backup archive, synthetic databases, and build artifacts are removed on success or failure. It never prunes Docker or alters preexisting services/volumes. Cleanup requires successful empty Docker inventory readback, including for an already-removed container. Unresolved ownership, lookup, removal, or readback errors make the wrapper fail without deleting unproven resources; inspect cleanup.log and outcome.log for diagnostics. An original smoke failure is preserved even if cleanup also fails.

The focused cleanup regression needs only Python 3 and Bash:

python3 -m unittest discover -s scripts -p test_server_container_cleanup.py -v

It executes the wrapper's actual cleanup functions with explicitly mocked Docker transport, including timeouts and missing cidfiles; it does not replace the real container smoke or contact a daemon.