Latch

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Pup ID and packs, explained

What a Pup ID and a pack are, in plain words — why you might want one (a new computer, a Handler far away, a group of pup friends, an AI kennel), who can see what, and how to set each one up, step by step. Both are optional; nothing changes until you use them.

On this page

The short version

A Pup ID is a digital key — a secret code that signs things as you, not as your computer or your server. (It has nothing to do with the key to your lock: that stays in your hand, and the emergency key always works.) It lives on your box, you keep a sealed copy of it and a recovery sheet somewhere safe, it signs a paper for every badge you earn, and it comes with you when you move to a new box. It needs no account anywhere. One key is one pup: a second persona is a second pup on its own box, and nothing in the app links the two (though a den both join can see they call from the same place).

A pack is a group of pups — with a Handler, or just friends — whose boxes keep in touch through one meeting point, the den. Every pup keeps their own game on their own box; the den passes messages along and keeps only the latest card from each pup — and whoever runs it can read what passes through, so join dens run by people you trust.

Both are optional. Ignore them and Latch is exactly the solo game it always was. Apart from your name and fingerprint, which a pack you join shows its members, nothing is shown to anybody until you tick it on Consent — one thing at a time, stopped with one tap from then on, and every grant suspended at once by the 🛑 safeword. Stuck on a word? See Words you'll see at the bottom.

Three kinds of Handler

The Handler in your game is the built-in voice you named — it stays, whatever you do here. A pack's Handler is somebody else, on their own box — a person, or in an AI kennel a model — and yours only while you wear their collar. Your AI Handler is a model on your own computer.

An everyday picture

+------------------------------+
| your box - your home: your   |
| game, photos and Pup ID      |
+------------------------------+
           |      ^
     posts |      | answers
           v      |
+------------------------------+
| the den - the clubhouse, on  |
| the host's own Latch: passes |
| messages along, keeps only   |
| each pup's latest card       |
+------------------------------+
           ^      |
     posts |      | answers
           |      v
+------------------------------+
| a pack-mate's box - theirs:  |
| their game, photos, Pup ID   |
+------------------------------+

Your box only ever calls out to the den. Nothing in a pack — not the den, not your Handler — ever connects in to your box. (The host's box is the one exception: its den answers its members.) That is what federated means here: many separate boxes that talk to each other, with no big shared server holding everybody's games. A Handler can only ask; your box decides.

Why federated, and not one big website

Do I need this?

Packs need Latch on your own computer — for everyone in the pack

The hosted beta can make a Pup ID, but it can't join or host a pack, and it has no AI Handler or chat bot. To use those, install Latch — the setup wizard does it without a terminal.

If you… You want
play alone, on one computer, and like it that way nothing here — carry on
might move to a new computer one day nothing new — your whole game already moves in latch-bundle.zip (Export); a Pup ID adds that you arrive as the same pup, papers and packs included
are on the hosted beta its zip takes your game home; a Pup ID if you want to arrive as the same pup; packs once you have installed your own
want your badges signed as yours — mostly useful once a Handler countersigns them a Pup ID
want a keyholder a pack Handler comes closest — they can add time, freeze the clock and set training within your limits, but in Latch nobody else can unlock you or take time off
have a Handler who lives somewhere else a Pup ID and a pack — they host it (on their own Latch, with some server work), you join
want a few pup friends to keep each other company a Pup ID and a pack with no Handler — one of you, comfortable running a server, hosts it
are a Handler with pups of your own a Pup ID made as a Handler, on its own box, and a pack you host
want a Handler's voice and there is no human one your own AI Handler — no Pup ID or pack needed
want reminders in a chat app the chat bot — no Pup ID or pack needed

Why you'd want a Pup ID

Moving to a new computer

You don't need a Pup ID to move: the zip carries your whole game either way (no Pup ID? just steps 3 and 4). With one, you also arrive as the same pup, papers and packs included:

  1. On the old box, set a passphrase on your Pup ID if you have not (below).
  2. Pup ID → 🧳 Prepare to move. Packs, your AI and papers stop, so nothing is signed twice from two boxes; your own game — the lock, the emergency key — keeps working. You can cancel.
  3. Download the whole game: Settings → Export your data → ⬇ latch-bundle.zip. It is not encrypted — everything but your key is in it as plain files — so keep it where only you can open it.
  4. On the new box — freshly installed, nothing played on it yet — restore it. This one step is a command, not a button (how). Your Pup ID comes back ready if you give the passphrase and seal-at-rest was off; otherwise it waits for you to unlock it on the Pup ID page. If anybody held a grant, the box comes back paused until you look at Consent and resume.
  5. Back on the old box, Retire this box (under 🧳 Prepare to move: your passphrase, and a tick). Its plain key is deleted; the sealed copy stays, and Bring it back undoes it.

The bundle carries everything — the log, reflections, badges and papers, kit, photos, voice memos, grants and packs (they come back paused; each den learns of the new box at the first sync) — except recorded trance tracks: add them again. A pup.json carries no pack: each den refuses a new join while it still holds you through the old box, so leave your packs before Prepare to move (a leave cannot go out while you are packing), then join again with fresh tags.

From the hosted beta to your own box

A hosted instance is somebody else's computer, and a beta round may end with every profile deleted. You can take your game — and, if you make one there, your Pup ID — home later:

The host can see everything

Whoever runs a hosted instance can open your log, reflections, photos and voice memos, and your Pup ID's key lives on their computer too; they receive your passphrase whenever you type it. Seal-at-rest keeps the key off their disk, not out of their reach. It is still your key after you move — Latch has no way to change keys yet — so if that matters to you, make a fresh Pup ID on your own box instead. See Hosting it for other people.

When a disk dies

You kept You get back
a recent latch-bundle.zip your whole game as it was then — and your Pup ID too, if you had set a passphrase and still know it
your pup.json and its passphrase you, your papers, and the kit and photos you marked 🧳 — not the log
your recovery sheet, alone your key — you — under a new passphrase; nothing else
none of them nothing. Nobody can recover a lost key or a lost game — not the app, not its author, not a Handler

So: seal your key, write the recovery sheet down by hand, and keep a recent zip off the box, where only you can open it (it is not encrypted). A zip made before you set a passphrase brings the game and its papers back with no Pup ID: arrive your own key there (from a later pup.json or your recovery sheet) and the papers are yours again; make a new Pup ID instead and they stay as history under Signed by an earlier Pup ID.

Badges with your signature on them

Every badge you hold gets a paper: your key's signature on what you earned and when. See them under Pup ID → 📜 Papers. On its own a paper is your own word, and the app says so: no paper ever calls itself verified. While you wear a Handler's collar — and grant Countersign papers, and they may see that paper (Your papers or Badges earned with kit, plus The clock or Today's duties for a badge that states time or a count) — each badge you earn inside the collar is sent to them, for up to seven days, to countersign: "this is dated inside my collar" — never "I saw it happen".

You show papers to a Handler or a pack by granting Your papers in that pack, and you can hide any single paper from them — that stops sending it; a copy they already received stays signed by you. A papers-only file to send somebody is not built yet — and never send your pup.json: it holds your sealed key.

Retiring an old box

Once your pup lives on the new box, Retire this box on the old one (it sits under 🧳 Prepare to move — press that first if you have not): it signs nothing again, and an amber banner says so on every page. Retiring is not wiping: the sealed key, your whole game and any old backups stay on that disk, so before you sell or give the computer away, delete Latch's data folder and its backups. (If you moved by a zip without preparing and the old box is still in packs, a den that sees your key on the new box tells the old one — under your own key's signature — and it retires itself. A box that is packing to move talks to no den, so retire it yourself.)

Why you'd want packs

A Handler far away, with several pups

Who hosts: the Handler, on their own box, with a Pup ID made as a Handler (a person). Each pup: their own box and their own Pup ID; they join with a collar tag and choose to take the collar.

Who sees what: the Handler sees, for each pup, only what that pup granted and ticked — and only while that pup wears their collar. Pups see each other's names on the board, and each other's cards only after saying Show. The Handler also runs the den, so they can read the cards pups show each other too. A Handler's "person" or "AI" is their own word, and anything you show them they can copy, screenshot or paste into another app, an AI included: show only what you would show them in person.

Why federated: what the Handler sends — add time, a freeze, training — is a request each pup's own box checks against that pup's grants, caps and safeword. If the Handler's box is off, every pup's game carries on; if a pup's box is off for more than a day, what was queued meanwhile expires instead of landing all at once.

A few pup friends, no Handler

Who hosts: one of you runs the den. Hosting needs a box whose Pup ID was made as a Handler (a person) — a pup's box joins packs but never hosts them — with the pack set to Handled by: nobody — membership only. "Handler" there is only the kind of key that can host: with Handled by: nobody, nobody in the pack sees you as their Handler. If that friend is also a pup who wants to be on the board, that is a second box with their pup's own Pup ID — another computer, or a second copy set up by hand: the setup wizard installs one Latch per computer (its container is always named latch).

Who sees what: the board shows each member the others' names and fingerprints. Beyond that, each pup shows the pack-mates they pick exactly what they tick: lock status (locked, frozen or free), streak and level, chosen photos and kit, papers — and may let them send 🐾 kudos. Never the clock, never duties. The den's operator can read every card it relays. Everyone is still a stray — Latch's word for a pup who wears nobody's collar, and what your header chip says; not a lesser state. There is no collar in a pack with no Handler, and nobody countersigns anything.

A club or munch that runs one den

The same shape, bigger: one trusted person runs the den for the group. Worth knowing before you join one:

A stray who joins a pack, then leaves

You join, you play, and one day you want out. Leave stops everything the pack could see or do, from now on, in one step: the collar comes off (a collar off paper is written), every grant, ticked photo, ticked item and shown mate is taken back, and training they gave you that is still open is withdrawn — no time moves. Your badges, papers and log all stay, and the header chip goes back to 🐾 stray. The den deletes the cards, photos and papers it held of you; it keeps your name and fingerprint among its alumni, plus its own log of what it asked of you, your box's answers and the papers it countersigned. What they already saw cannot be called back: a photo someone saved, a screenshot, or a paper you sent (it stays signed by you) stays with whoever has it. A collar that ended is not a collar that never happened — its papers stay yours.

No human Handler — an AI one

The simple way needs no pack at all: your own AI Handler, a language model running on your computer or network through Ollama, a free program that runs AI models at home. Under what you grant, it says a line on your Handler page, adds time, freezes the clock, assigns training or writes a prompt. It can chat, too (talk only). It never signs anything, so it can never vouch for you. Latch refuses internet addresses and Ollama's cloud models on every call, but cannot see past the server you name, and the link is plain http: keep Ollama on this machine or a network you trust.

An AI kennel is the pack version: somebody else's box whose Pup ID says it is an AI hosts a pack, and its model is the Handler. Everything you grant it is read by a language model the kennel's operator chose, and by the operator, like any den's. Latch on their box only lets it use a model on their own machine or network, but you cannot check their box; the collar asks you to say you understand that, and every signature it makes says ai. See AI kennels.

A Handler who acts, but only within your limits

This is what grants are for. Each thing a Handler may do is its own tick, with a daily limit you choose — the form starts at 60 minutes of added time, 60 minutes of freezes, 2 training tasks, 1 prompt and 3 lines a day. Over the first two sits the ceiling: the most time everybody together may move on your clock in one day — added time and freezes combined (4 hours unless you change it). On a day your health data says you are struggling, nobody can add time or freeze you. While you are paused, nothing they send lands.

Some things are never on offer at all: unlocking you, taking time off, undo, locking you, spinning the wheel, reading your words. Everything they do is a line in your log with their name on it, and none of it earns you XP or keeps a streak alive — that is still your work.

What other people can see

Beyond what each needs to work at all — the den and pack-mates know your name and fingerprint, your AI the day's facts, the chat room what its token and switches allow — everybody gets only what you tick, and the 🛑 safeword suspends every grant at once. In short:

Who What they can see What they can do What they never get
You (the box's owner) everything on your box everything — you alone unlock, take time off, change grants and resume; you undo your own acts (a Handler's act is theirs: ask them, or pause) nothing is kept from you, except the numbers of a lock you chose to hide, until it ends
Your Handler — only while you wear their collar what you grant: lock status, the clock (a hidden lock's clock only under its own grant), streak and level, today's duties, the photos and kit you tick, kit badges, your papers (a collar paper only from this pack); while you are paused, only that you paused. As the den's operator they also read what you show your mates — see that row countersign papers; add time, a timed freeze (and lift their own), training with no reward or penalty, a question for a later day, a line — each capped per day, and added time and freezes also under the ceiling unlocking, taking time off, undo, locking you, the wheel, your words, your health, changing a grant, resuming
Pack-mates your name and fingerprint on the board; then, only if you Show them and granted it: lock status, streak and level, the photos and kit you tick, papers and kit badges that state no clock or duties send 🐾 kudos, if you granted it (one allowance shared by them all) the clock, a hidden clock, your duties, that you paused (it looks like a pup who granted nothing), any command
The den's operator — in a pack with a Handler, that is the Handler everything the den relays: the cards you send the Handler and the pack-mates, the photos in them, what you granted in that pack, papers sent to be countersigned; your box's internet address, and when it checks in let members in, release or remove them; a Handler's den countersigns anything you did not grant — it never leaves your box; nothing the den says changes your box beyond what you granted
The Matrix room (the chat bot) reminders; today's duties as done or not; today's question; your AI's lines that are safe to repeat; a Handler's lines and the clock only if you switch those on; short news. Whoever runs the homeserver (the Matrix server your room is on) can read all of it. The safeword does not silence it — only the lines stop ask !status and !today; !pause always; !recite and !log only if you switch them on — and anybody who can post there as you could do the same resuming, unlocking, your words, anybody's name, training titles, your kit, your health, a hidden lock's clock
Your AI Handler the day's facts (lock status, duties, streak, level, habits, observations, open training, who moved your clock) and one yes/no from your health, go gently today; with grants, the clock, your owned toys or gear, and your last few reflections in chat only under grants: a line, add time, timed freezes, training, a prompt for tomorrow — the same limits as a Handler any other health data, anybody else's words, your reflections outside chat, a hidden clock in chat — and it never signs a paper

Your health data stays on your box. Cards, the chat bot and a Handler's view are worked out as if the health module did not exist. The one exception is your own AI Handler: it gets a single yes/no, go gently today, and a line it writes on such a day is never relayed. A refusal because of a hard day reaches a Handler or a kennel only as refused.

Set it up, step by step

Who does what, in order: the host (usually the Handler) makes a Pup ID as a Handler → sets up the den → hosts the pack → makes one tag per pup. Each pup makes a Pup ID as a pup → joins with the tag → compares fingerprints → takes the collar, if offered → chooses what they see on Consent. (On the hosted beta only making a Pup ID works — see above.)

Make your Pup ID

  1. Open the Pup ID page: the 🪪 make your Pup ID chip in the header, or Settings → System → pup ID.
  2. Give a Name — every pack you join, and everyone on its board, will see it, so use your pup name, not your legal one — and choose what you are making the key as: a pup for your own game. (A Handler (a person) is for a box that will host a pack; an AI Handler is for an AI kennel's box.) This can never change later.
  3. Tick that you have read what the key is, and press 🪪 Make my Pup ID.
  4. Seal it with a passphrase — at least 12 characters, typed twice — and press Seal. Without a seal your key cannot travel: pup.json and the Export zip carry only the sealed copy.
  5. Under Recovery sheet, type your passphrase, tick the box and press Show my recovery sheet. Write it down by hand. It is shown once and stored nowhere.
  6. Optional: Turn seal-at-rest on. Until you do, any backup or snapshot of the whole data folder (Time Machine, a VM snapshot) holds your key in plain form; seal-at-rest deletes the plain key file, so those hold only the sealed copy. After every restart the key then waits, locked, until you 🔓 Unlock it on the Pup ID page — forget the passphrase then, and this box cannot sign for you either. Turn it on if anyone else can get at your backups, and on the hosted beta; leave it off if unlocking after every restart would be a chore.
  7. Keep a copy off the box: ⬇ pup.json here, or the whole game from Export.

Lose the key and you lose the pup

Nobody can reset your passphrase or rebuild your key: not the app, not its author, not a Handler. Keep the handwritten recovery sheet away from the computer (not a photo, not a cloud note), and never give it or pup.json to anyone: whoever holds either one — with the passphrase, where one is needed — is your pup. Changing the passphrase later does not re-seal a pup.json or zip you already made.

Your fingerprint — four groups of four characters, like AZMI-BDUF-ZSBR-PHGU — is what you read aloud so a Handler can check they are talking to the same pup.

Join a pack from a collar tag

  1. Your Pup ID must be ready (made and unlocked), made as a pup, on your own install.
  2. Get a collar tag from the den's operator — in a chat, on paper, face to face. Every invitation is called a collar tag, even in a pack with no Handler; it offers a collar only if the host chose that. It starts latch-tag:1:, works once, and expires in three days.
  3. Pack (in the menu) → I have a tag: paste it and press Who is asking? It is checked on your box with no network call at all.
  4. Read who is asking. Whether they say they are a person or an AI is their own signed claim — nobody can check it. Compare fingerprints — it is how you both know the tag wasn't swapped on the way: ask the operator to read the den's out, and read yours out to them, over a call or face to face, not in the chat the tag came through. If they don't match, press Not now.
  5. Press Join (the pack's name), or Not now. All that goes is your Pup ID, your name and the public half of your box key — a second key that only signs the pack's messages — and, as with any website, the den sees the internet address your box calls from.
  6. If the den waits for its operator, the pack's page says so until they have let you in.
  7. If the tag offered a collar, the pack's page shows 🔗 A collar is offered. Tick the name or colour they offer only if you want them, tick I understand if the Handler is an AI, and press Take the collar — or Decline. Taking the collar shows them nothing yet: you choose that next.
  8. On The board, press Show for each pack-mate you want to see your card, or Not yet. Show on its own shows only what you have ticked for pack-mates on Consent — nothing, until you do.

Choose what they see

  1. Open Consent (Settings → System → who else may act). Each pack has a section for its pack-mates — and its operator, who relays every card. The Handler's own section appears once you wear their collar.
  2. For each permission you want to give: tick allow, set the daily limit where there is one, and press Grant. For photos, toys and gear, tick the exact items in the list underneath — a category granted with nothing ticked shows nothing.
  3. Open This is exactly what … will receive to read the card before it goes, and set The ceiling, in minutes a day.
  4. On the pack's page, Show or Take back single photos and items, and Hide from them any paper. Change your mind any time: Revoke one line, Revoke everything they hold, or Revoke everything, from everybody.
  5. 🛑 Pause everyone — on Consent and on the dashboard — is the safeword. The bot can say it for you with !pause. Only you can lift it, with ▶ Resume, on the Consent page.

Host a pack, or run a den for friends

This is real server work, and only the host does it: a second program running beside Latch, an address every member's box can reach, and HTTPS if that address is on the internet. If you installed with the setup wizard and have never set up a reverse proxy, get help from someone who has — these steps don't yet cover a Docker install.

Only the den goes on the internet, never the game

Latch has no login of its own: anyone who can reach the game's pages can read and change everything in it. Never forward the game's port on your router. Publish only the den's own name, through a reverse proxy with HTTPS, passing on only /den/v1/*, and keep the game behind your login or on your own network. A private network or VPN your members share is safer still — but they can reach anything on it, so keep the game bound where only you reach it. Keep Latch updated.

  1. Use a box whose Pup ID is made as a Handler (a person) — or as an AI Handler for an AI kennel. A pup's box cannot host; a Handler's box cannot join. Someone who is both runs two boxes.
  2. Choose the den's address — somewhere every member's box can reach: a public name behind your reverse proxy with HTTPS, or an address on a private network or VPN all your members are on (a home network address works only if every member's box is on that same network). It must end in /den/v1, and it must not be the name you open the game on.
  3. Run the den on its own listener — recommended — with the same data folder as the game: uvicorn latch.den_app:app --host 127.0.0.1 --port 8771 --no-access-log. Behind a proxy, hand only /den/v1/* on the den's name to it. On a VPN with no proxy, bind it to this box's VPN address instead (--host <that address>) and give http://<that address>:8771/den/v1 in step 4 — every message is sealed and signed either way. Once the address is saved, the game and the den's listener both answer it with no change to LATCH_ALLOWED_HOSTS; if you do set that variable, keep your game's own names in it. Details and a Caddy example: Run the den on its own listener.
  4. Settings → 🐺 Packs → This den's public address, and Save.
  5. Pack → Hosting: a Name; Handled by you or nobody — membership only; New members wait for me or in at once (never a collar); Countersigning I click or automatic. Press Host a pack.
  6. Open the pack. Under A tag for a new member choose the Offer — membership, or a collar with a name and colour you would give — and press Make a tag. It is shown once: send it to that one pup, out of band.
  7. When they join, they read their fingerprint out to you. Under Members, press They read out … — it matches, then Let in. (A pack set to in at once lets a membership in by itself; a collar never goes on before that check.)
  8. Each member's entry shows what they granted, and — for a member wearing your collar — what they show you and Ask something of them, with every amount already clamped to their daily limits.

Tell your members what you can read

As the den's operator you can read everything the den relays — the cards members show you, the cards they show each other, and their photos. If the den is out of reach, nothing breaks: members' boxes keep trying, and their games carry on.

An AI kennel lets members in by itself — a collar still waits for your fingerprint check — and its commands come only from its model, never from a form. See AI kennels.

Leave a pack

On the pack's page press Leave …. The next page lists what is taken back and what stays (tick Take back the name I had before if a Handler gave you one); press Leave … again, or Stay. Your box keeps sending the leave until the den has heard it. Joining again takes a fresh tag. Moving boxes while in packs: see Moving.

Your own AI Handler, and the chat bot

Words you'll see

Word What it means
box one running Latch — the computer it is on, and its data; also called an instance (a hosted instance is one somebody else runs for several people)
key on this page, your Pup ID's secret signing key — not your lock's key, and not the emergency key
Pup ID the key that is you; made on the Pup ID page, once
fingerprint four groups of four characters that name a key; read aloud to compare
seal / seal-at-rest your key locked under your passphrase / keeping only that sealed copy on disk
papers your key's signature on each badge you earned; a Handler can countersign
pup.json a file with your sealed key, papers and 🧳 items — for arriving on your own new box; never give it away
bundle latch-bundle.zip, the whole game, for backups and moving — not encrypted
federated many separate boxes that talk to each other, with no central server
den the meeting point a pack's boxes talk through, running on the Latch of its operator (the host)
pack a group of pups on one den, with or without a Handler
card the short summary your box sends a pack — only what you ticked
collar tag the one-time invitation string you paste to join, collar or not
collar a Handler's claim you accept; one at a time; you can always take it off
Handler the built-in voice in your game; in a pack, a person (or an AI kennel's model) who is your Handler only while you wear their collar; or your own AI Handler
mates the other pups in a pack (pack-mates)
grant / cap one permission, given by you on Consent / its daily limit
ceiling the most time everybody together may add to your clock or freeze it for, in a day
safeword / pause 🛑 Pause everyone — suspends every grant at once; only you resume
kennel a den seen from its host's side; an AI kennel is a den whose Handler is a model
stray wearing nobody's collar — what your header chip says; not a lesser state, and most pups are strays most of the time

Common questions

Is any of this on by default? No. Until you make a Pup ID nothing about the game changes, and with no pack joined and none hosted, Latch makes no pack calls at all. Your AI Handler calls nothing until you set it up and switch it on. Consent starts with nothing ticked.

How do I find a pack? Latch has no directory. You join a pack run by someone you already know and trust, with a tag they give you.

Does my Handler need Latch too? Yes — their own box. There is no website they log into to watch you.

Does my computer need to stay on? Your box talks to its dens only while Latch is running. If it is off for more than a day, what a Handler asked meanwhile expires. Your own game is never affected.

Can my Handler see my photos? Through their own grants: only while you wear their collar, only if you granted Photos you pick, and only the check-in and verification photos you tick — the six newest of them at a time (a photo of a toy or piece of gear can go with that item, if you tick it under Toys or Gear you pick). But the Handler also runs the den, so any photo you show your pack-mates there passes through their box too, collar or not. Photos leave re-encoded at 512 px with no location or camera details; the picture still shows what it shows. Take back stops sending one; it cannot make anyone forget a photo they already saw or saved.

What if I lose my passphrase? Nobody can reset it. While this box still holds your key (and seal-at-rest is off) you keep playing and signing, but you cannot print a recovery sheet or change the passphrase; a pup.json sealed under it will not open, and a zip restores your game but leaves your Pup ID locked. With your recovery sheet you can arrive on a fresh box under a new passphrase. Without either, when this box goes, your pup goes with it.

Does the den see everything? It sees everything it relays — every card, photo and paper you send through it, to the Handler and to the mates — and where your box calls from, and when: every couple of minutes while it is on. It never sees anything of your game you did not grant: that never leaves your box.

Can I be in two packs? Yes. Each pack is granted separately, a collar paper goes only to its own pack, and you can wear only one collar at a time.

Do I need a server on the internet? Not as a pup: your box only calls out to the den, and nobody in the pack ever connects to it — though you do need Latch installed on your own computer, not the hosted beta. Only the den's host needs an address the members can reach — the internet, or a private network everybody shares.

Can a Handler unlock me, or take time off? Never, in the app: nobody can be given that, and the emergency key button always works for you. Latch never touches a real lock, though: where your physical key is kept is up to you, not the app.

Where to go next

Just playing? Nothing to do. Want a Pup ID? Make it now and write down the recovery sheet. Want a pack? Send whoever will host it this page's hosting steps, then wait for your tag.

This page also ships inside the app, at /guide — so your own instance always serves the guide for the version you are running, with the internet unplugged. Get Latch · Something wrong here? Tell me.