---
title: "Reference"
url: "https://control.actana.ai/docs/reference"
description: "Operator reference: environment variables, HTTP surfaces, observability, and the SDK."
updated: 2026-09-01T09:03:18+00:00
---

Operator reference for Actana Control: what you set, what listens, where logs land, and the package a program uses to talk to a Core.

None of the HTTP surfaces is a public integration API. The Panel serves its Operator. Each Core's hook receiver is loopback-only for harnesses it spawned. File routes ride the same mTLS server as the core link. Pairing redeem (`POST /v1/pair/redeem`) is the only pre-auth route on a Core. Third parties use [`@actana/sdk`](/docs/reference/sdk).

```mermaid
flowchart LR
  Op[Operator] --> Panel["Panel HTTP + panel link"]
  Panel --> Cores[Cores]
  SDK["@actana/sdk"] --> Cores
  Cores --> Hooks["hook receiver 127.0.0.1"]
  Cores --> Files["HTTPS /v1 files"]
```

## Pages

- [Environment variables](/docs/reference/environment-variables) — Panel, compose, container Core, metal layout, `AC_SECRETS_KEY`.
- [HTTP surfaces](/docs/reference/http-surfaces) — three surfaces, pairing redeem, retired task HTTP.
- [Observability](/docs/reference/observability) — compose logs, journalctl, `actana logs`, grep lines. No metrics endpoint.
- [SDK](/docs/reference/sdk) — `CoreClient`, `CoreSession`, `pairWithCore`.