# Plugin help runs binaries the run policy denies

- **Status**: Done
- **Kind**: Bug
- **Authors**: jp
- **Date**: 2026-09-28
- **Implements**: 072
- **Label**: client=cli
- **Label**: domain=plugins
- **Label**: package=jp_cli
- **Label**: type=bug

`jp -h` and `jp <plugin> -h` execute plugin binaries without checking
`plugins.command.<name>.run`, a pinned checksum, or `$PATH` approval.

## Why

- `print_plugin_help_section` (`crates/jp_cli/src/lib.rs`) calls
  `describe_plugin` on every `jp-*` binary `discover_plugins` finds.
- `describe_plugin` (`crates/jp_cli/src/cmd/plugin/dispatch.rs`) spawns the
  binary directly.
- `run_external` answers a bare `jp <plugin> --help` through `show_plugin_help`
  before `resolve_plugin_binary` runs, where the policy, checksum, and approval
  checks live.

RFD 077 says the `run` policy applies at every execution point, and RFD 072 now
states that admission precedes every spawn, `describe` included.

## Scope

Any `jp-*` executable on `$PATH` plus `jp -h`.
A binary set to `run = "deny"`, or an unapproved `ask` binary, executes, and the
user sees only a help listing: it can do anything before it reads its first
protocol message.

## Fix

- Root help: describe only admitted plugins; list any other by its file name
  without running it.
  No prompts from root help.
- `jp <plugin> -h`: go through `resolve_plugin_binary` first, prompting where
  the policy is `ask`.

## Verifying

- A `jp-*` test binary that writes a marker file when run, with `run = "deny"`:
  `jp -h` lists it and the marker is absent.
- The same binary under `ask` with no approval: `jp <plugin> -h`
  non-interactively fails with the approval error and the marker is absent.

## Comments

-----

- **From**: jp
- **Date**: 2026-09-28T20:16:24Z

Partly fixed by RFD 072 Phase 5 (manifest routing):

- `jp -h` now reads plugin manifests from the binaries and spawns nothing
  (`cmd/plugin/help.rs`).
- `jp <plugin> -h` routes first and runs the same admission as a normal run
  (`admit` in `dispatch.rs`: deny, pinned checksum, `$PATH` run policy) before
  sending `describe`.

Left for RFD 072 Phase 6: the admission order RFD 077 now describes (`ask`
default for every plugin, registry-checksum vouching), and the marker-file tests
under "Verifying" — no test yet proves an unapproved binary is not executed by
`jp <plugin> -h`.

-----

- **From**: jp
- **Date**: 2026-09-28T21:03:39Z

Fixed by RFD 072 Phase 6.

- `jp -h` reads manifests from the binaries (and, for a binary without one, what
  its approval recorded) and spawns nothing, whatever the `run` policy says.
- `jp <plugin> -h` goes through admission (`admission::admit`, in RFD 077's
  order: deny, pinned checksum, `allow`, then registry checksum or approval
  under `ask`) before `describe` is sent.

`dispatch::tests::plugin_help_does_not_run_an_unapproved_binary` is the
"Verifying" check: a script that writes a marker when run, invoked as `jp titles
-h` without a terminal, is refused with the approval error and the marker is
absent; once approved, it answers.
The test fails if `describe` is moved ahead of admission.