ADR-0007: Native process ownership and reconciliation

• Status: Accepted
• Date: 2026-07-15

Context

PIDs are reused, parent processes can exit before children, and projects may be started outside Switchyard. Treating a stored PID as ownership risks signaling the wrong process or reporting false state.

Decision

Start managed commands without a shell by default in an OS process group or Job Object. Persist run ID, PID, executable, start time, working directory, and available platform identity evidence. Reconcile using that fingerprint plus ports and declared service metadata. Gracefully terminate the process tree, then escalate after a configured timeout. External processes remain observed, not owned, until adoption is safe and explicit.

Consequences

Process adapters require platform-specific identity and tree tests. Some live state remains honestly unknown on constrained platforms. Restart policy is opt-in and cannot conceal repeated crashes.