Authored by Claude Opus 4.7 (Claude Code). Session continuation from cloud-deployment-trial sprint.

FAIR-band: under-target [15/30] — operator-direction (focus on local-dev embedding-server lifecycle gap that blocked add_memory). Mirror-pattern shape (no novel architecture); narrow surface across 4 source files + 2 spec files.

Evidence: L1 (45/45 PASS across direct-impact tree: daemon.spec.mjs + Orchestrator.spec.mjs + TaskDefinitions.invariants.spec.mjs). L3 post-merge for AC8 (operator-confirms-restart-cycle). Residual: AC5 model-load probe [#11986 — partial-resolution; AC5 stays open as L-deferred].

Refs #11986 (partial-resolution; AC5 + Contract Ledger row 4 deferred — see Deltas)

Summary

Restore LM Studio CLI (lms) auto-boot as an orchestrator-managed task. Mirror of the existing mlx_lm.server task shape (#11075 / PR #11957) for the parallel macOS-only local-embedding-server lane.

Regression chain: #9833 (closed 2026-04-09, commit 0a3812c4c) originally shipped LM Studio auto-boot in ai/services/memory-core/lifecycle/InferenceLifecycleService.mjs::startInferenceServer(). PR #11096 closing #11093 ("Centralize daemon supervision", commit 7e596385e) gutted the MC-side spawn but never landed the orchestrator-side counterpart. InferenceLifecycleService::startInferenceServer() now just warns "AgentOrchestrator should be managing it" and returns {status: 'offline'} — and the orchestrator had no lms task. Net effect: nobody restarted lms server when it died.

Empirical anchor: 2026-05-25 today — embedding endpoint at 127.0.0.1:1234 went silent at 13:00:50Z (per orchestrator.log:45546), 46min after the last successful kbSync at 12:14:27Z. Stayed dark until operator manually re-ran lms server start. Multiple downstream failures cascaded: add_memory, ask_knowledge_base, KB sync periodic-sync exiting code 1, dream task hitting the same endpoint.

Architectural shape

Parallel-alternative to orchestrator.mlx:

Both lanes serve OpenAI-compatible HTTP for local embedding workloads. Operators pick one via the respective enabled flag; both enabled simultaneously is allowed but unusual (different ports, operator chooses which one openAiCompatible.host resolves to).

Changes

Source files

• ai/config.template.mjs (+27 / -0 after cycle-2 JSDoc tighten) — added orchestrator.lms namespace. JSDoc explicitly calls out the macOS-only scope, parallel-alternative-to-mlx relationship, AND the AC5-deferred state of the model field (server-up ≠ model-loaded; ensuring model is loaded is tracked as #11986 AC5 residual).
• ai/daemons/orchestrator/daemon.mjs (+36 / -0) — added resolveLmsConfig({orchestratorConfig, env}) helper. Exact mirror of resolveMlxConfig shape: reads env-vars NEO_ORCHESTRATOR_LMS_{ENABLED,MODEL,PORT} with Env.parseBool canonical boolean parsing; falls back to AiConfig.orchestrator.lms. startOrchestrator() invokes both helpers and passes lmsEnabled/lmsModel/lmsPort through to Orchestrator.start().
• ai/daemons/orchestrator/TaskDefinitions.mjs (+22 / -9) — buildTaskDefinitions accepts lmsEnabled / lmsModel / lmsPort params. Conditional task emission: tasks.lms = {command: 'lms', args: ['server', 'start', '--port', String(lmsPort)], pidFileName: 'lms.pid', expectedCommand: 'lms server'}. lms binary resolves via PATH (operator's .zshenv exports PATH=$PATH:/Users/tobiasuhlig/.lmstudio/bin), exact mirror of how chroma task resolves. Note: lmsModel is plumbed through but currently informational only (passed via the JSDoc-documented lms task but not consumed by a model-load step) — see #11986 AC5 residual.
• ai/daemons/orchestrator/Orchestrator.mjs (+7 / -1) — start() accepts lmsEnabled / lmsModel / lmsPort; passes through to buildTaskDefinitions.

Tests

• test/playwright/unit/ai/daemons/orchestrator/daemon.spec.mjs (+119 / -0) — 4 new tests mirroring the MLX pattern: pure-function-no-env-leak, concrete-values-flow-through, resolveLmsConfig env-precedence (4 sub-cases), AiConfig canonical defaults regex assertion.
• test/playwright/unit/ai/daemons/orchestrator/Orchestrator.spec.mjs (+16 / -0) — 1 new test mirroring the MLX pass-through coverage: lmsEnabled / lmsModel / lmsPort flow into task definitions correctly.

Deltas from ticket — partial-resolution framing

This PR ships AC1–AC4 + AC6 + AC7 of #11986. AC5 + Contract Ledger row 4 (Orchestrator-side model-load probe) explicitly deferred — #11986 stays OPEN.

Cycle-1 reviewer (@neo-gpt) correctly flagged that the original Resolves #11986 close-target compressed server-up and model-ready into the same delivered state. Substantive content unchanged; close-target reshaped to Refs #11986 so the ticket stays open for AC5 follow-up rather than auto-closing on merge.

AC5 deferral rationale (preserved from cycle-1 body): the model-load probe (lms load <model> if absent in /v1/models) requires either a new postSpawnProbe hook in ProcessSupervisor or a wrapper script chaining lms server start && lms load <model>. Both shapes are additive substrate beyond the load-bearing lifecycle restoration. Server-lifecycle restoration is the load-bearing AC for unblocking the regression; LM Studio remembers the last-loaded model across restarts in practice, so the model-load probe is an additional safety net for cold-boot scenarios.

Cycle-2 changes:

• Close-target: Resolves #11986 → Refs #11986
• ai/config.template.mjs JSDoc on orchestrator.lms.model: tightened from "model identifier loaded into LM Studio" → "model identifier the operator intends LM Studio to serve... ensuring this model is loaded... is tracked as #11986 AC5 residual and is NOT performed by this lane today."
• This PR-body updated: Refs framing, Deltas restated, Evidence line surfaces the AC5 residual explicitly

Test Evidence

npm run test-unit -- test/playwright/unit/ai/daemons/orchestrator/daemon.spec.mjs \
                     test/playwright/unit/ai/daemons/orchestrator/Orchestrator.spec.mjs \
                     test/playwright/unit/ai/daemons/orchestrator/TaskDefinitions.invariants.spec.mjs

→ 45/45 PASS (1.1s) at cycle-2 head f611ee0a8.

Two pre-existing DreamService.spec.mjs failures observed in the broader orchestrator test tree — verified unrelated to this diff by running on clean origin/dev (same 2 failures, same line numbers).

Post-Merge Validation

• Operator confirms enabling NEO_ORCHESTRATOR_LMS_ENABLED=true (or AiConfig.orchestrator.lms.enabled: true in overlay) causes the orchestrator to spawn lms server start --port 1234 on next restart
• Kill the lms process manually and confirm ProcessSupervisor restarts it (the load-bearing AC for the regression fix)
• After restart, confirm add_memory round-trips end-to-end (canonical smoke test for the embedding pipeline)
• Confirm orchestrator-state.json shows lms task entry with lastSuccessAt populated
• #11986 AC5 follow-up tracked in the still-open ticket; not part of this PR's validation surface

Avoided Traps

• ✓ Did NOT put the lifecycle back into InferenceLifecycleService — that's MC substrate; daemon supervision lives in the Orchestrator per the #11093 architecture. Re-gutting MC would re-introduce the boundary violation.
• ✓ Did NOT bundle a healthcheck active embedding-endpoint probe — separate concern (MC HealthService observability honesty), separate ticket.
• ✓ Did NOT replace tasks.mlx with tasks.lms — parallel namespaces, not mutually exclusive.
• ✓ Did NOT reinvent the HTTP probe — preserved InferenceLifecycleService::isInferenceRunning() as the canonical /v1/models probe shape for future AC5 model-load probe work.
• ✓ Did NOT compress AC5 into this PR's scope while shipping Resolves #11986 — cycle-2 corrected the close-target framing to Refs so the ticket stays open for AC5 follow-up.

Authority

#11986 was filed by me 2026-05-25 in the same turn the operator surfaced the gap. Self-assigned; implementation in same turn per swarm-topology-anchor §AND-discipline. Operator green-lit the implementation explicitly after confirming the parallel-alternative-to-mlx framing. Cycle-2 close-target reshape per @neo-gpt's cycle-1 substantive review (PRR commentId in conversation thread).

Origin Session ID: 8f1a91ee-3ee4-4e4b-9865-b5810f6be353

Authored by [Claude Opus 4.7] (Claude Code) — Session continuation from cloud-deployment-trial sprint.

Commits

• eb320abd4 — feat(orchestrator): supervise lms server lifecycle as orchestrator task (#11986)
• f611ee0a8 — fix(orchestrator): clarify lms.model JSDoc — flag AC5 residual (#11986)