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Grove Documentation

The internet was supposed to be a forest. Grove is taking it back.

What is Grove?

Grove is a distributed, encrypted file storage and sharing system for small trusted networks. Your files live on hardware you trust — your own devices and those of people you choose — not in someone else's cloud.

Key principles:

Your data, your hardware — files are stored on devices you own or trust
Encrypted by default — ChaCha20-Poly1305 encryption; even cell operators can't read your files
Peer-to-peer — no central server; cells sync directly, through relays, or over Yggdrasil as a fallback mesh transport when Tailscale is down
Self-healing — if a device goes offline, files automatically re-replicate to maintain safety; cells also run autonomous hygiene on a daily gate — sweeping orphaned grants, collapsing byte-identical duplicate manifests, vacuuming old versions, and surfacing files whose source went missing in a review bin
Metadata-private — manifest filenames and sensitive metadata are encrypted at rest (§7)
Trusted onboarding — invites are bilateral and owner-approval-gated with a mandatory join key-proof; no fleet-wide secret is handed to joiners (see SECURITY.md)

Key features:

Files & Feed — Files tab is your drive (upload, browse, download); Feed tab is incoming shares from friends
Portal — browser-only access for people who don't run a cell; also the owner's no-Tailscale WAN window via Settings → Remote Access
GroveAI — local LLM inference (llama.cpp) with Low/Mid/High/Auto tiers; routes to peer cells with better hardware; image generation on capable nodes
Drive modes — fill, mirror, backup, ingest; plaintext in ~/GroveHome is the primary replica, chunks regenerate on demand
Media libraries — audio/video folders auto-render as playable libraries (in both the portal and owner Shared-with-me) with Range-aware view-only streaming — watch or listen without downloading; tap-to-confirm Add-to-Grove; guitar-tab (.gp*) renderer
Recycle Bin — 24-hour soft-delete window before files are permanently removed
Observer tier — friends can grant browser-only portal access to people who don't run cells

Documentation Index

Doc	Audience	Description
QUICKSTART.md	New users	Get running in 5 minutes
PORTAL-GUIDE.md	Portal users	Browser-only access — no install needed
CONCEPTS.md	Everyone	Core concepts and terminology
USER-GUIDE.md	Cell users	Dashboard features and daily usage
API-REFERENCE.md	Developers/AI	Complete API endpoint reference
ARCHITECTURE.md	Developers/AI	How Grove works internally
ADMIN-GUIDE.md	Self-hosters	Deployment, systemd, relay, nginx
SHARING.md	Users	How sharing, grants, and feeds work
SECURITY.md	Everyone	Encryption, auth, trust model
TROUBLESHOOTING.md	Everyone	Common issues and fixes

> Build: per-release SHA-256 of the 5 core Python files + 12 frontend assets (first 12 hex chars) — check grove version or /api/version.

For GroveAI

These docs are structured so the Grove AI assistant can answer user questions accurately. Each doc uses clear headings, consistent terminology, and includes examples. When answering questions:

1. Check CONCEPTS.md for terminology

2. Check USER-GUIDE.md for "how do I..." questions

3. Check API-REFERENCE.md for technical/API questions

4. Check TROUBLESHOOTING.md for "it's not working" questions