ATProto User Creation & Sync Investigation Summary#

Date: October 14, 2025
Status: 🔴 CRITICAL ISSUES FOUND

🔍 Investigation Overview#

Investigated the user creation flow from Auth0 signup → MongoDB → ATProto PDS to understand why ATProto accounts are not being automatically created.

📋 Current Flow (Expected)#

User Signs Up → Auth0
Auth0 Log Stream → Webhook to /.netlify/functions/auth0-events (event type: "ss")
auth0-events.mjs:
- ✅ Creates verifications record (count: 0)
- ✅ Creates users record with generated code
User Verifies Email → Auth0
Auth0 Log Stream → Webhook to /.netlify/functions/auth0-events (event type: "sv")
auth0-events.mjs:
- ✅ Increments verifications count to 1
- ✅ Calls createAtprotoAccount() to create PDS account
- ✅ Stores ATProto credentials in users collection

🐛 Issues Found#

Issue #1: Users Records Not Created ❌#

Affected Users: All 5 recent signups (100%)

Evidence:

MongoDB Collections Status:
  Verifications: 5/5 ✅ (100%)
  Users: 0/5 ❌ (0%)
  Handles: 3/5 (60%)
  ATProto: 0/5 ❌ (0%)

Root Cause: The user code generation in auth0-events.mjs is failing silently:

try {
  await ensureUserCodeIndex(database);
  const signupDate = new Date(log.data.date);
  const code = await generateUniqueUserCode(database, signupDate);
  
  const users = database.db.collection("users");
  await users.insertOne({ 
    _id: aestheticSub, 
    code,
    when: signupDate
  });
  
  shell.log("🎫 Generated user code:", code, "for:", aestheticSub);
} catch (error) {
  shell.log("⚠️ Failed to generate user code:", aestheticSub, error);
  // Don't block signup on code generation failure
}

The error is logged but swallowed, so signup succeeds but user record is never created.

Impact:

No user codes generated
No ATProto accounts created (dependent on user records)
Users can still sign up and use handles, but missing identity data

Issue #2: ATProto Accounts Not Created ❌#

Affected Users: All 4 email-verified users (100%)

Root Cause: Cascading failure from Issue #1

createAtprotoAccount() requires user record to exist
Without user record, no code is available for fallback handle
ATProto account creation is never attempted

Evidence from auth0-events.mjs:

// 🦋 Create ATProto account on first verification
shell.log("🦋 Creating ATProto account for newly verified user...");
const atprotoResult = await createAtprotoAccount(
  database,
  aestheticSub,
);

This code runs, but likely fails because:

No user record with code exists
User may not have handle set yet
createAtprotoAccount() needs either handle or code

✅ What's Working#

Auth0 Log Stream Webhook - Confirmed working
- AUTH0_LOG_TOKEN is set in Netlify env
- Signup events ("ss") are being received
- Verification events ("sv") are being received
Verifications Collection - Working perfectly
- All users have verification records
- Counts are accurate (0 for unverified, 1 for verified)
Handles Collection - Partially working
- 3 out of 5 users have handles set
- Handle creation via /handle.mjs endpoint works

🔧 Recommended Fixes#

Fix #1: Investigate User Code Generation Failure#

Priority: 🔴 CRITICAL

Action Items:

Check Netlify function logs for user code generation errors
Review generateUniqueUserCode() implementation
Check if MongoDB index creation is failing
Verify database permissions for inserting into users collection

Command to check logs:

netlify functions:log auth0-events

Fix #2: Backfill Missing User Records#

Priority: 🟡 HIGH

Action:

cd /workspaces/aesthetic-computer/at
node scripts/test-user-creation-flow.mjs 5 --fix

This will:

Create missing users records with generated codes
Create ATProto accounts for email-verified users
Sync all data to PDS

Affected Users:

auth0|68ee503033f18c5d54238469 - Needs user record (email not verified)
auth0|68ee500f0729405b6c0dfa18 - Needs user record + ATProto account
auth0|68ee4fe6041a48c2971c7fb1 - Needs user record + ATProto account
auth0|68ede47abdf0b654d1475476 - Needs user record + ATProto account
auth0|68ebc6c78aa676dc64c40609 - Needs user record + ATProto account

Fix #3: Improve Error Handling#

Priority: 🟢 MEDIUM

Update auth0-events.mjs to:

Log full error details (not just message)
Send alerts for user creation failures
Retry user code generation
Create user record with temporary/fallback code if generation fails

📊 Detailed Audit Results#

Recent Users Status (Last 5 Signups)#

User 1: auth0|68ee503033f18c5d54238469#

Email: bjarke.hee@gmail.com
Email Verified: ❌
Created: 6.1 hours ago
Verifications: ✅ (count=0)
Users Record: ❌
Handle: None
ATProto: ❌

User 2: auth0|68ee500f0729405b6c0dfa18#

Email: csx0909@gmail.com
Email Verified: ✅
Created: 6.1 hours ago
Verifications: ✅ (count=1)
Users Record: ❌
Handle: @csx
ATProto: ❌

User 3: auth0|68ee4fe6041a48c2971c7fb1#

Email: violinoletsgo@gmail.com
Email Verified: ✅
Created: 6.1 hours ago
Verifications: ✅ (count=1)
Users Record: ❌
Handle: None
ATProto: ❌

User 4: auth0|68ede47abdf0b654d1475476#

Email: ligands-bays1k@icloud.com
Email Verified: ✅
Created: 13.7 hours ago
Verifications: ✅ (count=1)
Users Record: ❌
Handle: @zhuxin
ATProto: ❌

User 5: auth0|68ebc6c78aa676dc64c40609#

Email: christianbluhme@yahoo.dk
Email Verified: ✅
Created: 52.3 hours ago (2.2 days)
Verifications: ✅ (count=1)
Users Record: ❌
Handle: @43
ATProto: ❌

📁 Files Involved#

Netlify Functions#

/system/netlify/functions/auth0-events.mjs - Webhook handler (ISSUE HERE)
/system/netlify/functions/handle.mjs - Handle management

Backend#

/system/backend/at.mjs - ATProto account creation
/system/backend/authorization.mjs - User lookup functions
/system/backend/database.mjs - MongoDB connection
/system/public/aesthetic.computer/lib/user-code.mjs - Code generation

Audit Scripts (Created)#

/at/scripts/audit-user-creation-sync.mjs - Full audit tool
/at/scripts/test-user-creation-flow.mjs - Fix/backfill tool
/at/scripts/check-auth0-webhook-config.mjs - Config checker

🎯 Next Steps#

Immediate: Check Netlify logs for actual error messages
Quick Fix: Run backfill script with --fix flag
Root Cause: Debug why user code generation is failing
Long-term: Add monitoring/alerting for user creation failures
Testing: Create test users to verify fix

📞 Key Questions to Answer#

❓ What is the actual error message from user code generation?
❓ Is it a MongoDB permission issue?
❓ Is it a unique index collision issue?
❓ Has this been working in the past, or is it a new deployment issue?
❓ Are there any rate limits or throttling on MongoDB writes?

Investigation Tools Available:

audit-user-creation-sync.mjs - Check sync status
test-user-creation-flow.mjs - Simulate/fix user creation
check-auth0-webhook-config.mjs - Verify webhook config

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