**Feature request: biblio-gui should resolve git-annex symlinks when serving fil¶

Transcript¶

Feature request: biblio-gui should resolve git-annex symlinks when serving files

Problem¶

biblio-gui returns 403 Forbidden when serving docling artifact images that are git-annex managed. The image files are symlinks through .git/annex/objects/ that ultimately resolve to a RIA store (e.g. /storage2/ria-store/...). The web server refuses to follow the symlink chain.

Example:

GET /api/files/docling/sirota_2003_CommunicationNeocortex/sirota_2003_CommunicationNeocortex_artifacts/image_000003_....png -> 403 Forbidden

Symlink chain:

file.png -> ../../../../.git/annex/objects/K4/p6/MD5E-s296363--....png
  -> /storage2/ria-store/.../annex/objects/K4/p6/MD5E-s296363--....png  (real file, readable)

Proposed fix¶

When serving static files from the bib directory, resolve symlinks before serving (e.g. os.path.realpath() or equivalent). This is safe since biblio-gui already scopes file access to the bib directory tree. Options:

Resolve symlinks in the file-serving endpoint -- use Path.resolve() / os.path.realpath() before passing to FileResponse, and validate the resolved path is still under an allowed root (bib dir or known annex/RIA paths).
Configure the underlying server (uvicorn/starlette) to follow symlinks if it exposes that option.

Context¶

This affects any project using git-annex (especially with datalad + RIA stores) for PDF/image storage, which is the standard setup for pixecog and likely other managed bib directories.

Source context: pixecog¶

PixEcog (pixecog): Neuropixels and ECoG dataset and analysis

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614785c remove CI builds/ from tracking, add to gitignore
63f0884 pipeio notebook test

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