# Desktop Automation Decision

## Decision

KeePassGO will not implement KeePass-style auto-type as its primary desktop automation mechanism.
The secure gRPC API is the replacement integration surface for trusted desktop automation, browser extensions, and local helper tools.

## Why

- The gRPC API gives a narrower and more explicit trust boundary than synthetic key injection.
- Browser and local automation clients can request exactly the credential operation they need:
  - list entries
  - list groups
  - list templates
  - create and mutate entries
  - copy fields
  - manage attachments
  - generate passwords
- A typed authenticated API is easier to test and reason about than fake keystroke delivery to arbitrary windows.
- Synthetic typing is platform-specific, fragile, and substantially harder to make safe across Linux, Windows, and future Android support.
- The product requirement is integration capability comparable in purpose to KeePass auto-type, not literal keystroke emulation.

## Product Consequences

- Trusted desktop automation should be implemented as clients of the gRPC service.
- Browser integrations should target the gRPC API rather than ad hoc local protocols.
- UI workflows may still provide copy-to-clipboard behavior for direct human use.
- If a future use case demonstrates that gRPC plus clipboard is insufficient, native desktop automation can be reconsidered as a secondary capability, not as the baseline integration model.

## Exit-Criteria Impact

This document is the explicit resolution of the desktop automation requirement from [`AGENTS.md`](../AGENTS.md) and [`TODO.md`](../TODO.md):
- desktop automation is resolved by design
- the secure gRPC interface is the superseding trusted integration surface