Long, substantive session. Fixed CLOSE.php and records-api.php gate loopholes flagged by Builder[20]. Built the media.db categorization foundation (category column, controlled vocabulary, index action) and wrote SOP-RESEARCH-MEDIA-DB.md. Added D-LEARN-FIRST as a real platform law in RULES-REG.md. Verified other sessions' recent claims rather than trusting them, found one real gap (per-system category enforcement is advisory-only). Coordinated the Google service-account key transfer with USR369, built gdrive-api.php (T758), and got sheets_append genuinely working end-to-end for SOP-DATA-BACKUP.md. Root-caused and fixed a real OAuth scope bug in drive_update. Everything notated across session log, formal decisions, knowledge.db, LEGACY-40.md, and handoff-40.md before this close.

CLOSE.php v2.8 (decision detail min-length gate). records-api.php T660 (subject required on add_decision). Confirmed T726 trash pattern is genuine soft-delete-first. media-db/api.php v1.3-1.4 category foundation, all 10 pre-existing rows hand-categorized. Wrote SOP-RESEARCH-MEDIA-DB.md. Researched and wrote SOP-GDRIVE-SERVICE-ACCOUNT.md. Added D-LEARN-FIRST law to RULES-REG.md. Verified (not trusted) other sessions' recent work -- base64 file-reader mode confirmed working, gdrive-api.php confirmed not yet built, per-system category enforcement gap found and flagged. Coordinated JSON key transfer via cPanel/X-plore, diagnosed the real file path. Built gdrive-api.php with JWT signing, token caching, retry/backoff, 5 actions. Live-tested every action against real Drive/Sheets resources. sheets_append confirmed working end-to-end. drive_upload confirmed blocked by real Google storage-quota limit. drive_update root-caused (OAuth scope) and fixed, confirmed working. drive_trash improved from invisible to a narrower permission gap, still open. Updated SOP-DATA-BACKUP.md with the working mechanism and all 6 spreadsheet IDs.