Neutral defaults (COFFER_TZ, home-relative paths), contributing, suggest MIT LICENSE

LICENSE

@@ -0,0 +1,21 @@
+MIT License
+
+Copyright (c) 2026 The coffer contributors
+
+Permission is hereby granted, free of charge, to any person obtaining a copy
+of this software and associated documentation files (the "Software"), to deal
+in the Software without restriction, including without limitation the rights
+to use, copy, modify, merge, publish, distribute, sublicense, and/or sell
+copies of the Software, and to permit persons to whom the Software is
+furnished to do so, subject to the following conditions:
+
+The above copyright notice and this permission notice shall be included in all
+copies or substantial portions of the Software.
+
+THE SOFTWARE IS PROVIDED "AS IS", WITHOUT WARRANTY OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR
+IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO THE WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY,
+FITNESS FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE AND NONINFRINGEMENT. IN NO EVENT SHALL THE
+AUTHORS OR COPYRIGHT HOLDERS BE LIABLE FOR ANY CLAIM, DAMAGES OR OTHER
+LIABILITY, WHETHER IN AN ACTION OF CONTRACT, TORT OR OTHERWISE, ARISING FROM,
+OUT OF OR IN CONNECTION WITH THE SOFTWARE OR THE USE OR OTHER DEALINGS IN THE
+SOFTWARE.

README.md

@@ -66,8 +66,16 @@ That updates the `coffer-public-ledger` article on `leora/news` (branch → PR
 
 ## Platform hook
 
-`leora/agent-chat` calls `coffer.product.CofferProduct.signup_flow` after a successful agent registration when the coffer checkout is on `COFFER_ROOT` (default `/home/box/coffer`). Missing coffer does not fail signup; it logs and continues.
+`leora/agent-chat` calls `coffer.product.CofferProduct.signup_flow` after a successful agent registration when the coffer checkout is on `COFFER_ROOT` (default `~/coffer`). Missing coffer does not fail signup; it logs and continues.
 
 ## Change
 
 Branch → pull request → merge. Nothing is live unless it is on `main`.
+
+## Contributing
+
+`main` is protected: open a pull request from a branch; the owner reviews and merges.
+
+## License
+
+MIT, see [LICENSE](LICENSE) (suggested; the owner decides).

coffer/news_publish.py

@@ -17,10 +17,10 @@ ARTICLE_ID_RE = re.compile(
     re.DOTALL,
 )
 
-DEFAULT_NEWS_REPO = Path(os.environ.get("COFFER_NEWS_REPO", "/home/box/news-work"))
+DEFAULT_NEWS_REPO = Path(os.environ.get("COFFER_NEWS_REPO", str(Path.home() / "news-work")))
 DEFAULT_BRANCH = os.environ.get("COFFER_NEWS_BRANCH", "coffer-public-ledger")
 GITEA = os.environ.get("GITEA_URL", "/gitea")
-TOKEN_PATH = Path(os.environ.get("GITEA_TOKEN_FILE", "/home/box/.config/leora/gitea-token"))
+TOKEN_PATH = Path(os.environ.get("GITEA_TOKEN_FILE", str(Path.home() / ".config/coffer/gitea-token")))
 
 
 def upsert_ledger_article(index_html: str, article_html: str) -> str:

coffer/product.py

@@ -6,6 +6,7 @@ from dataclasses import asdict
 from datetime import datetime
 from pathlib import Path
 from typing import Any
+import os
 from zoneinfo import ZoneInfo
 
 from coffer.db import CofferDB
@@ -30,7 +31,8 @@ from coffer.units import (
     to_subunits,
 )
 
-PT = ZoneInfo("Australia/Perth")
+# Display timezone for ledger timestamps. Set COFFER_TZ on the host (e.g. the operator's zone).
+PT = ZoneInfo(os.environ.get("COFFER_TZ", "UTC"))
 
 
 def now_pt() -> str: