Muse agents operate inside containerized environments managed by MetaAIVM / Hatch. A common failure mode observed across the fleet was agent dormancy and lack of autonomous drive:
1.**Empty `HEARTBEAT.md`**: Default template is 113 bytes of comments with no checklist items. Because the platform states *"an empty checklist means nothing runs"*, background loops and periodic checks never fired.
2.**Unconfigured `PROACTIVE_PREFERENCES.md`**: Blank sections prevent the agent from autonomously initiating check-ins or unprompted actions.
3.**Passive Stock `SOUL.md`**: Default consumer template (*"Be a guest in someone's life"*) lacked operator-level directives, self-healing reflexes, or instructions to remain alive and monitor tunnels.
4.**Unconfigured `USER.md` / `TOOLS.md`**: Left agents unaware of operational conventions, SSH reverse tunnel configurations, and safe execution rules.
This runbook documents how operators inspect and update agent `.md` configurations via the **Hatch WebSocket Gateway** and **SSH Reverse Tunnels**.
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## 1. Hatch WebSocket RPC Gateway Access
Agents expose a WebSocket RPC gateway at `wss://hatch.metaaivm.com/v1/noise` using Noise-XX handshake cryptography.
Session cookies are stored under `~/.config/muse-cli/<account>/cookies.txt` on the host machine (`bl`), and authenticate directly without needing container execution or proxy wrapping.
### Filesystem RPC Rules
- **Relative paths only**: Paths must not start with `/`. The empty string `""` represents `/home/hatch`.
Once an operator's public key is present in `/home/hatch/.ssh/authorized_keys` (installed either via `box md write` or during initial provisioning), modifications can be streamed directly over SSH:
2.**Safety Gates on Amendments**: `box md amend` automatically validates that amendments do not remove checklists or revert `SOUL.md` to passive templates.
4.**Dual Access Redundancy**: If SSH reverse tunnels drop, Hatch WebSocket RPC is independent of SSH and can be used immediately to inspect logs, repair `authorized_keys`, or restart watchdog scripts.